with a clear conscience, and the sense that he had tried to keep
that last injunction.

CONCLUSION

Years had passed away. The oaths of Louis, and promises of Lothaire, had
been broken; and Arnulf of Flanders, the murderer of Duke William, had
incited them to repeated and treacherous inroads on Normandy; so that
Richard's life, from fourteen to five or six-and-twenty, had been one
long war in defence of his country. But it had been a glorious war for
him, and his gallant deeds had well earned for him the title of "Richard
the Fearless"--a name well deserved; for there was but one thing he
feared, and that was, to do wrong.

By and by, success and peace came; and then Arnulf of Flanders, finding
open force would not destroy him, three times made attempts to
assassinate him, like his father, by treachery. But all these had
failed; and now Richard had enjoyed many years of peace and honour,
whilst his enemies had vanished from his sight.

King Louis was killed by a fall from his horse; Lothaire died in early
youth, and in him ended the degenerate line of Charlemagne; Hugh Capet,
the son of Richard's old friend, Hugh the White, was on the throne of
France, his sure ally and brother-in-law, looking to him for advice and
aid in all his undertakings.

Fru Astrida and Sir Eric had long been in their quiet graves; Osmond and
Alberic were among Richard's most trusty councillors and warriors; Abbot
Martin, in extreme old age, still ruled the Abbey of Jumieges, where
Richard, like his father, loved to visit him, hold converse with him, and
refresh himself in the peaceful cloister, after the affairs of state and
war.

And Richard himself was a grey-headed man, of lofty stature and majestic
bearing. His eldest son was older than he had been himself when he
became the little Duke, and he had even begun to remember his father's
project, of an old age to be spent in retirement and peace.

It was on a summer eve, that Duke Richard sat beside the white-bearded
old Abbot, within the porch, looking at the sun shining with soft
declining beams on the arches and columns. They spoke together of that
burial at Rouen, and of the silver key; the Abbot delighting to tell,
over and over again, all the good deeds and good sayings of William
Longsword.

As they sat, a man, also very old and shrivelled and bent, came up to the
cloister gate, with the tottering, feeble step of one pursued beyond his
strength, coming to take sanc