from them, and from the other insurgents,* one of the hostages given by Eudes being Alice, his daughter by Bertha, and consequently halfsister of Conan. Henry was called into Normandy by the death of his mother Matilda, before he had time to complete his measures for maintaining the peace of the duchy of Britanny; and the instigations and promises of the King of France once more had their effect upon the discontented nobles. of that province and Aquitaine. The revolt in the latter district we shall have to notice hereafter; but in Britanny the unfortunate Eudes again conspired and leagued himself with the Viscount of Thouars and various discontented nobles of Poitou, not without some prospect of success. The truce with the King of France was soon about to expire ; and though Henry endeavoured to make it the basis of a solid peace, the French king took advantage of every accident to avoid such a result, sought every occasion of offence; and in a conference at Bourges, Louis and the insurgents mutually bound themselves not to make peace separately with the King of England.

The affairs of that monarch wore a very formidable aspect towards the commencement of 1168; a

*The historians of Britanny leave no doubt that Henry was in that province in 1167 and gained the advantages here stated over the Breton insurgents. Lord Lyttleton passes over the events of this expedition in silence, or confounds them with those of the preceding year.

sentence of excommunication hung over his head in consequence of his quarrel with Becket; Britanny, Aquitaine, and Poitou, were either in actual insurrection, or on the eve of a general revolt; and the King of France had so positively pledged himself to support the insurgent Barons of all those provinces, that it was impossible for him to recede with honour. About the same time two events occurred, which still farther incensed the King of England against his continental nobles, and those nobles against the King. The Earl of Salisbury, who had been left by Henry in Poitou, as his lieutenant, was treacherously murdered by Guy of Lussignan, afterwards more famous in history; but on the other hand the English monarch exasperated his adversaries to the highest pitch of fury, by an act of the most brutal and shameless kind.

As is well known, the moral character of Henry, throughout life, was anything but pure; but at this period there appears a charge against him of so foul and base a nature, that we may wish for the honour of human nature there was any means of disproving it. It must be remembered that the daughter of Eudes had been given as a hostage for her father's faith and submission, and that, unmindful of the brutality which Henry had displayed towards the Welsh hostages, he had again broken out into revolt. In revenge for her father's perfidy, Henry is said to have forcibly violated the person

of the unfortunate girl.* The king's former treatment of his hostages was certainly cruel, although it has been defended upon the grounds of necessity; but this was an act of baseness scarcely parallelled in the history of modern Europe. The effect was, of course, but to aggravate the rancorous animosity of Eudes, and he was busily taking measures to render his insurrection successful, when all his plans were frustrated by the extraordinary activity of the English monarch.

Without giving himself any time for repose, Henry, after having chastised the insurgents and criminals of Poitou, as will be shown hereafter, marched at once into Britanny, and attacked Eudes in the midst of his own territory. With a rapidity truly wonderful, he reduced almost every castle and town belonging to the Viscount, and then turning to the inferior insurgents, he took the high fort of Becherel, and many other small places, meeting with no check or repulse during the months of May and June. At the end of the latter month, he hurried across the country to confer with the King of France at La Ferté Bernard, where a meeting, which had with difficulty been concerted, was to take place between them. The Breton nobles, as well as others whom I shall have occasion to mention in another place, appealed to Louis more

*The historians of Britanny assert that force was used, though the English and Normans are silent on that point.

as a judge than an ally, and Henry could of course only act towards the French King as monarch with monarch. The bonds were drawn closer between Louis and the insurgents, the breach between Henry and the French sovereign was widened; and, as we shall see hereafter, the meeting did not take place, though the parties approached within a few miles of each other.

The two kings returned to their territories with the intention of immediately resuming hostilities, and carrying them on with greater activity than before. The effect, however, was not such as might be anticipated from the enmity of two powerful monarchs, and the strife of two mighty nations. Little was done on either side; and at the festival of the Epiphany, in the following year, a more satisfactory arrangement of their differences took place between Henry and Louis, in which the English monarch's skill and perseverance obtained many objects which he sought, even while he appeared to be making

concessions.

In the meantime, however, Henry had continued unshaken in the exercise of sovereignty in the Duchy; and the possession thereof was secured to him and to his son Geoffrey, by the treaty of peace which was soon after entered into between him and the King of France, and of which I shall speak when I proceed to notice more fully the events that had been taking place in Poitou.

To all the particulars, indeed, of that treaty

I shall have to return shortly, in order to notice various clauses contained in it, which have an especial reference to this history; but it may be necessary, for the purpose of showing the exact position in which the English monarch was placed, to give an account of several other events which occurred during the struggles of Britanny, and the desultory warfare with France, before I turn to the affairs of Poitou and Aquitaine.

In the midst of the difficulties and embarrassments which surrounded Henry at this time, while in open hostility with the Archbishop, with the thunders of Rome hanging over his head, with his subjects in revolt in many of his hereditary territories on the continent, his newly-acquired possession of Britanny shaken by the resistance of some of the most distinguished nobles of that country, his Welsh vassals waging a successful warfare for the recovery of their independence, and the French monarch repaying his great services by ravaging his territories and supporting all his enemies, Henry suddenly found two princes, who had ever been friendly towards him, join the party of his foes, and prepare to invade his dominions. These were the Count of Flanders, and his brother, the Count of Boulogne, one of whom had been under Henry's guardianship, while the other was indebted to him for the very territories that he possessed. Nevertheless, the present enmity of the Count of Boulogne and his brother was not without some cause, to