Little is recorded of Etheldreda's life as abbess; and, after a rule of seven years, she died at the age of forty-nine, in the year 679, her death being due to an epidemic then prevalent, combined with a tumour in the neck. The death-bed scene is sculptured on one of the corbels of the Octagon Towers at Ely, where the more picturesque events of her life are quaintly set before us in stone. The saintly lady died after much suffering, which the ministrations of her devoted physician Cynifrid failed to allay; though he did for her all that the surgery of those days allowed. She bore her sickness with composure of mind, and when she knew that the end was at hand, she (as others have done before and since) summoned her whole household to her chamber to take her last farewell of them all. She told them that the time of her departure was at hand; she spoke to them of the vanity of this world's enjoyments, and recommended them to keep Heaven always in view, whereby they might in some measure have a foretaste of its joys. After this she received the Communion in both kinds from the hands of Huna, a priest devoted to her service; then, while praying for the inhabitants of the monastery, she passed from earth. It may be of interest to remember that throughout the seven years of her rule at Ely, Theodore, the great organiser of the Anglican Church, "the first Archbishop whom the whole Church of England obeyed," filled the See of Canterbury. It was Etheldreda's wish to be buried with all simplicity in the cemetery set apart for the nuns of Ely; so we are glad to learn that this her last desire was respected by her followers, and that she was laid to rest among the nuns in a wooden coffin. Her elder sister, St. Sexburga, widow of the King of Kent, took her place as Abbess, and ruled at Ely till another generation was arising. After sixteen years had gone by, those who still remembered and loved Etheldreda wished that her body should be with them at their devotions in the church, and they resolved to translate her remains from the cemetery to the Abbey.