242 ROGER OF WENDOVETÎ. [Λ .1). 12U7. to you on the mutter of the church of Canterbury, humblv and carefully, and with gentle exhortations and requests, you, if I may so speak, with all deference to your highness, wrote in reply to ns contumaciously ami waywardly, with threats and reproaches ; and whereas we defer to you more than we ought, yon show ns less consideration than you ought; for if jour devotion is very necessary to us. still our regard is no less advantageous to you. And, although in such a ease we have never paid such honour to any prince as we have to you, you are endeavouring to lessen our dignity in a way that no prince has, in a like ase, presumed to do; you set forth some frivolous excuses by which you assert that you cannot give your consent to the election of our beloved son, master Stephen, entitled a cardinal priest of St. Chrysogonns, because forsooth be has been intimate with your enemies, and is not personally known to you. Moreover, as the proverb of Solomon says, 'The net is cast in vain before the eyes of birds,' since we know that it is not to be imputed as a fault, but rather to be reckoned as a glory to him, that, when he was for a time at Paris studying the liberal arts, he made such advance in them that he was rewarded with the title of teacher, not only in civil acquirements, but also in theological learning; and so, whereas his life agrees with his doctrines, he was rewarded with the prebenda! stall in the church of Paris ; wherefore, we think it a wonder, if a man of such renown, and who derived his origin from your kingdom, could, as far as report goes, be unknown to you, especially when yon wrote to him three times after he was promoted to the rank of cardinal by us, that, however you were disposed to summon him to your service, you nevertheless were glad that he was raised to a higher office. But it ought rather to take your attention, that be was born in your kingdom of parents who were faithful and devoted to you, and that he had been made a prebend in the church at York, which was a far greater and higher situation than that of Paris; win.nee, not only by reason of flesh and blood, but also by his holding ecclesiastical bout fits and office, he was proved to have a sincere affection for you and your kingdom. Put your messengers gave to us ano!her reason for your not giving your consent to his election, which was forsooth, because you had never been asked for it by