the cathedral of Bamberg, and signalised his visit by taking Henry’s foundation under his immediate care. It seemed as if the old alliance of Papacy and Empire were renewed. Next year Henry crossed the Brenner at the head of a strong German army, which traversed all Italy, in three divisions, commanded respectively by Henry himself, the Patriarch of Aquileia, and the Archbishop of Cologne. But by the time the Lombard dukes of Capua and Salerno had made their submission, and Henry was marching through Apulia, a deadly sickness raged in his host and compelled its immediate retreat. Next year Henry was back in Germany. It is significant that the office of Count Palatine of Italy ceased to exist during his reign. The Emperor was no longer an effective ruler of the peninsula. In the latter years of his life Henry attached himself still more strongly to the Cluniac party, and, as with Otto III., his friendship for foreign priests brought him into renewed conflict with the German bishops. Aribo, Archbishop of Mainz, led the opposition to Henry and Benedict. But just as the conflict was coming to a head, Benedict VIII. died (1024). He was quickly followed to the grave by Henry himself. With him perished the last king of the male stock of the Ludolfing dukes of Saxony. His dull and featureless reign was but a tame conclusion to the brilliant period of the Ottos. [Sidenote: The two Conrads, 1024.] The ecclesiastical differences that had troubled Germany during Henry II.’s lifetime lay at the root of the party struggles that now raged round the appointment of his successor. As in Henry’s case, there was no specific candidate marked out by birth and special fitness for the choice of the German nation. The bishops, led by Aribo of Mainz and Burkhard of Worms, resolved to take full advantage of this freedom of election to prevent the accession of any prince inclined, like the late Emperor, to favour the spread of Cluniac ideas. They therefore urged the claims of Conrad of Swabia. Conrad was the great-grandson of Conrad the Red and his wife Liutgarde, Otto the Great’s daughter, and consequently nephew of Pope Gregory V., and descended from the Ludolfings on the female side. Though only the possessor of part of his rich family estates in the Rhineland, Conrad had made a lucky marriage with the widowed Gisela, Duchess of Swabia, the granddaughter of Conrad, king of Arles, and a descendant of the Carolingians. This gave him the guardianship of the young Duke Ernest of Swabia, Gisela’s son by her former husband, and secured for him a leading position among the German magnates. Conrad was a valiant and experienced warrior, and an intelligent statesman, possessing a clear head and a strong will, resolutely bent on securing practical objects immediately within reach. He had persistently held aloof from the ecclesiastical policy of his predecessor, with whom he had been more than once in open feud. He was