"English or Norman?"
"The former, I believe, but he has not yet spoken."
"Send for the almoner and infirmarer. I will come and look at him myself."
Leaving the scriptorium, the Abbot traversed the pleasant cloisters, which were full of boys, learning their lessons under the superintendence of certain brethren—some declining Latin nouns or conjugating verbs; some reading the scanty leaves of parchment which served as lesson books, more frequently repeating passages viva voce after a master, while seated upon rude forms, or more commonly standing. So were the cloisters filled—the only schools for miles around. They looked upon an inner quadrangle of the monastery, with the great church to the south. Passing through a passage to the west of the nave, the Abbot reached the gateway of the abbey, somewhere near the site of the present tower, which is modern. The view to the south from this point stretched across the Thames to Synodune; nearer at hand rose to left and right the towers of two parish churches,[12] the buildings of the town (or city, as it had hitherto been), poor and straggling as compared with the ecclesiastical dwellings, lay before them; the embankment of the Dyke hills then terminated the town in this direction, and beyond rose the stately clumps of Synodune.
Inside the porch rested the wayfarers; their beasts had been led to the stables, and on a sort of hand-bier before them, resting on tressels, lay the prostrate form of the victim of the prowess of Brian Fitz-Count.
"Where didst thou find him?" asked the Abbot.
"Near the spot on the downs where once holy Birinus preached the Evangel."
"And this dog?"
"Was with him, wounded by teeth as the master by sword. It was his moans and howls which attracted us."
The Abbot bent over the prostrate form.