The scene now changed to Innocent’s garden, no doubt some sort of formal garden with clipped plants, for the sure Italian taste changes little. The Pope knew that the great majority of the Council was dead against him with regard to Languedoc. Raymond Roger’s violence had certainly not been calculated to attract wavering churchmen, if any still wavered. But to Innocent that violence showed clearly as the fruit of great wrongs inflicted in the name of the Church over which he ruled, the Church which he passionately desired to have prevail as the arbiter of right and the doer of justice. His sense of his own personal honour, too, was as keen as any in that knightly age. Therefore he was troubled and sought to put his trouble from him among the growing things. Thither the Languedocian bishops, and others of their opinion, pursued him. If Simon had the land, they were saved, they said. If Raymond were returned to power, they and the Church in Languedoc were ruined. At first Innocent resisted, reminding them of the injustice of taking his lands from a Catholic noble like Raymond, and saying that while de Montfort might keep the lands taken from heretics, at least the rights of the widow and orphan must be preserved. But they pressed upon him indignantly, first Fulk speaking, then Theodisius, then the Archbishop of Auch, insisting that such a settlement would give de Montfort nothing, since the Pope held all three counts for Catholics; whereas de Montfort deserved much. They themselves had preached against Raymond as wicked and detestable, to restore him would be to disavow them altogether. Everything must be given outright to de Montfort. Indeed, they dared to say, it was impossible to take from him that which he possessed, for they would be there to defend him. Still Innocent held out. He reproached them with their cruelty, their refusal to compromise, the savage sermons in which they had so far exceeded his will. A few supported him, among them the Abbot of Beaulieu, who was present as Ambassador from John of England, and (for a wonder) Arnaut Amalric. That fierce old man had forced the Pope’s hand more than once in de Montfort’s interest. Now, full of his quarrel with his former friend, he told Innocent to take no one’s counsel but to go his own way. Nevertheless, the voices raised in support of the Pope’s opinion were so few that, at last, Innocent consented that Raymond should be deposed and Simon be Count of Toulouse. The Council so voted in a decree and went home, having legislated in the name of a united Christian Europe, at the apex of the Church’s power.