[1026] _Gesta Hen._ (Stubbs), vol. i. pp. 245, 246. Rog. Howden (Stubbs), vol. ii. p. 197. R. Diceto (Stubbs), vol. ii. p. 5. Rob. Torigni, a. 1181. This last writer, whose chronology has now become extremely confused, puts the event a year too late. So does Rigord (Duchesne, _Hist. Franc. Scriptt._, vol. v.), p. 7. Rigord indeed gives an account of the matter so different from that of the English writers--_e.g._ he represents it as taking place publicly, amid a great concourse of spectators--that one might almost suppose he was relating a second coronation, performed in the following year. But there seems no other record of any such thing; and there are some details in his story which point to a different conclusion. Not only does he, too, name the archbishop of Sens as the consecrator--an outrage upon Reims which could not possibly have been repeated--but he betrays his own confusion by giving the date as June 1, 1181, and then describing the day as Ascension-day, which in 1181 fell on May 14, but which really was the day of the crowning in 1180 (May 29). The truth is that the panegyrists of Philip Augustus are obliged to slur over this first disgraceful year of his reign as rapidly and confusedly as they can. [1027] _Gesta Hen._ as above, p. 246. Rog. Howden as above. There was a story that young Henry of Anjou, standing close behind his brother-in-law Philip on his first coronation-day in Reims cathedral, had bent forward to hold the crown upon the boy’s head, and thus relieve him of its weight and keep it safely in its place.[1028] The little act of brotherly kindness and protecting care may be taken as typical of the political attitude which Henry’s father actually assumed towards the boy-king of the French, and which he faithfully maintained until Philip himself rendered its maintenance impossible. It was in truth no new thing for a count of Anjou to act as the protector of a king of France. But we may fairly question whether this traditional function of the Angevin house had ever been fulfilled so honestly and unselfishly as it was by Henry during the first two years of Philip’s reign. It was Henry alone who, by his personal influence and tact, brought Philip himself to reason and the count of Flanders to submission.[1029] Next year, when Philip had been left sole king of France by the death of Louis VII.,[1030] it was Henry whose mediation checked an attempt of the Flemish count to avenge by force of arms the loss of his influence at court;[1031] and when a few months later the house of Blois, with characteristic inconstancy, made common cause with Flanders against France, it was the prompt and vigorous action of Henry’s sons which alone saved the royal domain from invasion on all sides at once, and enabled their young sovereign to hold out