He is restored to his bishopric. September 3, 1091.
His renewed influence with the King. will, and William, on his march to Scotland, personally put the Bishop once more in possession of his see and of all its rights and belongings, temporal and spiritual.[1] Bishop William did not come back empty-handed; he brought with him costly gifts for his church, ornaments, gold and silver vessels, and, above all, many books.[2] And, at some time before the year was out, we find him confirming with great solemnity, with the witness of the great men of the realm, certain grants of the Conqueror to the monks of his church.[3] The return of the Bishop was an event not only of local but of national importance. He was restored by the King, not only to his formal favour, but to a high place in his innermost counsels. Bishop William was not one of those who come back from banishment having learned nothing and forgotten nothing. He had, in his sojourn beyond the sea, learned an altogether new doctrine as to the relations between bishops and kings.
Loss of the ships. Michaelmas, 1091. The march which had been interrupted by the ceremony at Durham was clearly a slow one. William was at Durham in the first days of September; much later in the month a heavy blow fell on one part of the expedition. The greater part of the ships were lost a few days before the feast of Michaelmas, and we are told that this happened before the King could reach Scotland. The King was therefore several weeks in journeying
- [Footnote: eos episcopus a periculo liberavit, et consilio suo ut obsidio solveretur
effecit."]
- ↑ Sim. Dun. Hist. Eccl. Dun. iv. 8. "Unde rex placatus, universa quæ in Anglia prius habuerat, ei restituit." More formally in the Gesta Regum, 1091; "Veniens Dunelmum, episcopum Willelmum restituit in sedem suam, ipso post annos tres die quo eam reliquit, scilicet tertio idus Septembris." The time of three years is not quite exact; see above, p. 94.
- ↑ Hist. Eccl. Dun. u. s. "Ille nequaquam vacuus rediit, sed non pauca ex auro et argento sacra altaris vasa et diversa ornamenta, sed et libros plurimos ad ecclesiam præmittere curavit."
- ↑ See above, p. 295, and below, p. 305.
