on, and Peter Abailard, an able student of the Paris
University, held a controversy with Bernard, in which we see the first
struggle between intellect and authority. Bernard roused the young king,
Louis VII., to go on the second crusade, which was undertaken by the
Emperor and the other princes of Europe to relieve the distress of the
kingdom of Palestine. France had no navy, so the war was by land,
through the rugged hills of Asia Minor, where the army was almost
destroyed by the Saracens. Though Louis did reach Palestine, it was with
weakened forces; he could effect nothing by his campaign, and Eleanor,
who had accompanied him, seems to have been entirely corrupted by the
evil habits of the Franks settled in the East. Soon after his return,
Louis dissolved his marriage; and Eleanor became the wife of Henry,
Count of Anjou, who soon after inherited the kingdom of England as our
Henry II., as well as the duchy of Normandy, and betrothed his third son
to the heiress of Brittany. Eleanor's marriage seemed to undo all that
Louis VI. had done in raising the royal power; for Henry completely
overshadowed Louis, whose only resource was in feeble endeavours to take
part against him in his many family quarrels. The whole reign of Louis
the Young, the title that adhered to him on account of his simple,
childish nature, is only a record of weakness and disaster, till he died
in 1180. What life went on in France, went on principally in the south.
The lands of Aquitaine and Provence had never dropped the old classical
love of poetry and art. A softer form of broken Latin was then spoken,
and the art of minstrelsy was frequent among all ranks. Poets were
called troubadours and _trouveres_ (finders). Courts of love were held,
where there were competitions in poetry, the prize being a golden
violet; and many of the bravest warriors were also distinguished
troubadours--among them the elder sons of Queen Eleanor. There was much
license of manners, much turbulence; and as the Aquitanians hated
Angevin rule, the troubadours never ceased to stir up the sons of Henry
II. against him.

7. Philip II. (1180--1223).--Powerful in fact as Henry II. was, it was
his gathering so large a part of France under his rule which was, in the
end, to build up the greatness of the French kings. What had held them
in check was the existence of the great fiefs or provinces, each with
its own line of dukes or counts, and all practically independent of the
kin