Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 26.djvu/120

 many members of the monastic orders on English affairs, returning about the end of November with further proposals for peace, which were in favour of the empress rather than of the king. When Stephen rejected them, he probably decided to join the empress's party as soon as a good opportunity for doing so arose.

After the battle of Lincoln the empress sent proposals to him on 16 Feb. 1141, and on Sunday 1 March he went, according to agreement, to confer with her outside Winchester. She offered that, if he would receive her and be faithful to her, she would be guided by him in all the greater affairs of the realm, and especially in all preferments to bishoprics and abbacies, and the chief men of her party guaranteed that she should keep this engagement. On this he swore fealty to her, and the next day led her to the cathedral, where she was received by him and other bishops with much solemnity, as though she was about to receive coronation, the legate pronouncing a blessing on her friends and excommunication against her enemies. On 7 April he held a council at Winchester, to which came Archbishop Theobald, all the bishops, and many abbots. With them he had private conferences, and the next day made a speech in which he advocated the claim of the empress, declared that Stephen had broken his promise to honour the church, dwelt on his bad administration and his violence towards the bishops, and announced that on the previous day the clergy, to whom it chiefly pertained to elect and consecrate their prince, had chosen Matilda as lady of England and Normandy. All present either applauded or at least refrained from dissent, and he then adjourned the session until the arrival of the citizens of London on the following day. When they came they prayed that Stephen might be released from captivity. Henry repeated his oration of the day before, and added that it did not become them to favour Stephen's party. A clerk then handed him a petition from the queen on her husband's behalf. He declared it unfit to be read, but the clerk read it, and he answered him as he had answered the Londoners. Matilda soon offended him by refusing to allow his nephew, Eustace, the continental possessions of Stephen. He left her court; had an informal interview with his sister-in-law, the queen, at Guildford; yielded to her entreaties, and, without consulting the other bishops, absolved Stephen's party from excommunication, and declared that he would do his best to procure the king's liberation. The Earl of Gloucester went to Winchester, and vainly tried to arrange the quarrel, and the empress marched at once to Winchester. As she entered the city the bishop leapt on his horse and rode in haste into Wolvesey Castle. The empress invited him to come and speak with her; he returned answer, ‘I will make myself ready,’ and sent to summon all the king's party to his aid. Meanwhile the empress besieged his palace and his new fortress with a large army, in which were David, king of Scotland, Robert of Gloucester, and other earls and barons. Before long Stephen's lords came to his aid, and with them the queen, and the Flemish mercenaries, and a force of Londoners. Then, in turn, the bishop and his allies besieged the besiegers. Outside Winchester the queen ‘with all her strength’ laid waste the country, and intercepted provisions, so that ‘there was great hunger therein’ (Anglo-Saxon Chron. a. 1140), while from Wolvesey Tower burning missiles were, by the bishop's orders, shot down on the houses of the burghers, who were on the side of the empress. The city was fired, the ‘Nuns’ minster was burnt, and even Hyde Abbey beyond the walls was destroyed. Fire and famine brought the empress's army to despair. Robert of Gloucester prepared to retreat, and on the evening of 14 Sept. the bishop ordered that peace should be proclaimed and the gates opened. The empress escaped, but as Earl Robert was issuing from the city with his force, the bishop gave the signal for attack, and he was overpowered and taken prisoner. Winchester was sacked by the Londoners and others of the king's party, apparently with the bishop's goodwill (Cont. ii. 134). Since he became bishop he had been on bad terms with the Hyde convent, and he ordered the treasure of the house which could be gathered after the fire to be brought to him. A famous cross, with the image of the Lord wrought with much gold, silver, and precious stones, and given to the church by Canute [q. v.], was melted, and the metal brought to the bishop was put at sixty pounds of silver and fifteen pounds of gold. On 7 Dec. the legate held another council at Westminster, at which the king was present. He stated that he had received the empress under compulsion, and that she had since infringed the rights of the church and had plotted against him; he commanded all to obey the king, and denounced all who upheld the Angevin countess as excommunicate. Either fear or reverence kept all the clergy silent, but a layman sent by the empress spoke sharply on his mistress's side, and contradicted the legate to his face. Henry kept his temper, and would not give way.

Henry's power largely rested on his lega-