of the treasury of St.
Albans which, curiously enough, the convent lent pregnant women in order
to assist them in child-birth; a strange animal, little known in
England: "a certain elephant,"[317] drawn from nature, with a replica of
his trunk in another position, "the first, he says, that had been seen
in the country."[318] The animal came from Egypt, and was a gift from
Louis IX. of France to Henry III. Matthew notes characteristic details
showing what manners were; he gives great attention to foreign affairs,
and also collects anecdotes, for instance, of the wandering Jew, who
still lived in his time, a fact attested in his presence by an
Archbishop of Armenia, who came to St. Albans in 1228. The porter of the
praetorium struck Jesus saying: "Go on faster, go on; why tarriest thou?"
Jesus, turning, looked at him with a stern countenance and replied: "I
go on, but thou shalt tarry till I come." Since then Cartaphilus
tarries, and his life begins again with each successive century. Matthew
profits by the same occasion to find out about Noah's ark, and informs
us that it was still to be seen, according to the testimony of this
prelate, in Armenia.[319]

In the fourteenth century the most illustrious chroniclers were Ralph
Higden, whose Universal History became a sort of standard work, was
translated into English, printed at the Renaissance, and constantly
copied and quoted[320]; Walter of Hemingburgh, Robert of Avesbury,
Thomas Walsingham,[321] not to mention many anonymous authors. Several
among the historians of that date, and Walsingham in particular, would,
on account of the dramatic vigour of their pictures, have held a
conspicuous place in the literature of mediaeval England had they not
written in Latin, like their predecessors.[322]

From these facts, and from this ample, many-coloured literary growth,
may be gathered how complete the transformation was, and how strong the
intellectual ties with Rome and Paris had become; also how greatly the
inhabitants of England now differed from those Anglo-Saxons, that the
victors of Hastings had found "agrestes et pene illiteratos," according
to the testimony of Orderic Vital. Times are changed: "The admirable
Minerva visits human nations in turn ... she has abandoned Athens, she
has quitted Rome, she withdraws from Paris; she has now come to this
island of Britain, the most remarkable in the world; nay more, itself an
epitome of the world."[323] Thus could speak concern