Its nobles were like the robber-nobles of the Rhine: "they rode the country
by night," wrote the Earl, "like thieves, in parties of twenty or thirty or
forty," and gathered in leagues against the Seneschal, who set himself to
exact their dues to the Crown and to shield merchant and husbandman from
their violence. For four years Earl Simon steadily warred down these robber
bands, storming castles where there was need, and bridling the wilder
country with a chain of forts. Hard as the task was, his real difficulty
lay at home. Henry sent neither money nor men; and the Earl had to raise
both from his own resources, while the men whom he was fighting found
friends in Henry's council-chamber. Again and again Simon was recalled to
answer charges of tyranny and extortion made by the Gascon nobles and
pressed by his enemies at home on the king. Henry's feeble and impulsive
temper left him open to pressure like this; and though each absence of the
Earl from the province was a signal for fresh outbreaks of disorder which
only his presence repressed, the deputies of its nobles were still admitted
to the council-table and commissions sent over to report on the Seneschal's
administration. The strife came to a head in 1252, when the commissioners
reported that stern as Simon's rule had been the case was one in which
sternness was needful. The English barons supported Simon, and in the face
of their verdict Henry was powerless. But the king was now wholly with his
enemies; and his anger broke out in a violent altercation. The Earl offered
to resign his post if the money he had spent was repaid him, and appealed
to Henry's word. Henry hotly retorted that he was bound by no promise to a
false traitor. Simon at once gave Henry the lie; "and but that thou bearest
the name of king it had been a bad hour for thee when thou utteredst such a
word!" A formal reconciliation was brought about, and the Earl once more
returned to Gascony, but before winter had come he was forced to withdraw
to France. The greatness of his reputation was shown in an offer which its
nobles made him of the regency of their realm during the absence of King
Lewis from the land. But the offer was refused; and Henry, who had himself