  It was not long before the Pope would have regrets. In February 1229 a number of students were killed by the forces of the queen-regent, Blanche of Castile, when they intervened in a drunken student riot during Carnival. Outraged, the masters and students appealed to William for redress of their rights, but William failed to take action. The students and masters went on strike, dispersing from Paris and appealing to Pope Gregory IX. It was apparently during this period that William gave the Dominicans their first chair in theology at the university. The Pope, who was to remark that he regretted “having made this man,” rebuked William, appointed a commission to settle the dispute, and ordered William to reinstate the striking masters. Nevertheless, William went on to receive important missions from the Pope in subsequent years, acting, for example, as a papal representative in peace negotiations between France and England in 1231.