human
(as Bacon curiously phrases it); yet the great case of Beckett is there to show that nothing was absolutely sacred in these violent years. Nor does it stand alone. In 1191, Jeffrey, Archbishop of York, and son of Henry II., was seized at the altar of St Martin's Priory, Dover; and dragged, episcopal robes and all, through dirty streets to the Castle: this, too, by order of William Longchamp, Bishop of Ely, and Papal Legate. In 1378, Archbishop Sudbury complained in Parliament that one Robert Hawley had been slain at the high altar even while the priest was saying a mass. It was rumoured indeed that one Thurstian, a Knight, chasing a sanctuary man with drawn sword, was of a sudden stricken with grievous ailments. But this and other like stories did not deter the citizens of London (_circa_ 1349) from assembling at supper time in a great crowd, and dragging forth a soldier who had escaped on the way from Newgate to Guildhall, where he was being taken for trial. In another case (_temp._ Henry VI.), where a youth had taken sanctuary after having foully slain a kind mistress, the good women about St Martin's broke in and despatched him with their distaffs. Of those who took sanctuary to good purpose the most famous was Elizabeth, widow of Edward IV., who, in 1471, registered herself a sanctuary woman in Westminster, and there sat, in Sir Thomas More's phrase,
gpt
Alow in the rushes. But you have read the tragic story in Shakespeare. And in a later age
human
There were two chief plague-spots in London, he snarled:
gpt
he added,
human
and if he did not depart on the instant, he had no further protection. But it occurred to over-anxious legislators that such a fugitive might carry beyond seas precious hints of the mysteries of trade or politics, or that, making as if for the nearest port, he might but proceed to infest another place. So he was ordered to abjure the liberty of the realm, but not the realm itself; and being branded, was confined under a governor in one or other of the sanctuaries. Whenever he ventured forth--as he might in the daytime--he must wear the prescribed badge of the refuge. He dare carry no weapon save a meat-knife, and that but at meal-times. He must likewise answer to the daily roll-call. If he committed another felony--and crimes done _sub spe redeundi_ had been a sore grievance of late--he was to lose his rights. The governor was empowered to hold courts for debt and minor offences within his bounds. And so