The death-bed of William was a death-bed of all formal devotion, a
death-bed of penitence which we may trust was more than formal. The
English Chronicles,[59] after weighing the good and evil in him, sends
him out of the world with a charitable prayer for his soul's rest; and
his repentance, late and fearful as it was, at once marks the
distinction between the conqueror on his bed of death and his
successor cut off without a thought of penitence in the midst of his
crimes. He made his will. The mammon of unrighteousness which he had
gathered together amid the groans and tears of England he now strove
so to dispose of as to pare his way to an everlasting habitation. All
his treasures were distributed among the poor and the churches of his
dominions. A special sum was set apart for the rebuilding of the
churches which had been burned at Mantes, and gifts in money and books
and ornaments of every kind were to be distributed among all the
churches of England according to their rank. He then spoke of his own
life and of the arrangements which he wished to make for his dominions
after his death. The Normans, he said, were a brave and unconquered
race; but they needed the curb of a strong and righteous master to
keep them in the path of order. Yet the rule over them must by all law
pass to Robert. Robert was his eldest born; he had promised him the
Norman succession before he won the crown of England, and he had
received the homage of the barons of the Duchy. Normandy and Maine
must therefore pass to Robert, and for them he must be the man of the
French king. Yet he well knew how sad would be the fate of the land
which had to be ruled by one so proud and foolish, and for whom a
career of shame and sorrow was surely doomed.
[Footnote 58: From "The History of the Norman Conquest."]
[Footnote 59: William of Malmesbury.]
But what was to be done with England? Now at last the heart of William
smote him. To England he dared not appoint a successor; he could only
leave the disposal of the island realm to the Almighty Ruler of the
world. The evil deeds of his past life crowded upon his soul. Now at
last his heart confest that he had won England by no right, by no
claim of birth; that he had won the English crown by wrong, and that
what he had won by wrong he had no right to give to another. He had
won his realm by warfare and bloodshed; he had treated the sons of the
English soil with needless harshness; he had cruelly wronged nobles
and commons; he had spoiled many men wrongfully of their inheritance;
he had slain countless multitudes by hunger or by the sword. The
harrying of Northumberland now rose up before his eyes in all its
blackness. The dying man now told how cruelly he had burned and
plundered the land, what thousands of every age and sex among the
noble nation which he had conquered had been done to death at his
bidding. The scepter of the realm which he had won by so many crimes
he dared not hand over to any but to God alone. Yet he would not hide
his wish that his son William, who had ever been dutiful to him, might
reign in England after him. He would send him beyond the sea, and he
would pray Lafranc to place the crown upon his head, if the Primate in
his wisdom deemed that such an act could he rightly done.
Of the two sons of whom he spoke, Robert was far away, a banished
rebel; William was by his bedside. By his bedside also stood his
youngest son, the English Ætheling, Henry the Clerk. "And what dost
thou give to me, my father?" said the youth. "Five thousand pounds of
silver from my hoard," was the Conqueror's answer. "But of what use is
a hoard to me if I have no place to dwell in?" "Be patient, my son,
and trust in the Lord, and let thine elders go before thee." It is
perhaps by the light of the later events that our chronicler goes on
to make William tell his youngest son that the day would come when he
would succeed both his brothers in their dominions, and would be
richer and mightier than either of them. The King then dictated a
letter to Lafranc, setting forth his wishes with regard to the
kingdom. He sealed it and gave it to his son William, and bade him,
with his last blessing and his last kiss, to cross at once into
England. William Rufus straightway set forth for Witsand, and there
heard of his father's death. Meanwhile Henry, too, left his father's
bedside to take for himself the money that was left to him, to see
that nothing was lacking in its weight, to call together his comrades
on whom he could trust, and to take measures for stowing the treasure
in a place of safety.
And now those who stood around the dying King began to implore his
mercy for the captives whom he held in prison. He granted the
prayer....
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.