justice, for which his administration had been much cele- 1067.
brated in Normandy; and even during this violent revo-
lution, every disorder or oppression met with rigorous
punishment. His army in particular was governed with
severe discipline; and notwithstanding the insolence of
victory, care was taken to give as little offence as possible
to the jealousy of the vanquished. The king appeared
solicitous to unite in an amicable manner the Normans and
the English, by intermarriages and alliances; and all his
new subjects who approached his person were received
with affability and regard. No signs of suspicion ap-
peared, not even towards Edgar Atheling, the heir of the
ancient royal family, whom William confirmed in the
honours of earl of Oxford, conferred on him by Harold,
and whom he affected to treat with the highest kindness,
as nephew to the Confessor, his great friend and bene-
factor. Though he confiscated the estates of Harold,
and of those who had fought in the battle of Hastings
on the side of that prince, whom he represented as an
usurper, he seemed willing to admit of every plausible
excuse for past opposition to his pretensions, and he re-
ceived many into favour who had carried arms against
him. He confirmed the liberties and immunities of Lon-
don and the other cities of England; and appeared de-is
sirous of replacing every thing on ancient establishments.
In his whole administration, he bore the semblance of the
lawful prince, not of the conqueror; and the English
began to flatter themselves, that they had changed, not
the form of their government, but the succession only of
their sovereigns, a matter which gave them small concern.
The better to reconcile his new subjects to his authority,
William made a progress through some parts of England;
and besides a splendid court and majestic presence,
which overawed the people, already struck with his mili-
tary fame, the appearance of his clemency and justice
gained the approbation of the wise, attentive to the first
steps of their new sovereign.

But amidst this confidence and friendship which he
Gul. Pict. p. 208. Order. Vitalis, p. 506.

1067. expressed for the English, the king took care to place all real power in the hands of his Normans, and still to keep possession of the sword, to which, he was sensible, he had owed his advancement to sovereign authority. He disarmed the city of London and other places, which appeared most warlike and populous: and building citadels in that capital, as well as in Winchester, Hereford, and the cities best situated for commanding the kingdom, he quartered Norman soldiers in all of them, and left nowhere any power able to resist or oppose him. He bestowed the forfeited estates on the most eminent of his captains, and established funds for the payment of his soldiers. And thus, while his civil administration carried the face of a legal magistrate, his military institutions were those of a master and tyrant; at least of one who reserved to himself, whenever he pleased, the power of assuming that character.

March.

King's re- By this mixture, however, of vigour and lenity, he had turn to Nor- so soothed the minds of the English, that he thought he mandy. might safely revisit his native country, and enjoy the triumph and congratulation of his ancient subjects. He left the administration in the hands of his uterine brother, Odo, bishop of Baieux, and of William Fitz-Osberne. That their authority might be exposed to less danger, he carried over with him all the most considerable nobility of England, who, while they served to grace his court by their presence and magnificent retinues, were in reality hostages for the fidelity of the nation. Among these were Edgar Atheling, Stigand the primate, the earls Edwin and Morcar, Waltheof, the son of the brave earl Siward, with others, eminent for the greatness of their fortunes and families, or for their ecclesiastical and civil dignities. He was visited at the abbey of Fescamp, where he resided during some time, by Rodulph, uncle to the king of France, and by many powerful princes and nobles, who, having contributed to his enterprise, were desirous of participating in the joy and advantages of its success. His English courtiers, willing to ingratiate themselves with their new sovereign, outvied each other

in equipages and entertainments; and made a display of 1067. riches which struck the foreigners with astonishment. William of Poictiers, a Norman historian', who was present, speaks with admiration of the beauty of their persons, the size and workmanship of their silver plate, the costliness of their embroideries, an art in which the English then excelled; and he expresses himself in such terms, as tend much to exalt our idea of the opulence and cultivation of the peoples. But though every thing bore the face of joy and festivity, and William himself treated his new courtiers with great appearance of kindness, it was impossible altogether to prevent the insolence of the Normans; and the English nobles derived little satisfaction from those entertainments, where they considered themselves as led in triumph by their ostentatious conqueror.

lish.

In England affairs took still a worse turn during the Discontents absence of the sovereign. Discontents and complaints of the Engmultiplied everywhere; secret conspiracies were 'entered into against the government; hostilities were already begun in many places; and every thing seemed to menace a revolution as rapid as that which had placed William on the throne. The historian above mentioned, who is a panegyrist of his master, throws the blame entirely on the fickle and mutinous disposition of the English, and highly celebrates the justice and lenity of Odo's and FitzOsberne's administration. But other historians, with more probability, impute the cause chiefly to the Normans; who, despising a people that had so easily submitted to the yoke, envying their riches, and grudging the restraints imposed upon their own rapine, were desirous of provoking them to a rebellion, by which they expected to acquire new confiscations and forfeitures, and to gratify those unbounded hopes which they had formed in entering on this enterprise".

r P. 211, 212. As the historian chiefly insists on the silver plate, his panegyric on the English magnificence shows only how incompetent a judge he was of the matter. Silver was then of ten times the value, and was more than twenty times more rare than at present; and consequently, of all species of luxury, plate must have been the rarest. t P. 212. " Order. Vitalis, p. 507.

1067.

Their insurrections.

It is evident that the chief reason of this alteration in the sentiments of the English, must be ascribed to the departure of William, who was alone able to curb the violence of his captains, and to overawe the mutinies of the people. Nothing indeed appears more strange than that this prince, in less than three months after the conquest of a great, warlike, and turbulent nation, should absent himself in order to revisit his own country, which remained in profound tranquillity, and was not menaced by any of its neighbours; and should so long leave his jealous subjects at the mercy of an insolent and licentious army. Were we not assured of the solidity of his genius, and the good sense displayed in all other circumstances of his conduct, we might ascribe this measure to a vain ostentation, which rendered him impatient to display his pomp and magnificence among his ancient subjects. It is therefore more natural to believe that, in so extraordinary a step, he was guided by a concealed policy; and that, though he had thought proper at first to allure the people to submission by the semblance of a legal administration, he found that he could neither satisfy his rapacious captains, nor secure his unstable government, without farther exerting the rights of conquest, and seizing the possessions of the English. In order to have a pretext for this violence, he endeavoured, without discovering his intentions, to provoke and allure them into insurrections, which he thought could never prove dangerous, while he detained all the principal nobility in Normandy, while a great and victorious army was quartered in England, and while he himself was so near to suppress any tumult or rebellion. But as no ancient writer has ascribed this tyrannical purpose to William, it scarcely seems allowable, from conjecture alone, to throw such an imputation upon him.

But whether we are to account for that measure from the king's vanity or from his policy, it was the immediate cause of all the calamities which the English endured during this and the subsequent reigns, and gave rise to those mutual jealousies and animosities between them and the Normans, which were never appeased till a long tract

of time had gradually united the two nations, and made them one people. The inhabitants of Kent, who had first submitted to the conqueror, were the first that attempted to throw off the yoke; and in confederacy with Eustace, count of Boulogne, who had also been disgusted by the Normans, they made an attempt, though without success, on the garrison of Dover. Edric the forester, whose possessions lay on the banks of the Severn, being provoked at the depredations of some Norman captains in his neighbourhood, formed an alliance with Blethyn and Rowallan, two Welsh princes; and endeavoured, with their assistance, to repel force by force. But though these open hostilities were not very considerable, the disaffection was general among the English, who had become sensible, though too late, of their defenceless condition, and began already to experience those insults and injuries, which a nation must always expect that allows itself to be reduced to that abject situation. A secret conspiracy was entered into, to perpetrate, in one day, a general massacre of the Normans, like that which had formerly been executed upon the Danes; and the quarrel was become so general and national, that the vassals of earl Coxo, having desired him to head them in an insurrection, and finding him resolute in maintaining his fidelity to William, put him to death as a traitor to his country,

The king, informed of these dangerous discontents, Decemb. 6. hastened over to England; and by his presence, and the vigorous measures which he pursued, disconcerted all the schemes of the conspirators. Such of them as had been more violent in their mutiny, betrayed their guilt by flying or concealing themselves; and the confiscation of their estates, while it increased the number of malcontents, both enabled William to gratify farther the rapacity of his Norman captains, and gave them the prospect of new forfeitures and attainders. The king began to regard all his English subjects as inveterate and irreclaimable enemies; and thenceforth either embraced, or was more fully con

* Gul. Gemet. p. 289. Order. Vitalis, p. 508. Anglia Sacra, vol. i. p. y Hoveden, p. 450. M. West. p. 226. Sim. Dunelm. p. 197.

245.