WESTMINSTER ABBEY AND ITS MONUMENTS. 2T 
later in date than the Confessor’s time. The most important of 
these is known as the Chapel of the Pyx, which was probably 
originally the treasury of the Abbey. 
I cannot within the limits at my disposal give the history of 
the Abbey in any detail. My chief object is to direct attention 
to the question of burials and memorials of the dead. Sebert 
and his wife are said to have been buried in the original church, 
and Edward the Confessor erected a monument over their 
remains before the high altar of his new minster. He also made 
elaborate arrangements for his own interment in a chapel to the 
east of the altar. William the Conqueror chose the Abbey as his 
place of coronation, and everyone of his successors who has been 
crowned has in this respect followed his example. The Norman 
and Angevin sovereigns, however, for various reasons, were not 
buried here. In a.p. 1163, Pope Alexander canonized Edward 
the Confessor, and, at the instigation of St. Thomas, Archbishop 
of Canterbury, King Henry II. had a new shrine made, worthy 
of the regal saint. In doing this he displayed the same spirit 
which actuated nearly all the kings of England down to the time 
of Henry VIII. They were all anxious to establish their claim 
to be considered Englishmen, and to identify themselves with 
English thoughts and feelings, and in no way could they do this 
better than by showing respect to the memory of one who was 
always regarded as specially representing the family of Egbert 
and Alfred. And they could devise no more obvious way of 
showing that respect than by gifts to that monastery of which 
Edward was now regarded as the founder and patron. These 
feelings were very strongly developed in the mind of Henry III., 
who conceived the idea of making the Confessor’s shrine the 
centre of the burial place of his race. He added to the church 
a “lady chapel,” and later the still existing octagonal chapter 
house ; but, not content with these additions, he pulled down the 
Confessor’s church, and in its place erected a large portion of 
that which exists to this day. ‘lhe shrine of the Confessor was 
still to be the nucleus of the building, but that which Henry II. 
had erected gave way to one yet more splendid. Of this 
