stle and convent to convent, and treated with iniquitous and
shocking severity. Pope Celestine, after examination, annulled the
decision of the council of Compiegne touching the pretended
consanguinity, leaving in suspense the question of divorce, and,
consequently, without breaking the tie of marriage between the king and
the Danish princess. "I have seen," he wrote to the Archbishop of Sens,
"the genealogy sent to me by the bishops, and it is due to that
inspection and the uproar caused by this scandal that I have annulled the
decree; take care now, therefore, that Philip do not marry again, and so
break the tie which still unites him to the Church." Philip paid no heed
to this canonical injunction; his heart was set upon marrying again; and,
after having unsuccessfully sought the band of two German princesses, on
the borders of the Rhine, who were alarmed by the fate of Ingeburga, he
obtained that of a princess, a Tyrolese by origin, Agnes (according to
others, Mary) of Merania, that is, Moravia (an Austrian province, in
German _Moehren,_ out of which the chroniclers of the time made Meranie
or Merania, the name that has remained in the history of Agnes). She was
the daughter of Berthold, Marquis of Istria, whom, about 1180, the
Emperor Frederick Barbarossa had made Duke of Moravia. According to all
contemporary chronicles, Agnes was not only beautiful, but charming; she
made a great impression at the court of France; and Philip Augustus,
after his marriage with her in June, 1196, became infatuated with her.
But a pope more stern and bold than Celestine III., Innocent III., had
just been raised to the Holy See, and was exerting himself, in court as
well as monastery, to effect a reformation of morals. Immediately after
his accession, he concerned himself with the conjugal irregularity in
which the King of France was living. "My predecessor, Celestine," he
wrote to the Bishop of Paris, "would fain have put a stop to this
scandal, but he was unsuccessful; as for me, I am quite resolved to
prosecute his work, and obtain by all and any means fulfilment of God's
law. Be instant in speaking thereof to the king on my behalf; and tell
him that his obstinate refusals may probably bring upon him both the
wrath of God and the thunders of the Church." And indeed Philip's
refusals were very obstinate; for the pride of the king and the feelings
of the man were equally wounded. "I had rather lose half my domains,"
said he,