Page:The reign of William Rufus and the accession of Henry the First.djvu/261

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outward appearance, but at the heart. William examined further into Howel's life and conversation, and presently gave him the temporal investiture of the bishopric. At the same time a congé d'élire went to Le Mans, which led to Howel's "pure and simple" election by the Chapter. A point both of canon and of feudal law turned up. The old dispute between the Norman Duke and the Angevin Count about the advowson of the bishopric had never been settled; the Peace of Blanchelande was silent on that point. Legally there can be no doubt that the true temporal superior of the Bishop of Le Mans was neither Fulk nor William, but their common, if forgotten, lord King Philip. But, whoever might be his temporal lord, no one doubted that the Bishop of Le Mans was a suffragan, and the suffragan highest in rank, of the Archbishop of Tours. Yet, as things stood, as Tours was in the dominions of Fulk, a subject of William who went to that metropolis for consecration might have been called on to enter into some engagement inconsistent with his Norman loyalty. By a commission therefore from Archbishop Ralph of Tours, Howel received consecration at