pectacle. Eleanor had been accompanied to
England by her uncle William, Bishop-elect of Valence, who soon became
the King's favorite, was admitted into the council, and assumed the
ascendency in the administration. The barons took the first
opportunity to remonstrate; but Henry mollified their anger by adding
three of their number to the council, and, that he might be the more
secure from their machinations, obtained from the Pope a legate to
reside near his person. This was the cardinal Otho, who employed his
influence to reconcile Henry with the most discontented of the barons.
By his advice William returned to the Continent. He died in Italy, but
the King, mindful of his interests, had previously procured his
election to the see of Winchester, vacant by the death of Peter des
Roches.

The next favorites were two other uncles of the Queen, Peter de Savoy,
to whom Henry gave the honor of Richmond, and Boniface de Savoy, who,
at the death of Edmund, was chosen archbishop of Canterbury. The
natives renewed their complaints, and waited with impatience for the
return of Richard, the King's brother, from Palestine; but that Prince
was induced to espouse the cause of the foreigners, and to marry
Sanchia, another of the daughters of Raymond. But now Isabella, the
Queen-mother, dissatisfied that the family of Provence should
monopolize the royal favor, sent over her children by her second
husband, the Count de la Marche, to make their fortunes in England.
Alice, her daughter, was married to the young Earl of Warenne; Guy,
the eldest son, received some valuable presents and returned to
France; William de Valence, with the order of knighthood, obtained an
annuity and the honor of Hertford; and Aymar was sent to Oxford,
preferred to several benefices, and at last made bishop of Winchester.

Associations were formed to redress the grievances of the nation:
under the decent pretext of preventing the misapplication of the
revenue, a demand was repeatedly made that the appointment of the
officers of state should be vested in the great council; and at length
the constitution was entirely overturned by the bold ambition of Simon
de Montfort, Earl of Leicester.

Simon was the younger of the two sons of the Count de Montfort, a name
celebrated in the annals of religious warfare. By the resignation of
Amauri, his brother, the constable of France, he had succeeded to the
estates of his mother Amicia, the elder of the two sisters and
co