Page:Historyoffranc00yong.djvu/59

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IV.] EXTENSION TO THE SOUTH. 35 over to the secular power for punishment. At this council the fate of Toulouse was debated. Raymond and his son were present, and were kindly received by the Pope, who was much shocked at their account of the barbarities committed in their county. It was decided that Simon should keep the fiefs of the French crown he had won on the right bank of the Rhone, and that those on the left bank, which belonged to the Empire, should be left in the hands of the Church to be restored to the son of the despoiled count, if he showed himself worthy. 4. Death of Simon de Montfort, 1218. — When Ray- mond of Toulouse and his son landed at Marseilles, they found that great city warm in their cause, and no sooner did they raise their standard than all the remains of the Albigenses, and all the Catholics of the South joined them. The war began again ; a new crusade was preached, and Toulouse, which had expelled its garrison, was besieged by Montfort himself in 1218. While hear- ing mass, he was told that the besieged were setting fire to his chief machine. He rose from his knees, saying, " Lord, now lettest Thou Thy servant depart in peace," and a few minutes later was killed by a stone from a mangonel. His dominion died with him. His younger son of his own name was afterwards famous both in England and m Gascony. His elder son, Ainalric^ had married the daughter of the Count of Vieniiois, a prince of the Empire just beyond the Rhone, who bore the title of Dauphin or Dolpliin. He found himself unable to cope with the Southern nobles, though the king's eldest son Lewis the Lion, on returning from England, came to head the crusade. Amalric, finding he could not keep either Beziers or Nimes, offered them to the king, but wary Philip would not plunge into such a war, refused them, let Raymond's son succeed him peaceably in 1222, and permitted the Albigenses to live in peace. 5. Death of Philip IL, 1223. — The papal legate in vain summoned a synod at Sens to force Philip to seize Toulouse. The king was already wasting in low fever, and died on the 14th of July, 1223. He had found France a kingdom of small strength, with a king in constant rivalry with vassals greater than their lord ; he left it a pov/erful state, to which many great fiefs had been annexed, where the king had full weight, and where order was beginning to prevail. 6. Lewis VIII., 1223. — The reign of Lewis VIII. was D 2