property to monasteries, and to the poor, and to spend days and nights in fasting and prayer, for the release of the defunct; he replied, “What I have said is fixed; for the judgments of God, by which I am plunged in the sulphureous whirlpool of hell, are without repentance. There I shall be tossed for my crimes, as long as the pole whirls round the stars, or ocean beats the shores. The rigour of this irreversible sentence remains for ever, devising lasting and innumerable kinds of punishment: now, therefore, let the whole world seek for availing remedies! And that you may experience some little of my numberless pains, behold,” said he, stretching out his hand, dripping with a corrupted ulcer, “one of the very smallest of them; does it appear trifling to you?” When the other replied, that it did appear so; he bent his fingers into the palm, and threw three drops of the purulent matter upon him; two of which touching his temples, and one his forehead, penetrated the skin and flesh, as if with a burning cautery, and made holes of the size of a nut. When his friend acknowledged the acuteness of the pain, by the cry he uttered, “This,” said the dead man, “will be a strong proof to you, as long as you live, of my pains; and, unless you neglect it, a singular token for your salvation. Wherefore, while you have the power; while indignation is suspended over your head; while God’s lingering mercy waits for you; change your habit, change your disposition; become a monk at Rennes, in the monastery of St. Melanius.” When the living man was unwilling to agree to these words, the other, sternly glancing at him, “If you doubt, wretched man,” said he, “turn and read these letters;” and with these words, he stretched out his hand, inscribed with black characters, in which, Satan, and all the company of infernals sent their thanks, from hell, to the whole ecclesiastical body; as well for denying themselves no single pleasure, as for sending, through neglect of their preaching, so many of their subject-souls to hell, as no former age had ever witnessed. With these words the speaker vanished; and the hearer distributing his whole property to the church and to the poor, went to the monastery; admonishing all, who heard or saw him, of his sudden conversion, and extraordinary interview, so that they exclaimed, “It is the right hand of the Almighty that has done this.” [Sidenote: [A.D. 1065.] NEGOTIATION OF WILLIAM I.] I feel no regret at having inserted this for the benefit of my readers: now I shall return to William. For since I have briefly, but I hope not uselessly, gone over the transactions in which he was engaged, when only earl of Normandy, for thirty years, the order of time now requires a new series of relation; that I may, as far as my inquiries have discovered, detect fallacy, and declare the truth relating to his regal government.