A.D. 1183. DEATH AND BURIAL OF THE KING, THE SON. our Lord, in the fear of the Lord, he breathed forth his spirit. When news was brought of his death to our lord the king, his father, bursting into tears, he threw himself upon the ground, and greatly bewailed his son. Ο how dreadful a thing it is for sons to persecute a father ! for it is not the sword of the man who fights, not the hand of the foeman that avenges the injury of the father ; but it is fever that deals its retribution, flux of the bowels, with ulceration of the intestines, that exercises vengeance. The son laid prostrate, all return to the father. All are overjoyed, all rejoice, the father alone bewails his son. Why, glorious father, dost thou bewail him ? He was no son of thine, who could commit such violence upon thy fatherly affection. This defence of thee has wrought security for fathers, and has checked the audacity of parricides. For it was his due to perish by a severe retribution, who wished to introduce parricide into the world ; because the Judge of all minds, in the same way that He avenges the tribulations of the righteous, so does he sometimes punish the persecutions of the wicked. The king's servants, after having extracted the brain and the entrails, and buried them at Martel, sprinkled the body of the dead king with large quantities of salt, and then wrapped it in bulls' hides and lead, that they might take it to Rouen for burial there, and accordingly set out on their way with the royal body ; but when they had come to the city of Le Mans, and had passed the night in the church of Saint Julian the Confessor and Pontiff, singing hymns and psalms in its vicinity, and wished in the morning to depart thence with the body, the bishop of the city and the clergy, together with the common people, would not allow them to carry it away, but buried it in an honorable manner in the church of Saint Julian. On this being told to the people of Rouen, they were indignant thereat, and resolutely demanded his body, swearing that they would take it by force, unless it was instantly given up to them ; upon which the king, the father, ordered that the body should be given up to the people of Rouen, as the king, his son, had, while living, commanded ; which was accordingly done ; and they dug up the king's body from the spot