As soon as the justiciars in England heard of their sovereign’s captivity they took what steps they could in his behalf. They sent Bishop Savaric of Bath, who claimed some kinship with the house of Hohenstaufen, to negotiate with the Emperor for his release,[1079] and they endeavoured to ascertain where he was confined. All the world knows the story, put into its earliest and most charming literary shape by a French minstrel some seventy years later, which has for all after-time linked the name of its hero Blondel with that of the royal _trouveur_.[1080] Blondel de Nesle, a _trouveur_ of some distinction, was a contemporary of Richard, and the story in itself is not impossible. The minstrel of Reims represents Blondel as having found Richard in the custody of the duke of Austria; if so, he must have set out at the very first tidings of the capture. The searchers officially sent from England, the abbots of Boxley and Robertsbridge, evidently went after the object of their search was known to have been transferred into the hands of the Emperor. They “wandered over all Alemannia” (western Germany or Suabia) “without finding him,” till they met him on Palm Sunday (March 21) at Ochsenfurt on his way to Spire. His guards evidently allowed them to confer with him freely; he was naturally delighted at the meeting, and questioned them eagerly about the state of his realm and the attitude of his vassals.[1081] The tidings they had to give him were not altogether satisfactory. England was tranquil and loyal, in spite of John’s efforts to make it otherwise. In Aquitaine a rising of the count of Périgord, the viscount of La Marche, and “nearly all the Gascon barons,” had been crushed by the seneschal of Gascony with the help of Richard’s brother-in-law, the son of the king of Navarre, and the victors had swept the country almost to the gates of Toulouse.[1082] But the Norman and Angevin lands sorely [Sidenote: 1191 _Dec._] needed the presence of their lord. At the close of 1191 King Philip had reached Paris, and invited or summoned the seneschal and magnates of Normandy to a meeting which [Sidenote: 1192] took place at Gisors on January 20, 1192.[1083] He demanded the restitution of Aloysia (who was in the tower at Rouen) [Sidenote: _Jan._] and of Gisors, and the cession of the counties of Eu and Aumale, in virtue, seemingly, of a document which he exhibited as “the agreement made between himself and the king of England at Messina.” They answered that they had no orders from Richard on the subject and would not act without them.[1084] Philip then invited John to come over from England and receive investiture of all Richard’s continental territories, and the hand of Aloysia. John was nothing loth, but was detained in England by a threat from his mother and the justiciars to seize all his castles there if he crossed the sea. Next, Philip summoned his host for an invasion of Normandy; but his barons refused to attack