While Flambard, the embodiment of the Red King's despotism, was thrown into the Tower, the Archbishop's recall had been one of Henry's first acts after his accession.

Matilda appeared before his court to tell her tale in words of passionate earnestness.

She had been veiled in her childhood, she asserted, only to save her from the insults of the rude soldiery who infested the land, had flung the veil from her again and again, and had yielded at last to the unwomanly taunts, the actual blows of her aunt.

"As often as I stood in her presence," the girl pleaded, "I wore the veil, trembling as I wore it with indignation and grief.

But as soon as I could get out of her sight I used to snatch it from my head, fling it on the ground, and trample it under foot.