certain that confronting them he bated no jot of heart or hope. He appears to us at first as very cautious, very desirous of giving the adversary no occasion to blaspheme. The summons issued in the name of the late Pope to Henry requiring him to appear and answer in Rome the charges made against him, seems to have been dropped at Alexander's death: and when his messengers came over the Alps demanding by what right a Pope had been consecrated without his consent, Gregory made mild reply that he was not consecrated, but was awaiting not the nomination but the consent of the Emperor, and that not till that had been received would he carry out the final rites. These were eventually performed with some sort of acquiescence from Henry, given through his wise and prudent ambassador, on the Feast of St. Peter, the 29th June, 1073. Gregory did what he could, as appears, to continue this mild treatment of Henry with all regard to his great position and power. He attempted to call together a very intimate council to discuss the state of affairs between the King and himself: a council of singular construction, which, but that the questions as to the influence and place of women are questions as old as history, and have been decided by every age according to no formal law but the character of the individuals before them, might be taken for an example of enlightenment before his time in Gregory's mind. He invited Duke Rudolf of Suabia, one of Henry's greatest subjects, a man of religious character and much reverence for the Holy See, to come to Rome, and in common with himself, the Empress Agnes, the two Countesses of Tuscany, the Bishop of Como (who was the confessor of Agnes), and other God-fearing persons, to consider the crisis at which the Church had arrived, and to hear and give advice upon the Pope's intentions and projects. The French historian Villemain throws discredit upon this projected consultation of "an ambitious vassal of the King of Germany and three women, one of whom had once been a prisoner in the camp of Henry III., the other had been brought up from infancy in the hate of the empire and the love of the Church, and the last was a fallen empress who was more the penitent of Rome than the mother of Henry." This seems, however, a futile enumeration. There could surely be no better defender found for a son accused than his mother, who we have no reason to suppose was ever estranged from him personally, and who shortly after went upon an embassy to him, and was received with every honour. Beatrice, on the other hand, had been the prisoner of his father the great Emperor, and not of young Henry of whom she was the relative and friend, and between whom and the Pope, as all good statesmen must have seen, it was of the greatest importance to Europe that there should be peace; while any strong personal feeling which might exist would be modified by Gregory himself, by Raymond of Como, and the wisest heads of Rome.