out the kingdom, and his name was erased from all books. The shrine
was destroyed, and the gold and jewels thereof were taken away in
twenty-six carts. Henry VIII. himself wore the Regale of France in a ring
on his thumb. Improbable as the story of Becket's trial may seem, such a
procedure was strictly in accordance with the forms of the Roman Catholic
Church, of which Henry still at that time professed himself a member:
moreover it is not without authentic parallels in history: exactly the
same measures of reprisal had been taken against Wycliffe at Lutterworth;
and Queen Mary shortly afterwards acted in a similar manner towards Bucer
and Fagius at Cambridge.

The last recorded pilgrim to the shrine of St. Thomas was Madame de
Montreuil, a great French dame who had been waiting on Mary of Guise, in
Scotland. She visited Canterbury in August, A.D. 1538, and we are told
that she was taken to see the wonders of the place and marvelled at all
the riches thereof, and said "that if she had not seen it, all the men in
the world could never 'a made her believe it." Though she would not kiss
the head of St. Thomas, the Prior "did send her a present of coneys,
capons, chickens, with divers fruits--plenty--insomuch that she said,
'What shall we do with so many capons? Let the Lord Prior come, and eat,
and help us to eat them tomorrow at dinner' and so thanked him heartily
for the said present."

Such was the history of Becket's shrine. We have dwelt on it at some
length because it is no exaggeration to say that in the Middle Ages
Canterbury Cathedral owed its European fame and enormous riches to the
fact that it contained the shrine within its walls, and because the story
of the influence of the Saint and the miracles that he worked, and the
millions of pilgrims who flocked from the whole civilized world to do
homage to him, throws a brighter and more vivid light on the lives and
thoughts and beliefs of mediaeval men than many volumes stuffed with
historical research. No visitor to Canterbury can appreciate what he sees,
unless he realizes to some extent the glamour which overhung the resting
place of St. Thomas in the days of Geoffrey Chaucer. We have no certain
knowledge as to whether the other shrines and relics which enriched the
cathedral were destroyed along with those of St. Thomas. Dunstan and
Elphege at least can hardly have escaped, and it is probable that most of
the monuments and relics perished at the time of the Ref