[Illustration] <g>CARISBROOKE CASTLE</g>, p. 284.--Of the circumstances mentioned in the text, the following is the relation given by the learned monk already quoted:--“Rogerius verò de Britolio, Comes Herefordensis ad curiam regis vocatus venit, et inquisitus manifestam toti mundo proditionem negare non potuit. Igitùr secundùm _leges Normanorum_ judicatus est, et amissa omni hæreditate terrena, in carcere Regis perpetuò damnatus est. Ibi etiam Regi multoties detraxit, et contumacibus actis, implacabiliter offendit. Nam quondam, dum plebs Dei Paschale festum congruè celebraret, et Rex structum preciosarum vestium Rogerio Comiti per idoneos satellites in ergastulo mitteret; ille pyram ingentem antè se jussit præparari, et ibidem, Regalia ornamenta, chlamydem sericamq’ interulam, et renonem de preciosis pellibus peregrinorum _murium_ subitò comburi. Quod audiens Rex iratus dixit: ‘Multùm superbus est qui hoc mihi dedecus fecit; sed, _per splendorem Dei_, de carcere mea in omni vita mea non exibit.’ Sententia regis tàm fixa permansit, quòd nec etiam post mortem Regis ipse, nisi mortuus, de vinculis exiit. Rainaldus et Rogerius filii ejus, optimi tirones, Henrico Regi famulantur et clementiam ejus--quæ tardissima iis visa est--in duris agonibus præstolantur.” In commenting upon the above passage, a learned writer has made the following remarks:--“It appears from the text that Roger, Earl of Hereford, was brought to his trial before the king’s court, or council of the _proceres_, or great men of the kingdom, and was condemned by them to suffer perpetual imprisonment, with the loss of all his inheritance. So that, in this instance, as well as in the case of Ralph de Guader, the said court or council appear to have acted as a court of criminal jurisdiction. But it seems remarkable that the judgment they passed upon this great and notorious rebel, who could not, and did not, deny the crime he was charged with, should not have extended to his life; more especially, as Waltheof, Earl of Northampton, who had refused to have any share in the rebellion raised by the other two earls, and had only been guilty of concealing his knowledge of their intentions, was, in a short time after, condemned to lose his life for that lesser offence, and was, as stated in the text, actually beheaded at Winchester. One would almost suspect that they were tried by two different laws; namely, Roger, Lord of the Isle of Wight, who was a Norman, by the _law of Normandy_; and Waltheof, Earl of Northampton, who was an Englishman, by the _law of England_; and that the Norman law of that period did not punish high treason with death, although the English law did. With respect to the garments sent by the king to this haughty prisoner, they are understood by commentators on the original passage to have consisted of--First, an outer [Illustration]