With regard to this last marriage, it is to be observed that in the speech which Orderic puts into the mouth of Elias of La Flèche, addressing Hugh of Este (_ib._ p. 684), he says nothing about his mother at all, but makes him trace his descent from Herbert Wake-dog through his grandmother, whom he calls Herbert’s daughter: “Filia Herberti comitis Lancelino de Balgenceio nupsit, eique ... Joannem meum genitorem peperit.” The name of John’s wife, Paula, comes from another passage of Orderic (_ib._ p. 768); but he there says nothing about her parentage, merely calling her son Elias “Hugonis Cenomannorum consulis consobrinus.” The houses of Le Mans and La Flèche cannot have intermarried twice in two succeeding generations; one of Orderic’s statements must be wrong; but which, I cannot decide. The last point is the parentage of Gersendis, the wife of Azzo of Este; and as the whole tone of Elias’s speech (as above) implies that he and her son were related to the counts of Le Mans in the same degree, the solution of this question might almost be held to decide the previous one also. This seems to be Mr. Freeman’s opinion, and he regards Orderic’s statement quoted above as conclusive that Gersendis and Paula were both daughters of Hugh II., and sisters therefore of Margaret and Herbert II., in spite of the biographer of the bishops of Le Mans (Mabillon, _Vet. Anal._, p. 308), who expressly says that Gersendis was a daughter of Herbert Wake-dog, and the continuator of Will. Jumièges, who says:--“Cenomannenses ... consilium ineunt cum Heliâ filio Joannis de Flecâ ... ut _filiam cujusdam comitis Langobardiæ, neptem videlicet Hereberti quondam Cenomannensis comitis ex primogenitâ filiâ_, in matrimonium ducat.” Will. Jumièges, l. viii. c. 5 (Duchesne, _Hist. Norm. Scriptt._, p. 294). This re-appears in R. Diceto (Stubbs, vol. i. pp. 183, 184; Marchegay, _Comtes_, p. 334) in the following form:--“Helias, filius Johannis de Flecâ, Sibillam, filiam cujusdam comitis Longobardiæ, neptem scilicet Hereberti quondam Cenomannorum comitis, duxit uxorem, et cum eâ comitatum Cenomanniæ suscepit.” But this is certainly wrong; for the first wife of Elias was Matilda of Château-du-Loir, and the second was Agnes of Perche.