The pope had no doubt heard something about the indifferent reputation of the new bishop, for, the very day after his arrival at Langres, he held a conference with the ecclesiastics who had accompanied Gaudri, and plied them with questions concerning him.  “He asked us first,” says Guibert of Nogent, who was in the train, “why we had chosen a man who was unknown to us.  As none of the priests, some of whom did not know even the first rudiments of the Latin language, made any answer to this question, he turned to the abbots.  I was seated between my two colleagues.  As they likewise kept silence, I began to be urged, right and left, to speak.  I was one of those whom this election had displeased; but with culpable timidity I had yielded to the authority of my superiors in dignity.  With the bashfulness of youth I could only with great difficulty and much blushing prevail upon myself to open my mouth.  The discussion was carried on, not in our mother tongue, but in the language of scholars.  I therefore, though with great confusion of mind and face, betook myself to speaking in a manner to tickle the palate of him who was questioning us, wrapping up in artfully arranged form of speech expressions which were softened down, but were not entirely removed from the truth.  I said that we did not know, it was true, to the extent of having been familiar by sight and intercourse with him, the man of whom we had made choice, but that we had received favorable reports of his integrity.  The pope strove to confound my arguments by this quotation from the Gospel:  ‘He that hath seen giveth testimony.’  But as he did not explicitly raise the objection that Gaudri had been elected by desire of the court, all subtle subterfuge on any such point became useless; so I gave it up, and confessed that I could say nothing in opposition to the pontiff’s words; which pleased him very much, for he had less scholarship than would have become his high office.  Clearly perceiving, however, that all the phrases I had piled up in defence of our election had but little weight, I launched out afterwards upon the urgent straits wherein our Church was placed, and on this subject I gave myself the more rein in proportion as the person elected was unfitted for the functions of the episcopate.”

[Illustration:  Burghers of Laon——­220]

Gaudri was indeed very scantily fitted for the office of bishop, as the town of Laon was not slow to perceive.  Scarcely had he been installed when he committed strange outrages.  He had a man’s eyes put out on suspicion of connivance with his enemies; and he tolerated the murder of another in the metropolitan church.  In imitation of rich crusaders on their return from the East, he kept a black slave, whom he employed upon his deeds of vengeance.  The burghers began to be disquieted, and to wax wroth.  During a trip the bishop made to England, they offered a great deal of money to the clergy and knights who ruled in