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[D. Weller KING SEBERT’S TOMB.

Now we come to the time of Edward the Confessor, when we feel we know more about the real history.

Edward the Confessor had been in exile in Normandy during the reigns of the Danish Kings. When Hardicanute died, Edward came back to England, and was crowned King at Winchester. After he was once settled in his kingdom he remembered a solemn vow he had made while he was in a foreign land, and when he doubted whether he would ever get back to England. This was the vow: “Sire Saint Peter, under whose aid I put myself and my property, be to me a shield and protection against the tyrant Danish plans: Be to me lord and friend against all my enemies. To thy service I will entirely give myself up, and well I vow to you and promise you, when I shall be of strength and age, to Rome I will make my pilgrimage, where you and your companion Saint Paul suffered martyrdom.”

The English were most unwilling that their King should leave them, and go away on such a long and dangerous journey as it was in those days. So they begged the King to remain, and he sent to ask the Pope what he might do instead of going to Rome. The Pope answered that he might build or restore some monastery in honour of St. Peter. There is a beautiful old story which tells that while the King was thinking over this matter, and wondering where to build his monastery, a message was brought to him from a holy hermit of Worcestershire, one Wulsinus, and the message was as follows: “I have a place in the west of London, which I myself chose, and which I love. This formerly I consecrated with my own hands, honoured with my presence, and made it illustrious by divine miracles. The name of the place is Thorney, which once, for the sins of the people, being given to the fury of barbarians, from being rich is become poor, from being stately, low, and from honour is become contemptible. This let the King, by my command, repair and make it a house of monks, adorn it with stately towers, and endow it with large revenues. There shall be no less than the House of God and the Gates of Heaven.”