Bishop Gosfrith with his nephew, depopulating Bath, and Berkeley, and part of the county of Wilts, treasured up their spoils at Bristol. Roger Montgomery sending out his army with the Welsh from Shrewsbury, plundered Worcestershire. They had now hostilely approached Worcester, when the king's soldiers who guarded it, relying on the blessing of bishop Wulstan, to whom the custody of the castle was committed, though few in number, dispersed this multitude; and after wounding and killing many, took some of them prisoners. Moreover, Roger Bigod at Norwich, and Hugo de Grentmeisnil at Leicester, each with their party, were plundering in their respective neighbourhoods. In vain, however, did the whole power of revolt rage against a man, who was deficient neither in prudence nor in good fortune. For seeing almost all the Normans leagued in one furious conspiracy, he sent alluring letters, summoning to him such brave and honest English as yet remained; and complaining to them on the subject of his wrongs, he bound them to his party, by promising them wholesome laws, a diminution of tribute, and free leave to hunt.[1] With equal cunning he circumvented Roger Montgomery, when riding with him, with dissembled perfidy; for taking him aside, he loaded him with odium, saying, that he would willingly retire from the government, if it seemed meet to him and to the rest whom his father had left as his guardians; that he could not understand, why they were so outrageous; if they wanted money, they might have what they pleased; if an increase of their estates, they might have that also; in short, they might have whatever they chose; only let them be careful that the judgment of his father was not called in question: for, if they thought it ought to be disregarded in the instance of himself, it might be a bad example for them: for the same person made him king, who had made them earls. Excited by these words and promises, the earl, who, next to Odo, had been the chief leader of the faction, was the first to desert. Proceeding, therefore, immediately against the rebels, he laid siege to the castles of his uncle at Tunbridge and at Pevensey, and seizing him in the latter compelled him to swear, as he dictated, that he would depart England, and deliver up Rochester. To fulfil this promise he sent him
- ↑ On their own lands, it should seem from Sax. Chron., p. 465.
