In the fifteenth century, when our Henry Vth brought his victorious armies into France, the monks of Bec were reduced to a painful alternative.  It was apprehended by the French monarch, that the monastery might be converted into a depot by the English; and they were commanded either to demolish the church, or to fortify it against the invaders.  They naturally regarded the latter as the lesser evil; and the consequence was, that the abbey was scarcely put into a state of defence, when it was attacked by the enemy, and, after sustaining a siege for a month, was obliged to surrender.  A great part of the monastic buildings were levelled to the ground; and the fortifications which had been so strangely affixed to them were also razed:  meanwhile the monks suffered grievously from the contending parties:  their sacristy was plundered; their treasury emptied; and they were themselves exposed to a variety of personal hardships.  At the same time, also, the tomb of the Empress Maud[59], which faced the high altar, was destroyed, after having been stripped of its silver ornaments.

Considering the number of illustrious persons who were abbots or patrons of Bec, and who had been elected from it to the superintendance of other monasteries, the church does not appear to have been rich in monuments.  We read indeed of many individuals who were interred here belonging to the house of Neubourg, a family distinguished among the benefactors of the convent; and the records of the abbey speak also of the tomb of Richard of St. Leger, Bishop of Evreux; but the Empress was the only royal personage who selected this convent as the resting-place for her remains; and she likewise appears to have been the only eminent one, except Hellouin, the founder, who lay in the chapter-house, under a slab of black marble, with various figures of rude workmanship[60] carved upon it.  His epitaph has more merit than the general class of monumental inscriptions:—­

   “Hunc spectans tumulum, titulo cognosce sepultum;
      Est via virtutis nosse quis ipse fuit. 
    Dum quater hic denos aevi venisset ad annos,
      Quae fuerant secli sprevit amore Dei. 
    Mutans ergo vices, mundi de milite miles
      Fit Christi subito, Monachus ex laico. 
    Hinc sibi, more patrum, socians collegia fratrum,
      Cura, qua decuit, rexit eos, aluit. 
    Quot quantasque vides, hic solus condidit aedes,
      Non tam divitiis quam fidei meritis. 
    Quas puer haud didicit scripturas postea scivit,
      Doctus ut indoctum vix sequeretur eum. 
    Flentibus hunc nobis tulit inclementia mortis
      Sextilis quina bisque die decima. 
    Herluine pater, sic cA"lica scandis ovantA"r;
      Credere namque tuis hoc licet ex meritis.”