The History of England | Page 8

Canterbury, was at Rome in
disgrace. Walter Grey, Archbishop of York, and Hugh of Wells, Bishop
of Lincoln, were also abroad, while the Bishop of London, William of
Sainte-Mère-Eglise, was incapacitated by illness. Several important
sees, including Durham and Ely, were vacant. The ablest resident
bishop, Peter des Roches of Winchester, was an accomplice in John's
misgovernment.
The chief obstacle in the way of the royalists had been the character of
John, and the little Henry of Winchester could have had no share in the
crimes of his father. But the dead king had lately shown such rare
energy that there was a danger lest the accession of a boy of nine might
not weaken the cause of monarchy. The barons were largely out of
hand. The war was assuming the character of the civil war of Stephen's
days, and John's mercenaries were aspiring to play the part of feudal
potentates. It was significant that so many of John's principal
supporters were possessors of extensive franchises, like the lords of the
Welsh March, who might well desire to extend these feudal immunities
to their English estates. The triumph of the crown through such help
might easily have resolved the united England of Henry II. into a series
of lordships under a nominal king.
The situation was saved by the wisdom and moderation of the papal

legate, and the loyalty of William Marshal, who forgot his interests as
Earl of Pembroke in his devotion to the house of Anjou. From the
moment of John's death at Newark, the cardinal and the marshal took
the lead. They met at Worcester, where the tyrant was buried, and at
once made preparations for the coronation of Henry of Winchester. The
ceremony took place at St. Peter's Abbey, Gloucester, on October 28,
from which day the new reign was reckoned as beginning. The marshal,
who had forty-three years before dubbed the "young king" Henry a
knight, then for a second time admitted a young king Henry to the order
of chivalry. When the king had recited the coronation oath and
performed homage to the pope, Gualo anointed him and placed on his
head the plain gold circlet that perforce did duly for a crown.[1] Next
day Henry's leading supporters performed homage, and before
November 1 the marshal was made justiciar.
[1] There is some conflict of evidence on this point, and Dr. Stubbs,
following Wendover, iv., 2, makes Peter of Winchester crown Henry.
But the official account in _Fædera, i._, 145, is confirmed by _Ann.
Tewkesbury_, p. 62; _Histoire de G. le Maréchal_, lines 15329-32;
_Hist. des ducs de Normandie, et des rois d'Angleterre_, p. 181, and
_Ann. Winchester_, p. 83. Wykes, p. 60, and _Ann. Dunstable_, p. 48,
which confirm Wendover, are suspect by reason of other errors.
On November 2 a great council met at Bristol. Only four earls appeared,
and one of these, William of Fors, Earl of Albemarle, was a recent
convert. But the presence of eleven bishops showed that the Church
had espoused the cause of the little king, and a throng of western and
marcher magnates made a sufficient representation of the lay baronage.
The chief business was to provide for the government during the
minority. Gualo withstood the temptation to adopt the method by which
Innocent III. had ruled Sicily in the name of Frederick II. The king's
mother was too unpopular and incompetent to anticipate the part played
by Blanche of Castile during the minority of St. Louis. After the
precedents set by the Latin kingdom of Jerusalem, the barons took the
matter into their own hands. Their work of selection was not an easy
one. Randolph of Chester was by far the most powerful of the royalist
lords, but his turbulence and purely personal policy, not less than his

excessive possessions and inordinate palatine jurisdictions, made him
unsuitable for the regency. Yet had he raised any sort of claim, it would
have been hardly possible to resist his pretensions.[1] Luckily,
Randolph stood aside, and his withdrawal gave the aged earl marshal
the position for which his nomination as justiciar at Gloucester had
already marked him out. The title of regent was as yet unknown, either
in England or France, but the style, "ruler of king and kingdom," which
the barons gave to the marshal, meant something more than the
ordinary position of a justiciar. William's friends had some difficulty in
persuading him to accept the office. He was over seventy years of age,
and felt it would be too great a burden. Induced at last by the legate to
undertake the charge, from that moment he shrank from none of its
responsibilities. The personal care of the king was comprised within the
marshal's duties, but he delegated that branch of his work to Peter des
Roches.[2] These two,