me of the
publication of that work;[215] and M. de Gerville confirms their remark
by his own personal observation, at least as far as relates to the nave.
This indeed has been shortened of late; but he is persuaded, that
whatever still remains is really of the architecture of the days of Duke
Richard.--Robert, the following duke, repaired to St. Michael's Mount,
to superintend his forces, upon the occasion of the revolt of Alain,
Count of Dol; and it was hither, also, that the archbishop of Rouen
brought the humbled count, to make his peace with his offended
sovereign.--At the period of the conquest, the monks of St. Michael
furnished six transports towards that eventful expedition; and when,
after the death of William, the dominion over the mount passed by
purchase from Robert to Henry, they distinguished themselves by their
attachment to their new sovereign, who here supported a siege on the
part of his two elder brothers, and was finally driven to surrender only
by famine. The elder of these brothers, at an advanced period of his
life, re-visited the church in a far different guise; and, to discharge
his vows to the archangel for his safe return from the crusade,
prostrated himself before the shrine which he had erst assaulted with
the fury of his arms.--The year 1158 was, almost above every other,
memorable in the history of St. Michael's Mount. Henry Plantagenet, who,
two years before, had there received the homage of his subjects of
Brittany, then returned in pilgrim weeds, accompanied by Louis VII.
whose repudiated wife, Eleanor of Aquitaine, he had married; and the
two monarchs, attended by a numerous throng of secular nobility, as well
as by several cardinals, archbishops, and bishops, kneeled in amity at
the holy altar.

During the reign of the ill-starred John, St. Michael's Mount passed, in
common with the rest of Normandy, under the sceptre of France, and
suffered severely upon the occasion. Guy of Thouars, then in alliance
with Philip-Augustus, advanced against it at the head of an army of
Britons; and, experiencing on the part of the inhabitants but a feeble
resistance, set fire to the palisades, the principal defence of the
place. The flames communicated to the houses; and the church also fell a
prey to them. To use the words of Brito,

"vis ignea sursum
Scandit, et ecclesiae decus omne, locumque sacratum,
Resque monasterii cremat insatiabilis omnes."

Philip l