“Amen, Torfrida. There is one thing more to do before we die. The tomb in Crowland. Ever since the fire blackened it, it has seemed to me too poor and mean to cover the dust which once held two such noble souls. Let us send over to Normandy for fair white stone of Caen, and let carve a tomb worthy of thy grandparents.”
“And what shall we write thereon?”
“What but that which is there already? ‘Here lies the last of the English.’”
“Not so. We will write,—‘Here lies the last of the old English.’ But upon thy tomb, when thy time comes, the monks of Crowland shall write,—‘Here lies the first of the new English; who, by the inspiration of God, began to drain the Fens.’”