ER I.

It was the eve of the 5th of January--the eve of the day announced to
King Edward as that of his deliverance from earth; and whether or not the
prediction had wrought its own fulfilment on the fragile frame and
susceptible nerves of the King, the last of the line of Cerdic was fast
passing into the solemn shades of eternity.

Without the walls of the palace, through the whole city of London, the
excitement was indescribable. All the river before the palace was
crowded with boats; all the broad space on the Isle of Thorney itself,
thronged with anxious groups. But a few days before the new-built Abbey
had been solemnly consecrated; with the completion of that holy edifice,
Edward's life itself seemed done. Like the kings of Egypt, he had built
his tomb.

Within the palace, if possible, still greater was the agitation; more
dread the suspense. Lobbies, halls, corridors, stairs, ante-rooms, were
filled with churchmen and thegns. Nor was it alone for news of the
King's state that their brows were so knit, that their breath came and
went so short. It is not when a great chief is dying, that men compose
their minds to deplore a loss. That comes long after, when the worm is
at its work, and comparison between the dead and the living often rights
the one to wrong the other. But while the breath is struggling, and the
eye glazing, life, busy in the bystanders, murmurs, "Who shall be the
heir?" And, in this instance, never had suspense been so keenly wrought
up into hope and terror. For the news of Duke William's designs had now
spread far and near; and awful was the doubt, whether the abhorred Norman
should receive his sole sanction to so arrogant a claim from the parting
assent of Edward. Although, as we have seen, the crown was not absolutely
within the bequests of a dying king, but at the will of the Witan, still,
in circumstances so unparalleled, the utter failure of all natural heirs,
save a boy feeble in mind as body, and half foreign by birth and rearing;
the love borne by Edward to the Church; and the sentiments, half of pity
half of reverence, with which he was regarded throughout the land;--his
dying word would go far to influence the council and select the
successor. Some whispering to each other, with pale lips, all the dire
predictions then current in men's mouths and breasts; some in moody
silence; all lifted eager eyes, as, from time to time, a gloomy
Benedictine passed in the direction to or