But Henry succeeded in wresting the seal from him and naming to this as to other offices at his pleasure.

His policy was to entrust all high posts of government to mere clerks of the royal chapel; trained administrators, but wholly dependent on the royal will.

He found equally dependent agents of administration by surrounding himself with foreigners.
The return of Peter des Roches to the royal councils was the first sign of the new system; and hosts of hungry Poitevins and Bretons were summoned over to occupy the royal castles and fill the judicial and administrative posts about the Court.

The king's marriage in 1236 to Eleanor of Provence was followed by the arrival in England of the new queen's uncles.

The "Savoy," as his house in the Strand was named, still recalls Peter of Savoy who arrived five years later to take for a while the chief place at Henry's council-board; another brother, Boniface, was consecrated on Archbishop Edmund's death to the highest post in the realm save the Crown itself, the Archbishoprick of Canterbury.