believed, their supplications might yet follow him.

There were the chief mourners--Edwy and Edgar--and they followed the
royal corpse, the latter greatly afflicted, and shedding genuine tears
of sorrow--and the royal household. All the nobility of Wessex, and
many of the nobles from Mercia and other provinces, were gathered
together, and amidst the solemn silence of the vast crowd, Dunstan
performed the last sad and solemn rites with a broken voice; while the
archbishop--Odo the Good, as he was frequently called--assisted in
the dread solemnity.

It was over; the coffin was lowered to the royal vaults to repose in
peace, the incenses had ceased to float dreamily beneath the lofty
roof,[xi] the various lights which had borne part in the
ceremony were extinguished, the choral anthem had ceased, for Edred
slept with his fathers.

And outside, the future king was welcomed with loud cries of "God save
King Edwy, and make him just as Alfred, pious as Edred, and warlike as
Athelstane!"

"Long live the heir of Cerdic's ancient line!"

Thus their cries anticipated the decision of the Witan, and without all
was noise and clamour; while within the sacred fane the ashes of him who
had so lately ruled England rested in peace by the side of his royal
father Edward, the son of Alfred, three of whose sons--Athelstane,
Edmund, Edred--had now reigned in succession.

It must not be supposed that Edwy was as yet king by the law of the