his sword to strike, and the archbishop, bending his neck as though for prayer, and raising his hands, prepared for the martyrdom which he seems almost to have sought. The knight struck, shearing away the top of the skull, and with the same blow almost cutting off the arm of Edward Grim, who was supporting him. Another blow and another, then Becket fell on his knees, saying in a low voice, “For the name of Jesus and for the protection of the Church I am prepared to die.” Then Bret struck at him, wounding him severely: struck with such violence that he not only shivered his sword against the pavement, but also cut the crown from off the martyr’s head so that the blood, whitening from the brain and the brain reddening from the blood, “empurpled the face with the whiteness as of the lily and redness as of the rose, the colours of the Church as Virgin and Mother.” Another of the murderers placed his foot on the neck of the prostrate man, and with his sword’s point scattered the brains and blood about the pavement, calling out, “Let us go hence! This fellow will not rise again any more.” As the murderers fled out into the thick mirk of the night; as the monks cowered in terror in the black darkness of the silent Cathedral; as the crowds surged anxiously in the narrow streets of the city; as the dead archbishop lay there upon the blood-stained pavement, a few trembling but faithful friends near by,--there burst forth a tempestuous storm of rain and thunder. Then the silence of night and of fear. By-and-by the monks plucked up courage to approach the spot where lay the dead archbishop; turning the body they saw that the face was peaceful, no trace of terror or of wrath, he looked as one sleeping. After binding up the frightful wound in the head, they carried the body through the choir and laid it on a bier before the high altar. There in the dim light of the candles the monks mourned the fallen man, listening to Robert of Merton, who told them that Becket had lived a saint as he had died a martyr, showing them the monk’s habit beneath the dead man’s garments and the hair shirt next the skin. Then the monks broke out in praises of the man they had sometimes misjudged, knelt, kissed the hands and feet of the corpse, crying “_Saint_ Thomas.” The body was first laid to rest in the crypt, until the translation in 1220. In 1173 Becket was canonised, December 29th being the feast of St Thomas of Canterbury. To this tomb in the crypt came Henry II. to do penance for his own [Illustration: THE MARTYRDOM, CANTERBURY CATHEDRAL] sin and his servants’, in the darkest hour of his reign. Barefoot and fasting he came; with rods he was beaten by bishops, abbots and monks; in the crypt he passed the hours of night; so his sin was washed away.