328 MATTHEW OS» WE8TMIÏT8TEB. A.D. 1253. expedition, their crews being unable to get a fair wind, delayed them for three months, and the king, having by this time consumed the greater portion of his treasure, was prevented from putting his design in execution, because that voyage appeared destitute of the favour of God. William, bishop of Llandaff, died, and his death had been preceded by blindness which had lasted seven years. Earl Roger Bigod, mareschal of England, having been healthfully instructed by the judgment of the church, came cheerfully to the marriage, and gladly received as his wife the daughter of the king of Scotland, whom he had formerly despised. But the king, when at last he got the fair wind he desired, on the sixth of August bade farewell to England, and committed himself to Neptune, having appointed earl Richard, his brother, and his queen, guardiane of his kingdom, and having also entrusted to their his care eldest son Edward. And about the feast of the Assumption of the blessed Mary, the king landed in Guienne at Bourdeaux, and the citizens coming out to meet him, received him with reverence as they ought. Accordingly, he immediately ordered the town of Arguillon to be surrounded with a siege, as a great many of his enemies from Gascony had taken refuge there, though Gaston himself had fled to the king of Spain, with whom he had formed a friendship, and to whom (pledging him his hand, as it was said) he had promised the dominion of Guienne. But the French hearing that the king of England had arrived in Guienne, and fearing lest the people of Poitou should go over to the party of the king of England their lord, sent thither a small body of knights, not permitting them to have the guardianship of any castles or cities ; and so, being made faithful against their will, they did the French no harm, and could not do the English any good. Thomas of Hereford, archdeacon of Northumberland, died, the week after the feast of Saint Lawrence, with a holy and blessed end : at one time he had been a pupil in the school of the blessed Edmund, archbishop of Canterbury, and also a familiar companion of his, owing to which, he continued one of his most confidential friends till his death. And in like manner also, Master Richard, who was afterwards made bishop of Chichester, endeavoured to follow hie steps. He, because he was a lover of the poor, bequeathed his body to a certain very poor house, that, namely, of the Brothers of Mount Carmel. And this holy archdeacon Thomas, and this Richard,