LIFE AND TIMES OF THOMAS BECKET. 
was Matilda’s son, Henry of Anjou? Theobald was 
for Henry, so far as he dared to show himself. 
Bucket was trusted to carry messages to Rome, 
more than once, on this and other important busi- 
ness. "The struggle ended with a compromise. 
Kustace diel. Stephen was to rein for his life. 
Henry was pcaceably to follow him. The arrange- 
inent might have been cut again by the sword. But 
Stephen himself followed his son at & short interval, 
and Henry II, became king of England. With all 
these intrieate negotiations the future martyr was 
intimately connected, and by his remarkable talcuts 
especially recommended himself to the new king, 
No one called afterwards to an important position 
had better opportunities of acquainting himself 
with the spirit of the age, or the characters of the 
Principal actors in it.! 
If his services were valuable, his reward was mag- 
nificent. He was not a priest, but, again precisely 
as Nigellus deseribes. he was loaded with lucrative 
} Very strange things were 
Continvally happening. In 1154 
the Archbishop of York was 
Poisoned in the Kucharist by 
some of his clergy. ‘Kodem 
anuo Wilhelmus Kboracensis 
archiepiseopus, proditione eleri- 
COrum suorum Dost pereecptionem 
Eucharistie infra ablutiones 
liquore lothali infectus, extinclus 
st.” (Hovedon, vol. iD. 213) 
Becket could not fail to have 
ueard of this piece of villany and 
to have made his own reflections 
Upon ie