Wulstan took no part in what we should call politics; he thought it his duty to render his submission to the King whom the people had chosen, and to strive only to amend the life of the men of the country. He was in high favor with Harold during his short reign, and was for some time at court, where the fine Saxon gentlemen learnt to dread the neighborhood of the old Bishop; for Wulstan considered their luxury as worthy of blame, and especially attacked their long flowing hair. If any of them placed their heads within, his reach, he would crop off “the first-fruits of their curls” with his own little knife, enjoining them to have the rest cut off; and yet, if Wulstan saw the children of the choir with their dress disordered, he would smooth it with his own hands, and when told the condescension did not become a Bishop, made answer, “He that is greatest among you shall be your servant.” Aldred, Wulstan’s former Bishop, now Archbishop of York, was the anointer of both Harold and William the Conqueror. He kept fair with the Normans as long as he could, but at last, driven to extremity by the miseries they inflicted on his unhappy diocese, he went to William arrayed in his full episcopal robes, solemnly revoked his coronation blessing, denounced a curse on him and his race, and then, returning to York, there died of grief. Eghelwin, Bishop of Durham, gave good advice to Comyn, the Norman Earl, but it was unheeded, and the townsmen rose in the night and burnt Comyn to death, with all his followers, as they lay overcome with wine and sleep in the plundered houses. The rising of the northern counties followed, and Eghelwin was so far involved in it, that he was obliged to fly. He took shelter in the Camp of Refuge, was made prisoner when it was betrayed, and spent the rest of his life in one of William’s prisons. Our good Wulstan had a happier lot, and spent his time in his own round of quiet duties in his diocese, binding up the wounds inflicted by the cruel oppressors, but exhorting the Saxons to bear them patiently, and see in them the chastisement of their own crimes. “It is the scourge of God that ye are suffering,” he said; and when they replied that they had never been half so bad as the Normans, he said, “God is using their wickedness to punish your evil deserts, as the devil, of his own evil will, yet by God’s righteous will, punishes those with whom he suffers. Do ye, when ye are angry, care what becomes of the staff wherewith ye strike?” He had his own share of troubles and anxieties, but he met them in his trustful spirit, and straight-forward way. At Easter, 1070, a council was held at Winchester, at which he was summoned to attend. He was one of the five last Saxon Bishops; Stigand, who held both at once the primacy and the see of Winchester; his brother, Eghelmar, Bishop of Elmham; Eghelsie, of Selsey; and the Bishop of Durham, Eghelwin, who was in the Camp of Refuge.