The last earthly acts of the Conqueror were now done. He had striven to make his peace with God and man, and to make such provision as he could for the children and the subjects whom he had left behind him. And now his last hour was come. On a Thursday morning in September, when the sun had already risen upon the earth, the sound of the great bell of the metropolitan minster struck on the ears of the dying King. He asked why it sounded. He was told that it rang for prime in the church of our Lady. William lifted his eyes to heaven, he stretched forth his hands, and spake his last words: "To my Lady Mary, the Holy Mother of God, I commend myself, that by her holy prayers she may reconcile me to her dear Son, our Lord Jesus Christ." He prayed, and his soul passed away. William, king of the English and duke of the Normans, the man whose fame has filled the world in his own and in every following age, had gone the way of all flesh. No kingdom was left him now but his seven feet of ground, and even to that his claim was not to be undisputed. The death of a king in those days came near to a break-up of all civil society. Till a new king was chosen and crowned, there was no longer a power in the land to protect or to chastise. All bonds were loosed; all public authority was in abeyance; each man had to look to his own as he best might. No sooner was the breath out of William's body than the great company which had patiently watched around him during the night was scattered hither and thither. The great men mounted their horses and rode with all speed to their own homes, to guard their houses and goods against the outburst of lawlessness which was sure to break forth now that the land had no longer a ruler. Their servants and followers, seeing their lords gone, and deeming that there was no longer any fear of punishment, began to make spoil of the royal chamber. Weapons, clothes, vessels, the royal bed and its furniture, were carried off, and for a whole day the body of the Conqueror lay well-nigh bare on the floor of the room in which he died. THOMAS HENRY HUXLEY Born in 1825, died in 1895; educated at Charing Cross Hospital, London; assistant surgeon a naval ship in 1846-50; professor at the Royal School of Mines and the Royal Institute; lord rector of Aberdeen in 1874; lecturer at Cambridge in 1883; president of the Royal Society in 1883; published, among other works, "Man's Place in Nature" in 1868, "Lay Sermons" in 1870; "Critiques and Addresses" in 1873, "Evolution and Ethics" in 1893. ON A PIECE OF CHALK[60]