fatal sentence against the Emperor directly.

[Sidenote: His imperial schemes.]

Henry meditated one more step which would have rendered the Pope
powerless. Frederick, with the mere prospect of the Sicilian
succession for his son, desired to make the imperial title hereditary;
much more was Henry, the active sovereign of Sicily, anxious to
accomplish this. The lay princes could have been bribed to consent by
the recognition of hereditary succession to their fiefs. But the
German ecclesiastics, with the Pope at their back, had no desire to
increase the power of the Emperor, and the utmost that Henry could
secure was the election as German King, and therefore King of the
Romans, of his two-year-old son Frederick.

[Sidenote: His death.]

Henry's projects stretched out beyond the lands under his rule. The
death of Saladin encouraged the idea of a new crusade. Henry as
crusader might propitiate the Pope. But such an expedition once
started might have been diverted, as indeed happened a few years
later, for an attack upon Constantinople, which should lead to the
union of both empires under the ambitious Hohenstaufen. Pretexts were
not wanting. Henry collected a number of German crusaders upon the
coast of Italy, and many of these had actually sailed for Palestine
when everything was changed by Henry's sudden death on September 28,
1197. He had reigned eight years, and was only thirty-two years of
age. Despite his youthful age and his short reign he had raised the
imperial power to a height which it had scarcely ever touched before
and which it was never to reach again. Endowed with ability at least