It then occurred to the elder brother Gilbert that his father had suffered no rival to share his dominions; and, after ascertaining the sentiments of his immediate adherents, he determined upon entrusting a body of men to his son, Malcolm, with instructions to remove all impediments from his path to undivided power. The son was worthy of the father, and surprising the unsuspecting Uchtred in his island home, he tore out his eyes and tongue, and then, with still more atrocious barbarity, left him in this state to perish slowly and in agony. So speedily had this tragedy been enacted, that when Henry dispatched his chaplain, Roger Hoveden, from Normandy, with directions to put himself in communication with Robert de Vaux at Carlisle, and to negotiate with the lords of Galloway about the transfer of their allegiance to the English crown, the envoys, upon their arrival in Galloway, found Gilbert sole ruler of the province. He entered with eagerness upon the subject of their mission, guaranteeing a yearly tribute of two thousand marks of silver, and a thousand head of cattle and hogs, if Henry would release him from his dependance upon the king of Scotland; but as the envoys possessed no power to conclude an arrangement without submitting the terms to Henry, they could only promise to lay the proposal before their king, and, with this reply, they took their leave. [Sidenote: 23d Nov.] As it was late in November before they reached Galloway, by the time they returned to Normandy the convention of Falaise must have been decided upon, if it had not been already completed; and as the clause accepting the homage of William for Galloway precluded Henry from entering into a separate agreement with Gilbert, he availed himself of the crime of the latter as an excuse for breaking off the negotiations, and for refusing to treat upon any terms with the murderer of “his cousin Uchtred.”[426] [Sidenote: A. D. 1175.]