The sudden outburst of wrath on the part of the baronage in 1258 is explained not only by the fact that all men had lost patience with King Henry, for that had been the case for many years, but much more by the fact that the baronage had at last found a champion and mouthpiece in Simon de Montfort, the great Earl of Leicester. Simon was not one who might have been expected to prove a wise and patriotic statesman and a good Englishman, for he had originally come into notice as one of the king's foreign favourites. His grandmother had been the heiress of the earldom of Leicester, but she had married a Frenchman, the Count of Montfort. Their child was Simon the elder, a great crusading chief and a cruel persecutor of heretics. He was a bitter enemy of King John, and had never been permitted to get hold of the Leicester estates. In 1232 his son Simon the younger came across to England, to beg King Henry to make over to him the confiscated lands of his grandmother's earldom. Henry could never resist a petitioner, especially when he was a foreigner; he not only took Simon into favour and granted him the earldom of Leicester, but he married him to his sister, the Princess Eleanor, and for a time made him his confidant. But the king's sudden friendship did not endure, and ere very long he tired of Simon, and sent him over to govern Guienne, which was always in a state of chronic insurrection. Simon put down rebellion with a strong hand, and made himself unpopular with the Gascons, who sent many complaints of him to the king. But the fatal cause of estrangement between him and the earl was a money matter: Simon had expended large sums in the king's service, using his own money and borrowing more. When he sent in his accounts to Henry, the latter could not or would not pay, and very meanly allowed the loss to fall on Simon (1250). Simon then settled down into opposition to the king, though he was ready enough to serve the realm in all times of danger. He had now been living for many years in England, and his neighbours found him a just and sincere man, and one who had done his best to accustom himself to English ways of life and thought. He was especially beloved by the clergy, who admired his fervent piety and pure life. So it came to pass that the man who had once been known only as the king's favourite, was called Earl Simon the Righteous, and looked upon as the most patriotic and trustworthy of the nobles of the realm. Great men had been singularly wanting among the ranks of the English baronage, since William of Pembroke died and Hubert de Burgh was disgraced. It was not till Simon came to the front as the king's opponent that the nation's discontent with Henry was adequately expressed. [Sidenote: =The Provisions of Oxford.=]