A.D. 1177. LETTER OP POPE ALEXANDER. 4GÏ the peace towards the Church, and for fifteen years towards our most dearly beloved son m Christ, William, the illustrious king of Sicily, and the truce with the Lombards from the aforesaid calends of August for the space of six years in such manner as the said peace and truce had been agreed upon, and arranged and reduced to writing. Accordingly, in the same way that the said emperor has received us as the Catholic pope and his spiritual father, so do we acknowledge him as the Catholic emperor, and his wife as the Catholic empress, and their son as the Catholic king. Wherefore give thanks to our Creator who in His compassion has looked upon His spouse the Holy Church, and has in the fulness of His grace, after the many persecutions by which she has been grievously oppressed and crushed, restored peace and quietness to her. Given at Venice, at the Rialto, on the eighth day before the ides of August." The Letter of pope Alexander to Roger, archbishop of York, and Hugh, bishop of Durham, on the peace made between himself and the emperor. " Alexander, the bishop, servant of the servants of God, to his venerable brethren, Roger, archbishop of York, and legate of the Apostolic See, and Hugh, bishop of Durham, health and the Apostolic benediction. The obedience you have manifested in your most pleasing devotedness, and which you are known to have displayed both duteously and laudably towards ourselves and the Church, require that to you, as especial and duteous spiritual sons of the Church, we should describe the successes of the Church, inasmuch as it is worthy and becoming and right that those whom we have found so firmly rooted and established in duty towards us, we should render joyous and pleased at our welfare and that of the Church. Therefore, together with ourselves, give thanks to Almighty God who dwells on high, and who from above looks down upon the lowly, by whose bounty it has come to pass that His spouse the holy Church, after being long and grievously tossed by stormy waves and most mighty tempests, has now at length reached the haven of safety ; and, the raging storms appeased, enjoys the tranquillity her due, and so much longed for by her. Por, on the twelfth day before the calends of the present month of August, by command of our most dearly beloved son in Christ Prederic, the illustrious emperor of the Romans, the son