But thou, O Lord Jesus, our creator and redeemer, gracious disposer, art abundantly able to remedy our defects by means of those irregular and vagabond men. Thou didst bring to light thy treasure, hidden for so many years--I mean the body of St. Aldhelm, which they took up and placed in a shrine. The royal generosity increased the fame of the canons; for the king bestowed on the saint an estate, very convenient both from its size and vicinity. But my recollection shudders even at this time, to think how cruel he was to other monasteries, equally on account of the giddiness of youth, and the pernicious counsel of his concubine, who was perpetually poisoning his uninformed mind. But let his soul, long since placed in rest by the interposition of Dunstan,[181] pardon my grief: grief, I say, compels me to condemn him, “because private advantage is not to be preferred to public loss, but rather public loss should outweigh private advantage.” He paid the penalty of his rash attempt even in this life, being despoiled of the greatest part of his kingdom;[182] shocked with which calamity, he died, and was buried in the new minster at Winchester. CHAP. VIII. _Of king Edgar, son of king Edmund._ [A.D. 959-975.] [Sidenote: [A.D. 959-975.] OF KING EDGAR.] In the year of our Lord’s incarnation 959, Edgar, the honour and delight of the English, the son of Edmund, the brother of Edwy, a youth of sixteen years old, assuming the government, held it for about a similar period. The transactions of his reign are celebrated with peculiar splendour even in our times. The Divine love, which he sedulously procured by his devotion and energy of counsel, shone propitious on his years. It is commonly reported, that at his birth Dunstan heard an angelic voice, saying, “Peace to England so long as this child shall reign, and our Dunstan survives.” The succession of events was in unison with the heavenly oracle; so much while he lived did ecclesiastical glory flourish, and martial clamour decay. Scarcely does a year elapse in the chronicles, in which he did not perform something great and advantageous to his country; in which he did not build some new monastery. He experienced no internal treachery, no foreign attack. Kinad, king of the Scots, Malcolm, of the Cambrians, that prince of pirates, Maccus, all the Welsh kings, whose names were Dufnal, Giferth, Huval, Jacob, Judethil, being summoned to his court, were bound to him by one, and that a lasting oath; so that meeting him at Chester, he exhibited them on the river Dee in triumphal ceremony. For putting them all on board the same vessels he compelled them to row him as he sat at the prow: thus displaying his regal magnificence, who held so many kings in subjection. Indeed, he is reported to have said, that henceforward his successors might truly boast of being kings of England, since they would enjoy so singular an honour. Hence his fame being noised abroad, foreigners, Saxons, Flemings, and even