Early in November envoys from France brought letters from Philip setting forth that he and his barons had sworn on the Gospels to be at Vézelay ready to start on the Crusade at the close of Easter (April 1, 1190), and begging that Richard would take an oath to the same effect. Richard exacted from the envoys an oath “on the King of France’s soul” that this pledge should be fulfilled on the French side; then he called a great council in London and there caused one of his chief counsellors to take a like oath on his behalf in presence of the Frenchmen.[422] After this the king went on pilgrimage to S. Edmund’s on the festival of its patron saint.[423] Soon afterwards he was at Canterbury,[424] making peace between the archbishop and the monks, who had long been at strife.[425] The settlement was destined to be only temporary, but for the moment it was a triumph both of Richard’s kingly power and of his personal tact; the dispute had been a scandal which had baffled Henry II, and a legate sent by the Pope to deal with it had landed at Dover on November 20 (when Richard was at S. Edmund’s), but had been by Eleanor’s order forbidden to proceed inland, his mission having no sanction from the king.[426] Richard, however, wanted to make use of him for two other purposes: the confirmation of Geoffrey’s election to the see of York, and the raising of an Interdict laid by Archbishop Baldwin on John’s lands in consequence of the marriage of John and Isabel of Gloucester, who were cousins within the prohibited degrees. Accordingly the legate was entertained at Canterbury for two nights; he did what the king desired of him and then departed out of the realm.[427]