Page:Cassell's Illustrated History of England vol 1.djvu/211

A.D. 1174.] money, with which he hired into his service a number of foreign mercenaries, including 20,000 Brabançons. He also exercised all the arts of diplomacy to detach the neighbouring princes from the cause of his son, and sent messengers to Rome, acknowledging himself as the Pope's vassal, and entreating his assistance. The terms used by the king in his letter, in which the kingdom of England was called the patrimony of St. Peter, probably tended in some degree to excite and justify those pretensions of the see of Rome, which in subsequent reigns produced such important results. The Pope admitted the justice of the king's claims in opposition to those of his son, and confirmed the sentences of excommunication which the Norman bishops of Henry had issued against the adherents of the princes. He also sent a special legate across the Alps, commissioned to arrange terms of peace; but before the messenger arrived, the war had already commenced on the frontier of Normandy.

Allusion has already been made to the animosities existing between the different races inhabiting the continental territories of Henry II. The rebellion of the princes fomented this national hatred, and opposing nations took part in the contest, and having once drawn the sword, were not easily induced to lay it aside. While the King of France and Henry the younger were marching an army into Normandy, Richard had gone to Poitou, where most of the barons entered the field in his cause. Geoffrey met with similar success among the people of Brittany, who, with their former readiness for revolt, entered into a confederation for the purpose of securing their own interests, while ostensibly supporting the cause of their duke. The old king thus found himself attacked at several points simultaneously, while the troops whom he had at command were chiefly the Brabançon mercenaries, who, though valiant men-at-arms, were in fact little better than banditti. With a division of these troops Henry opposed the advance of the King of France, and ultimately compelled him to make a rapid retreat. Another division, which had been sent into Brittany, met with equal success against the insurgents, and the adherents of the princes were defeated wherever they showed themselves. King Louis, who possessed little persistence of character, soon grew weary of this war, as he had done on former occasions, and advised the rebellious sons to seek a reconciliation with their father. Henry consented to a conference, and the two kings met in a wide plain near to Gisors, where there was a venerable elm, whose branches descended to the ground. In this spot, from time immemorial, all conferences had been held between the dukes of Normandy and the kings of France.

The conference was attended by the two princes, accompanied by the archbishops, bishops, and nobles of both countries. The king offered to his eldest son half of the royal revenues of England, with the same portion of the incomes of Normandy and Anjou. To the other princes he also offered estates and revenues. The King of France, however, was alarmed by these conciliatory proposals, and threw difficulties in the way of a pacification, encouraging the enemies of Henry to take measures for breaking off the negotiations. One of these men was Robert, Earl of Leicester, who insulted Henry with open abuse, and even laid his hand upon his sword, as though he would have violated the truce by slaying his sovereign. He was, however, forcibly restrained by those who surrounded him. The tumult which arose was followed by a renewal of hostilities: and a desultory war, in which no engagement of importance took place, was continued during the rest of the year.

Robert of Leicester had returned to England for the purpose of joining Hugh Bigod, a powerful noble who adhered to the cause of the princes. The Scots, who had begun to make forays upon the lands in their neighbourhood, were also assuming a dangerous attitude; but were rebuked by Richard de Lucy, the king's high justiciary, who burnt their town of Berwick, and drove them back with considerable slaughter. On his return to the south he defeated the Earl of Leicester, and took him prisoner. The Saxon peasantry of England appear to have been entirely indifferent to these disputes, and, therefore, remained quiet. The people of Normandy, also, were generally faithful to their sovereign, and it was among the recent conquests of Henry—in the provinces of Poitou and Aquitaine, Maine and Anjou—that the rebellion gained ground. Two of the natural sons of the king, who were at that time in England, exerted themselves strenuously in the cause of their father, and one of these—Geoffrey, Bishop of Lincoln—distinguished himself by various successes against the insurgent barons.

Meanwhile, Richard, having fortified a number of castles of Poitou and Aquitaine, headed a general insurrection of the people of those provinces. Against him, in the year 1174, the king marched his Brabançon troops, having placed garrisons in Normandy to repel the attacks of the King of France. Henry took possession of the town of Saintes, and also of the fortress of Taillebourg, and in his return from Anjou, devastated the frontier of Poitou, destroying the growing crops as well as the dwellings of the people. On his arrival in Normandy he received news that his eldest son, with Philip, Earl of Flanders, had prepared a great armament, with which they were about to make a descent upon the English coast. The king, whose movements on such occasions were unsurpassed for rapidity and energy, immediately took horse, and proceeded to the nearest seaport. A storm was raying as he reached the coast, but Henry immediately embarked; carrying with him as prisoners his wife Eleanor, and Margaret, the wife of his eldest son, who had not succeeded in following her husband to the court of her father.

Henry landed at Southampton, whence he proceeded to Canterbury, for the purpose of undergoing that extraordinary penance, to which some allusion has already been made. It is related that he rode all night, without resting by the way, and that when, at the dawn of day, he came in sight of Canterbury cathedral, he immediately dismounted from his horse, threw from him his shoes and royal robes, and walked the rest of the way barefoot, along a stony road. On arriving at the cathedral, the king, accompanied by a great number of bishops, abbots, and monks, including all those of Canterbury, descended to the crypt in which the corpse of Thomas à Becket was laid. Gilbert Foliot, Bishop of London, addressed the people, and said: "Be it known to all who are here present, that Henry, King of England, invoking for his soul's salvation God and the holy martyrs, protests before you all that he never commanded nor desired the death of the saint; but, as it is possible that the murderers availed themselves of some words spoken imprudently, he implores his penance from the bishops now assembled, and is