And heartily did the monks of Ely and their guests renew and finish their feast, and hopefully and boldly did they speak of wars and victories over the Normans, until the drowsiness of much wine overcame them, and the sub-chamberlain of the house began to extinguish the lights, and collect together the torches and the lanterns, while the cellarer collected all the spoons, taking care to carry the Lord Abbat’s spoon in his right hand, and the spoons of the monks in his left hand, according to the statutes of the Order. It was the last time that the feast of Saint Edmund the Martyr was kept in the true Saxon manner in the great house at Ely. The next year, and the year following that, the monks had little wine and but little ale to drink; and after the long years of trouble although the cellars were getting filled again, the true old Saxon brotherhood was broken up and mixed, a foreigner was seated in the place of Abbat Thurstan,[89] and monks with mis-shaven tonsures and mis-shaped hoods and gowns filled all the superior offices of the abbey, purloining and sending beyond sea what my Lord Thurstan had spent in a generous hospitality, among true-born and generous-hearted Englishmen. But in this nether world even the gifts of saints and the chartered donation of many kings are to be kept only by the brave and the united: conquest recognises no right except as a mockery: the conquered must not expect to be allowed to call their life and limbs their own, or the air they breathe their own, or their wives and children their own, or their souls their own: they have no property but in the grave, no right but to die at the hour appointed for them. Therefore let men perish in battle rather than outlive subjugation, and look for mercy from conquerors! and, therefore, let all the nations of the earth be warned by the fate of the Anglo Saxons to be always one-hearted for their country. This patriotic and eloquent appeal may be very appropriately reiterated at the present day. The sentiment which it inculcates is as essential now as it was when the Saxons were defending the “Camp of Refuge.” Is it not consolidation rather than extension which is needed for the well being of our country? Will not the future greatness of our nation hinge upon the development of the highest principles of humanity—the unity, loyalty and virtue of its peoples? CHAPTER V. THE MONKS OF ELY TAKE COUNSEL.