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and Europe, impelled by its two ruling passions, was loosened, as it were, from its foundations, and seemed to precipitate itself in one united body upon the east. Robert Duke of Normandy, impelled by the bravery and mistaken generosity of his spirit, had early enlisted himself in the Crusade; but being always unprovided with money, he found that it would be impracticable for him to appear in a manner suitable to his rank and station at the head of his numerous vassals and subjects, who, transported with the general rage, were determined to follow him into Asia. He resolved, therefore, to mortgage, or rather to sell his dominions, which he had not talents to govern; and he offered them to his brother William, for the very unequal sum of ten thousand marks. The bargain was soon concluded: The king raised the money by violent extortions on his subjects of all ranks, even on the convents, who were obliged to melt their plate in order to furnish the quota demanded of them; He was put in possession of Normandy and Maine, and Robert providing himself with a magnificent train, set out for the Holy Land.

After the adventurers in the holy war were assembled on the banks of the Bosphorus, opposite to Constantinople, they proceeded on their enterprise; but immediately experienced those difficulties which their zeal had hitherto concealed from them, and for which, even if they had foreseen them, it would have been almost impossible to provide a remedy. The Greek emperor, Alexis Comnenus, who had applied to the western Christians for succour against the Turks, entertained hopes, and those but feeble ones, of obtaining such a moderate supply, as, acting under his command, might enable him to repulse the enemy: But he was extremely astonished to see his dominions overwhelmed, on a sudden, by such an inundation of licentious barbarians, who, though they pretended friendship, despised his subjects as unwarlike, and detested them as heretical. By all the arts of policy, in which he excelled, he endeavoured to divert the torrent; but while he employed professions, caresses, civilities, and seeming services towards the leaders of the Crusade, he secretly regarded those imperious allies as more dangerous than the open enemies by whom his empire had been formerly invaded. Having effected that difficult point of disembarking them safely in Asia, he entered into a private correspondence with Soliman, emperor of the Turks; and practised every insidious art, which his genius, his power, or his situation, enabled him to employ, for disappointing the enterprise, and discouraging the Latins from making thenceforward any such prodigious migrations. His dangerous policy was seconded by the disorders inseparable from so vast a multitude, who were not united under one head, and were conducted by leaders of the most independent intractable spirit, unacquainted with military discipline, and determined enemies to civil authority and submission. The scarcity of provisions, the excesses of fatigue, the influence of unknown climates, joined to the want of concert in their operations, and to the sword of a warlike enemy, destroyed the adventurers by thousands, and would have abated the ardour of men impelled to war by less powerful motives. Their zeal, however, their bravery, and their irresistible force, still carried them forward, and continually advanced them to the great end of their enterprise. After an obstinate seige they took Nice, the seat of the Turkish empire; they defeated Soliman in two great battles; they made themselves masters of Antioch; and entirely broke the force of the Turks, who had so long retained those countries in subjection. The soldan of Egypt, whose alliance they had hitherto courted, recovered, on the fall of the Turkish power, his former authority in Jerusalem; and he informed them by his ambassadors, that if they came disarmed to that city, they might now perform their religious vows, and that all Christian pilgrims, who should thenceforth visit the holy sepulchre, might expect the some good treatment which they had ever

received from his predecessors. The offer was rejected; the soldan was required to yield up the city to the Christians; and on his refusal, the champions of the cross advanced to the siege of Jerusalem, which they regarded as the consummation of their labours. By the detachments which they had made, and the disasters which they had undergone, they were diminished to the number of twenty thousand foot, and fifteen hundred horse; but these were still formidable, from their valour, their experience, and the obedience which from past calamities, they had learned to pay to their leaders. After a siege of five weeks, they took Jerusalem by assault; and, impelled by a mixture of military and religious rage, they put the numerous garrison and inhabitants to the sword without distinction.

This great event happened on the fifth of July in the last year of the eleventh century. The Christian princes and nobles, after choosing Godfrey of Bouillon king of Jerusalem, began to settle themselves in their new conquests; while some of them returned to Europe, in order to enjoy at home that glory, which their valour had acquired them in this popular and meritorious enterprise. Among these was Robert Duke of Normandy, who, as he had relinquished the greatest dominions of any prince that attended the Crusade, had all along distinguished himself by the most intrepid courage, as well as by that affable disposition and unbounded generosity which gain the hearts of soldiers, and qualify a prince to shine in a military life. In passing through Italy, he became acquainted with Sibylla, daughter of the Count of Conversana, a young lady of great beauty and merit, whom he espoused: Indulging himself in this new passion, as well as fond of enjoying ease and pleasure, after the fatigues of so many rough campaigns, he lingered a twelvemonth in that delicious climate; and though his friends in the north looked every moment for his arrival, none of them knew when they could with certainty expect it. By this delay he lost the kingdom of England, which the great fame he had acquired during the Crusades, as well as his undoubted title, both by birth and by the preceding agreement with his deceased brother, would, had he been present, have infallibly secured to him.

50.-HENRY AND MAUD.

ANONYMOUS.

It was upon the accession of Henry I., surnamed the Beau Clerc, or fine scholar, that most deference was paid to the Saxon or conquered part of the nation, and that a fresh and great start was given to the system of intermarriage. Duke Robert, the eldest of the three brothers, but the weakest and most imprudent, opposed the claim of Henry, as he had previously done that of Rufus. The claim of Duke Robert could not be altogether overlooked; but a popular and weighty recommendation for his brother was, that Henry Beauclerc was an Englishman, born in the country, and after the Conquest; and some of his party, as well Normans as English, set up this circumstance as being in itself decisive of his better right to the In a charter of liberties, which he issued the day after his coronation in Westminster Abbey, Henry merely represented that he owed the crown" to the mercy of God, and the common consent of the barons of the kingdom;" but nevertheless his English birth had carried great weight with it, and the frequent reference made to the circumstance flattered the Saxon part of the nation, and may have aided in giving the new king English feelings and partialities.

crown.

In his charter of liberties, Henry Beauclerc, among other things, promised to restore the old Saxon laws as they stood at the time of King Edward the Confessor subject only to the amendments made in them by his father; and, in fact, the laws and institutions of the country remained in all essential respects nearly the saine as before the Conquest. No new form or element of slavery was introduced.

N

England had her free-born men and her born serfs now, as in the days of King Harold, Edward the Confessor, and King Alfred. Throughout Europe the great body of the cultivators of the soil were serfs. The legal restrictions and disabilities which chained the labouring classes in England all existed before the Conquest, nor, though individuals suffered, was any class of the community deprived by that revolution of rights which it had previously possessed, or depressed to a lower position in the state than it had previously occupied. The Conquest had been destructive and dreadful, and a foreign yoke is odious at its first pressure. But in proportion as the races became mixed, these distinctions were forgotten; and even under the sons of the Conqueror, Rufus and the Beauclerc, England on the whole was a milder and better governed country than almost any other on the continent of Europe-not less free, not more oppressed by kings and baronage, and much less frequently distracted and wasted by internal war than the French kingdom, or any of the great states which then surrounded and now form integral parts of that kingdom.

Henry Beauclerc, who, on all necessary occasions, boasted of his English birth, determined to espouse an English wife as soon as he was seated on the throne. The lady of his choice was, to use the words of the Saxon Chronicle, "Maud, daughter of Malcolm, King of Scots, and of Margaret the good queen, the relation of King Edward, and of the right kingly kin of England." This descendant of the great Alfred had been sent from Scotland in her childhood to be educated by her aunt Christina, Edgar Atheling's second sister, who was abbess of Wilton in Wiltshire. As she grew up, several of the Norman captains, who had become great lords in England, aspired to the honour of her hand; but though several matches had been negotiated, none had been concluded. It should appear that the Red King acknowledged the importance of the fair Saxon of the ancient royal line, by preventing his powerful vassal William de Garenne from marrying her. When proposals were first made on the part of King Henry, Maud showed an aversion to the match. But she was assailed by irresistible arguments. "O noblest and fairest among women," said her Saxon advisers, "if thou wilt thou canst restore the ancient honour of England, and be a pledge of reconciliation and friendship!" When the fair Saxon yielded, some of the Norman nobles, neither liking to see an English woman raised to be their queen, nor the power of their king confirmed by a union which would endear him to the native race, and render him less dependent on Norman arms, raised a new obstacle, by asserting that Maud was a nun, and that she had been seen wearing the veil. If true, this was insurmountable. Henry postponed the marriage, and applied to Anselm, the Archbishop of Canterbury, to institute an inquiry. Anselm, being himself eager for the match, and very friendly to the English people, caused the royal maiden to be brought before him, and then questioned her gently with his own voice. To the archbishop Maud denied that she had ever taken the vows, or, of her free will, worn the veil; and she offered to give full proof of this before all the prelates of England. "I must confess," she said, "that I have sometimes appeared veiled; but listen unto the cause: in my first youth, when I was living under her care, my aunt, to save me, as she said, from the lust of the Normans, who attacked all females, was accustomed to throw a piece of black stuff over my head; and if I refused to cover myself with it, she would treat me very roughly. In her presence I wore that black covering, but as soon as she was out of sight I threw it on the ground and trampled it under foot in childish anger." After receiving this naïve explanation, which is by itself worth a chapter of ordinary history, the learned and venerable archbishop called a council of bishops, abbots, and monks, and summoned before this council the gentle and lovely Maud, and many of her witnesses, of both sexes and of both races.

Two

archdeacons, who had expressly visited the convent in which the young lady had been brought up, deposed that public report and the testimony of the nuns of that godly house agreed with and confirmed the declaration which Maud had made to the archbishop. The council unanimously decreed that the young lady was free, and could dispose of herself in marriage. On Sunday, the 11th of November, A.D. 1100, or little more than three months after the accession of the Beauclerc, the marriage was celebrated, and the Saxon queen was crowned with great pomp and solemnity. According to the chroniclers, both Norman and English, she proved a loving and obedient wife, as beautiful in mind as in person, being distinguished by a love of learning and great charity to the poor. Her elevation to the throne filled the hearts of the Saxon part of the nation with exceeding great joy. No son of the gentle Maud lived to succeed the Beauclerc, and through this misfortune England was visited by the miseries inseparably connected with disputed successions and civil wars. Yet this union between the blood of the Conqueror and the blood of King Alfred had a great and beneficial effect: it served as an example to some of the Norman baronage, it gave the court of the Beauclerc more of an English or Saxon character, and contributed to do away with many invidious distinctions.

51.-ROBERT THE CAPTIVE.

BURKE.

The Crusade being successfully finished by the taking of Jerusalem, Robert returned into Europe. He had acquired great reputation in that war, in which he had no interest; his real and valuable rights he prosecuted with languor. Yet such was the respect paid to his title, and such the attraction of his personal ao complishments, that when he had at last taken possession of his Norman territories, and entered England with an army to assert his birthright, he found most of the Norman barons, and many of the English, in readiness to join him. the diligence of Anselm, who employed all his credit to keep the people firm to the oath they had taken, prevented him from profiting of the general inclination in his favour. His friends began to fall off by degrees, so that he was induced, as well by the situation of his affairs, as the flexibility of his temper, to submit to a treaty on the plan of that he had formerly entered into with his brother Rufus.

But

This treaty being made, Robert returned to his dukedom, and gave himself over to his natural indolence and dissipation. Uncured by his misfortunes of a loose generosity, that flowed indiscriminately on all, he mortgaged every branch of his revenue, and almost his whole domain. His barons, despising his indigence, and secure in the benignity of his temper, began to assume the unhappy privilege of sovereigns. They made war on each other at pleasure. and, pursuing their hostilities with the most scandalous license, they reduced that fine country to a deplorable condition. In vain did the people, ruined by the tyranny and divisions of the great, apply to Robert for protection; neither from his circumstances, nor his character, was he able to afford them any effectual relief: whilst Henry, who by his bribes and artifices kept alive the disorder, of which he complained and profited, formed a party in Normandy to call him over, and to put the dukedom under his protection. Accordingly he prepared a considerable force for the expedition, and taxed his own subjects arbitrarily, and without mercy, for the relief he pretended to afford those of his brother. His preparations roused Robert from his indolence, and united likewise the greater part of his barons to his cause, unwilling to change a master, whose only fault was his indulgence of them, for the severe vigilance of Henry. The King of France espoused the same side; and even in England some emotions were excited in favour of the duke by indignation for the wrongs he had suffered, and those he was going to suffer. Henry was alarmed,

but did not renounce his design. He was to the last degree jealous of his prerogative; but knowing what immense resources kings may have in popularity, he called on this occasion a great council of his barons and prelates; and there, by his arts and his eloquence, in both which he was powerful, he persuaded the assembly to a hearty declaration in his favour, and to a large supply. Thus secured at home, he lost no time to pass over to the continent, and to bring the Norman army to a speedy engagement; they fought under the walls of Tenchebray, where the bravery and military genius of Robert, never more conspicuous than on that day, were borne down by the superior fortune and numbers of his ambitious brother. He was made prisoner; and notwithstanding all the tender pleas of their common blood, in spite of his virtues, and even of his misfortunes, which pleaded so strongly for mercy, the rigid conqueror held him in various prisons until his death, which did not happen until after a rigorous confinement of eighteen, some say twentyseven years. This was the end of a prince born with a thousand excellent qualities, which served no other purpose than to confirm, from the example of his misfortunes, that a facility of disposition, and a weak beneficence, are the greatest vices that can enter into the composition of a monarch, equally ruinous to himself and to his subjects.

The success of this battle put Henry in possession of Normandy, which he held ever after with very little disturbance. He fortified his new acquisition by demolishing the castles of those turbulent barons who had wasted, and afterwards enslaved, their country by their dissensions. Order and justice took place, until every thing was reduced to obedience; then a severe and regular oppression succeeded the former disorderly tyranny. In England things took the same course. The king no longer doubted his fortune, and therefore no longer respected his promises or his charter. The forests, the savage passion of the Norman princes, for which both the prince and people paid so dearly, were maintained, increased, and guarded with laws more rigorous than before. Taxes were largely and arbitrarily assessed. But all this tyranny did not weaken, though it vexed, the nation, because the great men were kept in proper subjection, and justice was steadily administered.

52. THE SHIPWRECK OF PRINCE WILLIAM.

SOUTHEY.

When his elder brother was preparing an armament in Normandy, for the purpose of asserting his right to the English crown, the Red King permitted his subjects to fit out cruisers; and these adventurers, who seem to have been the first that may be called privateers, rendered him good service; for the Normans, knowing that there was no navy to oppose them, and that when they landed they were more likely to be received by their friends and confederates than to be attacked before they were collected in sufficient numbers for defence, began to cross the Channel, cach at their own convenience, without concert, or any regard to mutual support; and so many of them were intercepted and destroyed by these cruisers, that the attempt at invasion was, in consequence abandoned. The remainder of Rufus's reign, short as it was, sufficed, through his own vigorous policy and the carelessness of his antagonist, for him to acquire a superiority at sea, which enabled him, at any time, to invade Normandy.

Once when he was hunting, a messenger from beyond sea brought him news that the city of Maus, which he had added to his possessions, was besieged. He instantly turned his horse, and set off for the nearest port. The nobles who were in his company reminded him that it was necessary to call out troops, and wait for

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