[531] Ord. Vit. 769 C. “Currus etiam pilis atque sagittis onustos illuc bobus pertrahi faciam. Sed ego ipse cum multis legionibus armatorum bubulcos alacriter boantes ad portas tuas præcedam. Hæc verissime credito et complicibus tuis edicito.” All this talk is at least very characteristic of William Rufus.
[532] Ord. Vit. 770 C. “Helias comes Goiffredum Britonem, decanum ejusdem ecclesiæ, ad episcopatum elegit.” See above, [p. 201].
[533] Vet. An. 303. “A domno Hoello venerabilis memoriæ episcopo Cenomannensis ecclesiæ scholarum magister et archidiaconus factus.” He was “ex Lavarzinensi castro, mediocribus quidem sed honestis exortus parentibus.” On his relations to Helias see [Appendix KK].
[534] Ord. Vit. 770 C. “Præveniens clerus Hildebertum de Lavarceio archidiaconum in cathedra pontificali residere compulit, et altæ vocis cum jubilatione tripudians cantavit Te Deum laudamus, et cetera quæ usus in electione præsulis exposcit ecclesiasticus.” An. Vet. 303. “Post discessum ipsius [Hoelli] proper scientiæ et honestatis suæ meritum, communi cleri plebisque assensu in ejus loco substitutus est.”
[535] Ord. Vit. u. s. “Quod Helias ut comperiit, valde iratus resistere voluit. Sed clericis dicentibus illi, Electionem tuam ecclesiasticæ præferre non debes electioni, reveritus, quia Deum timebat, siluit et, ne letale in membris ecclesiæ schisma fieret, canonicis consensit.” For Saint Eadward’s opposite conduct in the like case, see N. C. vol. ii. p. 120.
[536] Ib. “Goiffredus quippe de præsulatu securus erat, jamque copiosas dapes pro sublimatione sui præparaverat. Paratæ quidem dapes ab avidis comessoribus absumptæ sunt. Sed ipsum Cenomanni episcopum habere penitus recusaverunt.” He then mentions his promotion to Rouen.
[537] The story of Hildebert’s dealings with the heretic Henry are told at large by the Biographer, 312 et seqq. See also Milman, Latin Christianity, iv. 176.
[538] Vet. An. 326. He became Archbishop, “concedente Ludovico rege Francorum, Cenomannensibus et Turonensibus clericis et populis devotum præbentibus assensum.” The King therefore kept at Tours the right of advowson which he had lost at Le Mans. But had Hildebert, like Anselm (see vol. i. pp. 397, 404), to get leave from his church to go away, or had Cenomannian electors any share in choosing the Metropolitan? Orderic (770 D) says that he was chosen “a clero et populo,” seemingly of Tours, and “nutu Dei.” He does not mention any action on the part of Le Mans.
[540] Vet. An. 305. “Eo tempore inter regem Anglorum et Heliam comitem bellum gravissimum exortum est, pro eo scilicet quod idem rex Cenomannensem episcopatum calumniabatur [cf. N. C. vol. iii. p. 194], ideoque ordinationi episcopi moliebatur obsistere.”