One difficulty remains: the Biographer’s assertion that the second truce was made “sanz le Mareschal.” It seems impossible that this can be correct; no “general truce” between Henry and Louis, such as is clearly indicated by the letters patent, could have been made “without the Marshal,” _i.e._, without his participation and sanction as governor of King and kingdom. We may, perhaps, account for the Biographer’s mistake--for mistake it must surely be--somewhat as follows. The policy of the Royalist leaders in negotiating truces on such terms was doubtless too subtle for the understanding of most of the rank and file of their party; it seems to have been too profound for the understanding of the sturdy German constable of Berkhamsted, perhaps also for those of Falkes’s Norman lieutenant at Hertford and of the constable of Hedingham. The Marshal’s biographer evidently did not comprehend its object at all, and so disapproved of it utterly. He hints at his disapproval of the cession of Hertford and Berkhamsted--“Seisis en fu, _fust dreit ou tort_”; he gives us his undisguised opinion that when “cil qui aveient la baillie autre trieve de vint jors pristrent” at the price of evacuating Orford and Norwich, “_si mespristrent_.” On the other hand, he was not willing to admit that his hero could do wrong; so he decided--with a bold disregard of what was implied in his own statement that the terms were arranged by “cil qui aveient la baillie”--that this “mistake” must somehow have been made without the Marshal’s concurrence. NOTE II THE BLOCKED GATE AT LINCOLN The story of Bishop Peter’s discovery of the blocked gate runs thus: “Par un postiz a pie eissi En la vile, car il voleit Veeir coument ele seeit. E comme il esgardout issi, Une vielle porte choisi Qui ert de grant antequite E qui les murs de la cite Joigneit ovec cels del chastel. Quant il la vit, molt li fu bel, Mes el fu ancienement Close de piere e de ciment, Si que nuls entrer n’i puust Por nul besoing qu’il en eust. Quant li evesques ont veue Cele porte e aparceue, Por le chastel plus enforcier La fist abatre e trebuchier, E que l’ost veist e seust Que seure entree i eust.” (_Hist. G. le Mar._, ll. 16500–16518.)