appointed no successor to the archbishop, but held the revenues of the see in his own hands. He soon found a more congenial minister than Lanfranc. There was in his court a Norman clerk, of the name of Ralph, of handsome person and fluent speech, sensual and ambitious, to whom the king's steward gave the sobriquet of Flambard. He was a subtle financier. He managed to swell the king's revenues by a stricter admeasurement of the lands of the kingdom than that of Domesday-Book. He and his master seized Church properties, and made exactions upon the laity, with no pretence of justice. The halter was loosened from the robber's neck, if he could promise any gain to the king. The courtiers consumed the substance of the country-people.

Robert, duke of Normandy, was doing wrong to his commonwealth, after a different mode from William, king of England. Robert was destroying the resources of the state by improvident liberality. He had sold a third part of his duchy, the province of Cotentin, to his brother Henry, under some financial pressure. In 1090, the city of Rouen was incited to insurrection, chiefly by the bribes and promises of William. Henry came to the aid of Robert, although they had previously quarrelled ; and through his determined boldness the revolt was quelled. Robert, the duke, had many affairs on his hands at this period. When he was roused by war he appears to have been foremost in battle and siege. The king of England passed many months in Normandy, during the year 1091; and the brothers came to terms of agreement for their future government. Edgar Atheling was now deprived of his estates in Normandy, and compelled to seek an asylum in Scotland. Henry had put his five thousand crowns to such good interest that he had become formidable to the king and the duke. Amongst several strong castles, he had secured Mount St. Michael, although obliged to abandon other fortresses. Here, on this lofty rock, which stands twice in the day amidst a plain of sand, and twice encompassed with tidal waters, Henry bade defiance to the assaults of arms. But the waters which surrounded the castle were useless to allay the cravings of his famished garrison, and he was finally obliged to capitulate.

In 1092 the king returned to England, accompanied by the duke of Normandy. During his absence, Malcolm, the king of Scotland, had invaded the northern counties; and William hastened to drive them back. The armies met in Lothian; but a peace was concluded. On the return to the south, the English king seized Carlisle, which had been considered an appanage of the crown of Scotland. Another quarrel was the consequence; and Malcolm, after having met the English king at Gloucester, and resisted his claims, invaded Northumberland. Here the unfortunate king of Scotland, and his son Edward, were killed in a sudden surprise-some say by treachery. The good queen Matilda survived her husband and son only four days.

Duke Robert had come to England to obtain indemnity for possessions which he had surrendered in Normandy. He obtained nothing. According to the custom of chivalry, Robert sent to England two heralds to denounce his faithless brother as a perjured knight. William went to Normandy to submit the points in dispute to arbitration. Twenty-four Norman

A.D. 1096.

THE FIRST CRUSADE.

51

barons decided against him. He then resolved upon war; and collected a large army at Hastings. The chroniclers say that the unscrupulous financier, Ralph Flambard, made this a new pretence of extortion. The war with Robert was not undertaken; and the soldiers were dismissed to their homes, upon making a handsome contribution to the wants of the king. He had more bribery to accomplish in Normandy. But he suddenly returned home, to put down an outbreak of the Welsh; to which succeeded an insurrection of the nobles in the north. Rufus was as energetic and as merciless as his father; and the dangers were averted. But there was a new arrangement between the rival brothers which was eventually to unite England and Normandy again under one king. Robert, in 1096, pawned his dukedom to William for five years. The mortgage-money of ten thousand pounds was, of course, to be paid by the people of the island. Then Robert of Normandy became one of the leaders of the First Crusade.

In 1095 a zealous missionary went through Italy and France, and proclaimed in every land that the Holy Sepulchre, which Christian pilgrims had freely visited from the days of Haroun Alraschid, was now closed against them by the Turk who had conquered Syria; and that the servants of the cross were massacred, plundered, sold into slavery. This was Peter of Amiens, known as Peter the Hermit.* In November of the same year, Pope Urban II. attended the great council of Clermont, in Auvergne ; and from a lofty scaffold in the market-place preached the crusade to assembled thousands. With one voice the people in the market-place of Clermont shouted,-Deus lo voll; Deus lo volt. "It is, indeed, the will of God," said the Pope. "Let that acclamation be your battle-cry. Wear the cross as your sign and your solemn pledge."

The great Army of the East was to be gathered together from all nations, by another year. But the impatience of the people would not wait for arms or leaders. In the March of 1096, a vast multitude set forward from France, gathering fresh crowds as they proceeded. Wales, Scotland, Denmark, and Norway sent out their thousands, to join the great body that were moving on to the Rhine and the Danube. They were led in two divisions, one of which was commanded by Peter the Hermit; the other by a soldier named Walter the Penniless. Undisciplined, ill-provided, encumbered with women and children, their numbers were gradually wasted by hunger and fatigue. They irritated the inhabitants of the wild countries through which they passed, and suffered the most terrible defeats in Bulgaria. At last the remnant of the hundred thousand that had undertaken this perilous journey reached Constantinople. The emperor would have treated them with kindness, but they began to plunder the beautiful city, and they were driven out to seek the Asiatic side of the Bosphorus. They here renewed their devastations; and they were finally routed and cut to pieces by the Turks. The regular army of the Crusaders at length approached Asia under the commanders whom History and Poetry have made famous,—Godfrey of Bouillon, Hugh of Vermandois, Robert of Normandy, Robert of Flanders, Stephen of Chartres, Raymond of Toulouse,

This common title was derived from his family name of L'Ermite.

the ambitious Bohemond, and the accomplished Tancred. They came by different routes from their several countries. It was more than three years after Pope Urban had preached the crusade at Clermont, that Jerusalem fell, and the Holy Sepulchre was free. A terrible massacre disgraced this Christian triumph.

Whilst duke Robert was at the head of his knights and their horsemen in siege and battle, William, the king, was foreclosing upon the property of Normandy like a grasping usurer. His borrowed dukedom, however, gave him some trouble. He renewed the old quarrel with the king of France about the Vexin territory. In the province of Maine, also, which had been ceded to him, there was an obstinate baron, Hélie, who was little disposed to submit to his domination, and relied upon the support of the people, by whom he was beloved. The Red King was too strong for the baron in the end. In the July of 1099, at which time duke Robert was marching into Jerusalem, King William was ravaging Maine.

On the 1st of August, 1100, the king was in Malwood Keep, in the New Forest, hunting and feasting. According to William of Malmesbury, he was vexed and dispirited by evil dreams, and would not hunt. Dinner came, with copious draughts of wine; and then he would ride in the forest. He was alone with Walter Tyrrel. The sun was declining. The king had drawn his bow and wounded a stag; he was shading his eyes from the strong level light, when Walter, aiming at another stag, pierced the king's breast with a fatal arrow which glanced from a tree. Breaking off the shaft of the arrow, William fell from his horse, and "spoke word never more." Walter immediately ran up to the body, and then leapt upon his horse, none perceiving him. A few countrymen conveyed the body in a cart to Winchester, and there "it was committed to the ground within the tower, attended by many of the nobles, though lamented by few."

Prince Henry had been riding near the spot where William fell. Immediately that the death of his brother was certain, he galloped twenty miles to Winchester, pursued by William de Breteuil, the treasurer of Rufus, who divined his purpose. They arrived at the same hour. Henry hastened to the treasury; and, in spite of the opposition of de Breteuil, who insisted that Robert was the rightful successor, at length obtained the royal treasures. The next step was easy. He was crowned at Westminster on

Sunday the 5th of August.

Duke Robert, after the conquest of Jerusalem, had set out homeward. Passing through the Norman dominions in Italy, he was cordially received at the court of Geoffrey of Conversana, in Apulia; and there he lingered long, and finally married Sibylla, the daughter of his entertainer. With his young and beauteous wife he received a marriage portion amply sufficient to redeem his mortgaged dukedom. They arrived in Normandy, within a few weeks after Henry was firmly seated on the throne of England.

The sovereignty of Henry was so clearly an usurpation, that, with that prudence, however selfish, which belonged to his character, he sought to conciliate all classes of his subjects. He published a charter of liberties in 1101, in which he made many large concessions to the public good. Upon his accession he purged his government of the evil ministers of his

A.D. 1101. KING HENRY AND ROBERT OF NORMANDY. 53

brother's pleasures, and the corrupt administrators of his oppressive exactions. Ralph Flambard, the bishop of Durham, who was particularly obnoxious, was committed to the Tower, whence he contrived to escape to Normandy. Henry's choice of a queen appears to have been decided by a just and wise desire to propitiate the English population. Maud, the daughter of Malcolm, king of Scotland, and of Matilda, the sister of Edgar Atheling, was of the lineage of the Saxon kings. She had been brought up under the care of her aunt, the abbess of Wilton, who had caused her to wear the veil, though she had not taken the vows. After many discussions amongst the ecclesiastics, it was held that Maud was not bound to celibacy; and the king shared his throne with her. This marriage, which was called "The Union of the Races," was a cause of offence to the imperious Norman nobles; but Henry was supported by the best of the Churchmen, and especially by Anselm, the honest and enlightened bishop of Canterbury, who had been recalled and re-invested.

In 1101 Robert of Normandy invaded England. He landed at Portsmouth on the 1st of August. Some of the Norman barons openly joined him; others secretly encouraged his pretensions. Robert marched from the coast, and the two armies pitched their camps near each other. Henry desired a conference with his brother; and they met in the presence of the hostile troops. They were reconciled. A treaty was concluded without umpires; of which the chief article was that Robert relinquished his claims upon England. Robert and his army returned to Normandy; and the troops of Henry were disbanded, after the duke had remained a guest for several months at the court of the king. In the following year Henry, of whom clemency was not an attribute, commenced a series of persecutions against those of his barons who had favoured the enterprise of Robert. One of these Norman chieftains was Robert de Belèsme, earl of Shrews bury. The king had surrounded him with spies, and preferred many charges against aim of the heaviest nature. The earl fled to his castles, and refused to appear to abide a trial. Henry immediately called out the whole military force of the country, so formidable was this baron. At last the rebel earl surrendered; and was banished. He went over to Normandy, where he had vast estates, and for several years ravaged the country, and defied the power of the duke, who had entered into a mutual engagement with Henry to make common cause against any traitor to either of them. At length duke Robert concluded a peace with the fierce earl, and admitted him to his patrimonial estates. There was now a new cause for enmity between the reigning brothers.

Robert of Normandy had lost his wife in 1102. The corrupt manners of the times were immediately exhibited in the personal conduct of the unhappy prince; and for three or four years his example was one of public offence. In 1104, Henry went over to Normandy. Many of the nobles, who had also estates in England, gathered round him, and stimulated what was no doubt the secret desire of his heart; yet the brothers parted friends. Again the province was ravaged by the private hostilities of those who were considered the friends of Henry, and those who hated him. The countrypeople in many districts fled into France, leaving their lands uncultivated. In 1105, Henry landed on Easter-eve at the small port of Barbaflot; and

slept at the village of Carentan. On Easter Sunday he went in the most private manner to the church, where Serlo, the bishop of Séez, was to officiate at the solemnities of the great festival. The bishop took the misrule of Robert for his theme, and urged Henry to "take arms to redress this affliction of the land. Take arms, and recover the territory of your ancestors, and rescue the people from the dominion of abandoned men." And then the king said-"In God's name, I will not shrink from toiling earnestly for the restoration of peace." Very shortly after, Henry took Bayeux by assault, and burnt it to the ground. The people of Caen surrendered their fortress. At Whitsuntide, Henry and Robert had a conference, without coming to agreement. The Normans took their several sides; and the country was burnt and pillaged. Henry returned to England for money and men. In 1106 he was in Normandy with a far greater force, and constructed a fort before Tinchenbrai. The place was vigorously defended by William, earl of Morton; and duke Robert came to his relief, with a large force of Norman chivalry. Henry was strong in his infantry, both English and Norman. There was some negotiation before the decisive battle, which took place on the 28th of September, the anniversary of William the Conqueror's landing at Hastings. When the ranks met, "the troops were thronged so closely, and their weapons so locked together, that it was out of their power to injure each other, and both parties in turn attempted in vain to break the impenetrable phalanx." One of Henry's chaplains, Baudri, took the duke prisoner, after he had gallantly fought with unequal numbers. The contest was over. Amongst other prisoners was Edgar Atheling, who passed the remainder of his eventful life in England, without molestation, an object of pity rather than of fear. The deposed duke Robert was kept a prisoner in Cardiff Castle; "nor was he liberated till the day of his death." That release from a captivity of twenty-eight years arrived in 1135.

At the time of the battle of Tinchenbrai, duke Robert had a son of five years old, who had been brought up at Falaise. When Henry took possession of the place, the little boy was led to him. Henry used no violence to the child, but committed him to an honest guardianship. The king appears, in another year, to have repented of his honesty, and to have desired to get the young prince into his power. But Hélie de St. Saen fled with his charge; and put him under the protection of Louis, king of France, and Fulk, earl of Anjou. As the boy grew, the interests connected with him became more complicated. He was first patronised and afterwards cast off, by the earl of Anjou. The king of France used him as an instrument to check the growing power of Henry. At length there was open war between France and Normandy, and in 1119 was fought the battle of Noyon, or Brenneville, a place on the road from Rouen to Paris. Louis was here defeated and fled.

In 1118 "the good queen Maud" died. She had long retired to the monastery of Westminster, where she spent her revenues in the relief of the sick, and in acts of penitential piety. Her only daughter had been betrothed to the emperor of Germany in 1108, and was married in 1114. The king of England had many illegitimate daughters, and one was married to Eustace of Breteuil. In 1118, Eustace and the king had a dispute