nounced judgement. The pope declared that the election was uncanonical and must be judged to be void, because the monks, wishing to save time, had determined to elect by "inspiration of the Holy Spirit." The convent, therefore, asked the prior to name some person, and upon his designating the archdeacon William, the monks all cried out: "Placet: for he is a good man." Whereupon the prior, making the sign of the cross, declared that he made choice of the said William; and in the same way, and using the same form of words, the monks declared their agreement with him. This was no known form of canonical election, and for this reason the election was quashed. It is a curious thing that at this time many letters of the pope deal with irregularities in the process of elections; and, as in the case of Durham, it was found to be necessary in several instances to quash them altogether and appoint to the vacant offices.' Here, however, the pope, although pointing out that by law the appointment now devolved upon him, calling the monks who were at Rome for the purpose of the appeal, told them to present some names and that he would choose one of them. After consultation they proposed the translation from Salisbury of Bishop Richard Poore, whom they had previously elected, but whose election had been quashed in Rome. They were unwilling to offer any other names, and finally the pope consented to their choice, and translated Bishop Poore from Salisbury.

In Pope Gregory's letter, appointing Poore to his new diocese, the pontiff speaks of the damage done to the See by the unfortunate quarrels of the past years. He implies that Bishop Marsh was one of those unfortunate rulers who did not attend to the work " of correcting the wayward and gathering together the wanderers"; "who was not

1 Reg. de Grégoire, ix., vol. i.

content with the milk and the wool of the flock, but desired to take the skin also from the very bones of the scattered sheep." Hence, desiring to obtain for the Church of Durham, which "had been so injured in spiritual and diminished in temporal resources," some ruler who was likely to repair the ills of the past, he had fixed upon the bishop of Salisbury as one likely to do all that was needed. "And," he continues, " since it behoves you humbly to accept what has been settled by us so deliberately," we order you, under the obedience you owe, to accept the charge we have placed upon you.'

Bishop Poore did not in any way desire the promotion. He would rather have died, as he writes in his letter to the dean and Chapter of Salisbury, than be torn from the place and people he loved so sincerely. He would have refused, he says, "had not God been the only cause, and the order of a superior and the obedience due to him, whom to resist, as wise men have pointed out to me, is to resist God. For who am I to resist or contradict the orders of the lord pope, the Vicar of Jesus Christ on earth." He consequently goes to the north, as he is ordered, but he hopes that his canons will believe that his heart will always remain in his southern diocese.

Early in the year 1227, the English king was again in great need of money. At Northampton the barons were obliged to agree to the payment of £1,200, over and above the tax of a fifteenth, which all had to pay as an aid. This included the clergy; and all religious and beneficed clerks had to assent to this amount being levied upon their property, ecclesiastical as well as lay. They appealed to the pope, but without obtaining protection from him, for the king had secured the ear of the pontiff and "the arch1 Reg. de Grégoire, App. lii. 69. 2 Reg. S. Osmundi, ii. 101.

bishops and bishops under papal orders compelled them to pay by ecclesiastical censures," which, says the chronicler, "the lay power would not have been able to do." 1

1

Almost simultaneously with this, the king gave evidence of the uncertain character of his pledges, which subsequently made it impossible to rely upon them any more than on those of his father. In the month of February, Henry summoned a council at Oxford, at which he declared himself to be of age, and that he intended henceforth to transact the affairs of the State himself, without the advice of the bishop of Winchester, who had been his tutor since the death of William Marshall, earl of Pembroke. At the same meeting the young king publicly repudiated the "Charter of liberties of the forest," for granting which, just two years previously, he had obtained a grant from the nation. The ground of this repudiation was that, as these charters had been given whilst he was under age, he did not consider he should be bound to them in any way, now that he was his own master. In the same way, religious and others were informed that the sovereign did not admit any ancient charter or privilege; and that if they wished to enjoy any of the rights they claimed, they must take out new charters under the king's own seal, and for granting these they were forced to pay large sums into the king's treasury.

On 18th March, 1227, Honorius III died. One of his last acts, so far as England was concerned, was to send orders for the collection of money for the Holy Land," and to remind those who had taken the cross of their duty in regard to the projected expedition, which, now that matters had been arranged with the emperor Frederick, he hoped soon to direct upon its way. He was succeeded by the 1 Matth. Paris, iii. 122. Reg. S. Osmundi, ii. 77.

2

aged cardinal of Ostia, then eighty years of age, who took the name of Gregory IX. The new pope wrote to the archbishop and bishops of England to announce his accession, asking their prayers for the divine assistance in the duties of his high office, and ordering them to compel all in their respective districts who had taken the cross, to fulfil their grave obligations.' To King Henry he wrote in terms. similar to those in which he addressed other Christian rulers. He looked on him "as a special son of the Roman Church," and exhorts and orders him "ever to strive to honour and revere the Holy Roman Church, your mother, thus walking in the footsteps of your ancestors," and, "as becomes a Christian prince, humbly and devotedly to help us, who by God's providence are called to rule it." In a second letter, which apparently followed that announcing his election, the new pontiff addressed a more personal letter of fatherly advice to the English king. In it he earnestly prays him to cultivate a knowledge of God's law and endeavour in his acts to manifest true Christian devotion to His service."

2

In acknowledging these letters, Henry appears to have acquainted Gregory IX of his desire to establish his personal rule in his kingdom and to get rid of the governors, who, by the authority of the pope's predecessors, had been appointed over him during his minority. He likewise seems to have complained about certain lands, which he thought belonged to the Crown, but which were kept from him. On this point papal letters were dispatched at once to Archbishop Langton, ordering him to make all inquiries and to satisfy the king.*

1 Registres de Grégoire IX (ed. L. Auvray.) Tome i. No. I.

2 Ibid. No. 3.

4 Ibid. No. 23.

3 P. R. O. Papal Bulls, Bundle xxxv. No. 30.

Early in this, pontificate communications passed between the pope and the king, which furnish a sufficient indication that the relations between the State and Church in general, and between Archbishop Langton and the king in particular, had become both cordial and settled. It will be remembered that Pope Honorius had not only refused to ratify the election of Langton's brother, Simon, to the archiepiscopal see of York; but had forbidden his return to England, and this at the king's request, or at any rate at that of his advisers. A few months before the death of Pope Honorius III, Henry had written, in December 1226, to beg that this prohibition might now be cancelled. Cardinal Langton, he said, "was strenuously exerting himself to shield him (the king) from anything hurtful and to help him to everything good." He understood "that if (the archbishop) could occasionally enjoy the society of his brother Simon, of whom, as is not to be wondered at, he thinks not a little, he would pass his life in less sadness, which we would much desire, and would devote himself to our affairs with even greater ardour." Henry consequently begs that leave to come to England may be no longer refused to Simon Langton; and "by the affection, which the archbishop has for us," we beg that "the pope will be pleased to grant this."1

In the last days of Honorius nothing was done in the matter; but on 19th May, 1227, Pope Gregory wrote, that the petition addressed to his predecessor having come into his hands, he willingly granted what the king requested.' The same day the new pope wrote to Simon Langton himself: "though the Roman Church may pour out the wine that you may experience its discipline, still together with the rod of a father it has the affection of a mother, and we 1 P.R.O. Papal Bulls, Bundle xxxv. No. 83. Ibid., No. 84.