he had been accustomed to at
Caen; but his ideas on the matter of size were far grander than that of
his former Abbot, for St. Alban's Abbey Church far surpassed in its
dimensions the cathedral church which the new archbishop built at
Canterbury. As we have already seen (Chap. I.), he used the Roman bricks
from the ruined city of Verulamium as building material. Important as
this work was, the account of it occupies but a few lines in the
Chronicles. In these it is mentioned that Lanfranc contributed 1,000
marks towards the cost. Paul was an energetic man, as may be seen by the
short time occupied in building this large church; but it was not only
in providing a new church that he was active, for it is recorded that he
reformed the lives and manners of the monks, secured the restoration of
land that had been alienated, founded cells as occasion demanded, and
persuaded lay donors to give largely to the Abbey--tithes, bells, plate,
and books. Robert Mowbray, Earl of Northumberland, gave the Priory of
Tynemouth, which he had founded, to the Abbey of St. Albans. Abbot Paul
died on his way home from a visit to this new priory, and was buried
magnificently in his own Abbey.

The "Gesta Abbatum" begins at this point to sum up the good and evil
deeds of the abbots. Among Paul's shortcomings the following are
mentioned: he lost property through negligence; he destroyed the tombs
of his English predecessors in the Abbey; he did not secure as he should
have done the bones of Offa for his new church; he alienated the woods
of Northame; he bestowed some of the property of the Abbey upon his
illiterate kinsfolk. Yet, on the whole, his good deeds outweighed his
evil ones. William II., after Paul's death, kept the Abbey in his own
hands for four years, using, as was his wont, the revenues for his own
advantage. His death in the New Forest was considered by the monks of
the Abbey as a special punishment for the extortion he had practised on
them.

15. #Richard d'Aubeny# or #d'Albini# (1097-1119). This Abbot, a Norman,
was a man of much influence, and during his rule the Abbey was very
prosperous. He presented many and valuable ornaments to the church: a
shrine wrought in gold for the relics of the apostles, which Germanus
had placed in St. Alban's coffin in the fifth century; another shrine of
ivory and gilt, for the relics of martyrs and saints; a great number of
vestments and many valuable books. During his time, 1104, the relics of