ADRIAN IV.--ALEXANDER III.--BECKET.--THE THIRD CRUSADE. A.D. 1153-1192. In the year of Bernard's death Adrian IV. was chosen pope; and he is especially to be noted by us because he was the only Englishman who ever held the papacy. His name at first was Nicolas Breakspeare; and he was born near St. Albans, where, in his youth, he asked to be received into the famous abbey as a monk. But the monks of St. Albans refused him; and he then went to seek his fortune abroad, where he rose step by step, until at length the poor Hertfordshire lad, who would have had no chance of any great place in his own country (for he was of Saxon family, and the Normans, after the Conquest, kept all the good places for themselves), was chosen to be the head of Christendom (A.D. 1154). Adrian had a high notion of the greatness and dignity of his office. When the emperor Frederick I. (who is called _Barbarossa_, or _Redbeard_) went from Germany into Italy, and was visited in his camp by the pope, Adrian required that the emperor should hold his stirrup as he mounted his horse, and said that such had been the custom from the time of the great Constantine. Frederick had never heard of such a thing before, and was not willing to submit; but on inquiry he found that a late emperor, Lothair III., had held a pope's stirrup, and then he agreed to do the like. But he took care to do it so awkwardly that every one who saw it began to laugh; and thus he made his submission appear like a joke. Frederick Redbeard carried on a long struggle with the popes. When, at Adrian's death, two rival popes had been chosen (A.D. 1159), the emperor required them to let him judge between their claims; and, as one of them, Alexander III., refused to admit any earthly judge, Frederick took part with the other, who called himself Victor IV. And when Victor was dead, Frederick set up three more anti-popes, one after another, to oppose Alexander. But Alexander had the kings of France and England on his side, and at last he not only got himself firmly settled, but brought Frederick to entreat for peace with him, and with some cities of North Italy, which had formed themselves into what was called the Lombard League (A.D. 1177). But we must not believe a story that, when this treaty was concluded in the great church of St. Mark at Venice, the pope put his foot on the emperor's neck, and the choir chanted the words of the 91st Psalm, "Thou shalt go upon the lion and the adder:" for this story was not made up until long after, and has no truth at all in it.