John grew frantic at Richard’s return. In July 1193 Philip had warned him that “the devil is loose again,” and John sought shelter under Philip’s protection. In January Philip and John tried to bribe the Emperor to keep Richard another year. Failing, John sent a clerk to England with letters to his adherents; the messenger was arrested in London, his letters seized, and a council excommunicated John and disseized him of his English tenements. The old bishop of Durham returned to the siege of Tickhill; the earls of Huntingdon, Chester and Ferrers attacked Nottingham; Archbishop Hubert besieged and took Marlborough; Lancaster was given up; S. Michael’s Mount surrendered. Richard had been freed on February 4. He landed at Sandwich on March 13, was solemnly received in London three days later, and after three days’ siege Nottingham surrendered, making him once again undisputed master.
It seemed ungracious when Richard at once demanded the services of a third of the English knighthood, two shillings on every carucate from freeholders, and the whole of the Cistercians’ wool. The carucage, levied to complete the sum still due to Henry VI, was reckoned equivalent to the ancient hide; the Cistercians were allowed a money compensation. At a council at Nottingham at the end of March measures were taken for the punishment of traitors, though none were threatened with worse than dismissal from office. Geoffrey of York bought the sheriffdom of Yorkshire for three thousand marks. Hugh of Durham resigned Northumberland into the king’s hands. William of Scotland opened negotiations for its re-purchase, but the barons resented the proposal.
Richard made a progress through Mid-England and “wore his crown” at Winchester on the first Sunday after Easter, reasserting the majesty of the island-crown dimmed by his acceptance of the investiture of the kingdom of Burgundy from Henry VI. England was ready to welcome him as a new king, but on May 12 he sailed again for Normandy and never returned.
CHAPTER VIII.
The political history of England during the four years after Richard’s departure is the history of Hubert Walter’s administration. Richard never interfered in the island realm save to obtain money. Hubert, as justiciar and archbishop, wielded a power as absolute as William of Longchamp’s had been, but with far better qualifications. Trained under Ralf de Glanville, a former clerk in his household, dean of York and bishop of Salisbury from October 1189, he had accompanied Baldwin to Palestine and made himself Richard’s best adviser. He entered upon his vice-royalty under favourable conditions: an Englishman of high standing, familiar with the people and the system, with no one capable of heading opposition in secular affairs. William of Longchamp had left England for ever; John was dependent on Richard’s bounty; Geoffrey of York was discredited—his chapter obtained a papal sentence in June 1194 condemning him without trial, and royal justices confiscated all his archiepiscopal estates except Ripon. Hugh of Durham died at Howden on March 3, and his palatinate was taken into the custody of the royal justiciars. Two weeks later Celestine III sent Hubert a commission as legate for all England.
Hubert was more statesman than churchman. His first act was to despatch the judges itinerant, extending the principles of the Assizes of Clarendon and Northampton: the grand jury of sworn recognitors was extended to all judicial work; four knights chosen from the whole shire were to elect two out of every hundred, and these two to choose ten others; three knights and a clerk were appointed in every shire to keep the pleas of the Crown—the origin of the office of coroner; no sheriff was to act as justiciar in his own shire. In 1195 an edict required every man above fifteen to take an oath to preserve the king’s peace and join in the pursuit of malefactors, out of which grew the office of conservators and later justices of the peace. In the same year Hubert visited the northern province and held a council at York where fifteen canons were passed.
The most laborious part of Hubert’s task was to extract money from a country drained again and again. By Michaelmas 1194 the ransom accounts were closed. Richard resorted to two measures: a license for tournaments in England, the proceeds collected by Hubert’s brother Theobald Walter; and declaring all acts passed under the old seal null and void till brought for confirmation under the new one. In the following spring Robert, abbot of S. Stephen’s at Caen, was sent to conduct an inquiry Hubert had postponed in 1194; the abbot fell ill at Hubert’s table on Passion Sunday and died five days later.
Taxes pressed most severely on London. The substitution of the commune for the older shire-organization in 1191 had placed control in the hands of a mayor and aldermen, who assessed taxes oppressively. William Fitz-Osbert, “William with the Long Beard,” became the champion of the poor, withstood his fellow-aldermen, gathered followers, and after a visit to Normandy began boasting of the king’s favour. Hubert called the citizens together, obtained hostages, and ordered his arrest. William set his authority at defiance, preaching in the streets and at last in S. Paul, proclaiming himself “the king and saviour of the poor.” An armed party was sent; William killed one of the guides with a hatchet and took sanctuary in S. Mary-at-Bow. Hubert ordered the church set on fire; William, driven out, was stabbed on the threshold, carried to the Tower, condemned, dragged through the city, and hanged with eight adherents. The common people revered him as a martyr. Overwhelmed with obloquy, Hubert for a moment threw up the justiciarship, resuming it as soon as Richard’s confidence was assured.
In December 1197 Richard demanded three hundred knights at the barons’ cost or a sum to enlist mercenaries. At Oxford on December 7 Hubert proposed that the barons, including bishops, supply three hundred knights. Hubert and the bishop of London declared their readiness; Bishop Hugh of Lincoln refused—the church of Lincoln owed military service only in England, and he would sooner return to his hermit’s cell than bring unwonted burdens upon her—and Bishop Herbert of Salisbury echoed him. Hubert broke up the assembly in a fury. Richard ordered the property of the two bishops confiscated; no one dared touch Hugh’s. Hugh went to seek Richard and forced him into reconciliation on S. Augustine’s day; Herbert had to purchase his restoration heavily. The death of Rees Ap-Griffith gave Hubert a chance to restore his fading laurels by an expedition to the Welsh marches. Pope Celestine died on January 8, 1198; his successor Innocent III immediately wrote to Richard charging him to suffer no priest to hold a secular office. Hubert had no choice but resign, and Richard no choice but accept.
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