Six months after the consecration of the new archbishop, King Henry crossed from Normandy to England, at the end of January, 1163, but before he did so word had come to him from Becket which was like a declaration of principles. Henry had hoped to have him at the same time primate of the Church and his own chancellor. Not merely would this add a distinction to his court, but we may believe that the king would regard it as a part of the co-operation between Church and State in the reforms he had in mind. To Thomas the retention of his old office would probably mean a pledge not to oppose the royal will in the plans which he no doubt foresaw. It would also interfere seriously with the new manner of life which he proposed for himself, and he firmly declined to continue in the old office. In other ways, unimportant as yet, the policy of the primate as it developed was coming into collision with the king's interests, in his determined pushing of the rights of his Church to every piece of land to which it could lay any claim, in some cases directly against the king, and in his refusal to allow clerks in the service of the State to hold preferments in the Church, of which he had himself been guilty; but all these things were still rather signs of what might be expected than important in themselves. There was for several months no breach between the king and the archbishop. For some time after his return to England Henry was occupied, as he had been of late on the continent, with minor details of government of no permanent importance. The treaty of alliance with Count Dietrich of Flanders was renewed. Gilbert Foliot was translated to the important bishopric of London. A campaign in South Wales brought the prince of that country to terms, and was followed by homage from him and other Welsh princes rendered at a great council held at Woodstock during the first week of July, 1163. It was at this meeting that the king first met with open and decided opposition from the archbishop, though this was still in regard to a special point and not to a general line of policy. The revenue of the state which had been left by the last reign in a disordered condition was still the subject of much concern and careful planning. Recently, as our evidence leads us to believe, the king had given up the Danegeld as a tax which had declined in value until it was no longer worth collecting. At Woodstock he made a proposition to the council for an increase in the revenue without an increase in the taxation. It was that the so-called "sheriffs aid," a tax said to be of two shillings on the hide paid to the sheriffs by their counties as a compensation for their services, should be for the future paid into the royal treasury for the use of the crown. That this demand was in the direction of advance and reform can hardly be questioned, especially if, as is at least possible, it was based on the declining importance of the