Nothing, perhaps, more forcibly illustrates the sturdy independence and inflexible determination of the old Lancashire divine than his uncompromising resistance to the unjust attempt made by Elizabeth to appropriate to her own use, or that of some of her favourites, a portion of the temporalities of his bishopric. The revenues of the Cathedral church of Durham had attracted the cupidity of the sordid minions of the Court, who were anxious to enlarge their hereditary estates by the seizure of the Church's lands, and, at their instigation, the Queen, following the example of her father, Henry VIII., on Pilkington's nomination, had excepted out of the restitution several valuable manors and estates, a procedure that the newly-enthroned prelate, whose manly spirit, disdaining the slavish obsequiousness which characterised many of his episcopal brethren, refused to acquiesce in. He at once took measures for the recovery of the detained estates, and prosecuted his claim with so much firmness and energy, that Elizabeth, who was wont to speak of "unfrocking" contumacious bishops, had in the long run to yield, and Pilkington in 1566 had the good fortune to obtain the restoration of the whole of his lands, with the exception of Norhamshire, charged, however, with the payment of an annuity to the crown of £1,020. The bishop was no respecter of persons. If he was ready to brave the displeasure of the Queen in guarding the rights of the Church in his own diocese, he was equally willing to defend her interests elsewhere, and, as we shall hereafter see, did not scruple even to rebuke both a bishop and an archbishop in doing so. [Illustration: INTERIOR OF DURHAM CATHEDRAL.]