A Popular History of France from the Earliest Times Volume I Part 13

It is needless to point out that in this series of oaths, these obligations imposed upon the knights, there is a moral development very superior to that of the laic society of the period. Moral notions so lofty, so delicate, so scrupulous, and so humane, emanated clearly from the Christian clergy. Only the clergy thought thus about the duties and the relations of mankind; and their influence was employed in directing towards the accomplishment of such duties, towards the integrity of such relations, the ideas and customs engendered by knighthood. It had not been inst.i.tuted with so pious and deep a design, for the protection of the weak, the maintenance of justice, and the reformation of morals; it had been, at its origin and in its earliest features, a natural consequence of feudal relations and warlike life, a confirmation of the bonds established and the sentiments aroused between different masters in the same country and comrades with the same destinies. The clergy promptly saw what might be deduced from such a fact; and they made of it a means of establis.h.i.+ng more peacefulness in society, and in the conduct of individuals a more rigid morality. This was the general work they pursued; and, if it were convenient to study the matter more closely, we might see, in the canons of councils from the eleventh to the fourteenth centuries, the Church exerting herself to develop more and more in this order of knight-hood, this inst.i.tution of an essentially warlike origin, the moral and civilizing character of which a glimpse has just been caught in the doc.u.ments of knighthood itself.

In proportion as knighthood appeared more and more in this simultaneously warlike, religious, and moral character, it more and more gained power over the imagination of men, and just as it had become closely interwoven with their creeds, it soon became the ideal of their thoughts, the source of their n.o.blest pleasures. Poetry, like religion, took hold of it.

From the eleventh century onwards, knighthood, its ceremonies, its duties, and its adventures, were the mine from which the poets drew in order to charm the people, in order to satisfy and excite at the same time that yearning of the soul, that need of events more varied and more captivating, and of emotions more exalted and more pure than real life could furnish. In the springtide of communities poetry is not merely a pleasure and a pastime for a nation; it is a source of progress; it elevates and develops the moral nature of men at the same time that it amuses them and stirs them deeply. We have just seen what oaths were taken by the knights and administered by the priests; and now, here is an ancient ballad by Eustache Deschamps, a poet of the fourteenth century, from which it will be seen that poets impressed upon knights the same duties and the same virtues, and that the influence of poetry had the same aim as that of religion:

I.

Amend your lives, ye who would fain The order of the knights attain; Devoutly watch, devoutly pray; From pride and sin, O, turn away!

Shun all that's base; the Church defend; Be the widow's and the orphan's friend; Be good and Leal; take nought by might; Be bold and guard the people's right;-- This is the rule for the gallant knight.

II.

Be meek of heart; work day by day; Tread, ever tread, the knightly way; Make lawful war; long travel dare; Tourney and joust for lady fair; To everlasting honor cling, That none the barbs of blame may fling; Be never slack in work or fight; Be ever least in self's own sight;-- This is the rule for the gallant knight.

III.

Love the liege lord; with might and main His rights above all else maintain; Be open-handed, just, and true; The paths of upright men pursue; No deaf ear to their precepts turn; The prowess of the valiant learn; That ye may do things great and bright, As did great Alexander hight;-- This is the rule for the gallant knight.

A great deal has been said to the effect that all this is sheer poetry, a beautiful chimera without any resemblance to reality. Indeed, it has just been remarked here, that the three centuries under consideration, the middle ages, were, in point of fact, one of the most brutal, most ruffianly epochs in history, one of those wherein we encounter most crimes and violence; wherein the public peace was most incessantly troubled; and wherein the greatest licentiousness in morals prevailed.

Nevertheless it cannot be denied that side by side with these gross and barbarous morals, this social disorder, there existed knightly morality and knightly poetry. We have moral records confronting ruffianly deeds; and the contrast is shocking, but real. It is exactly this contrast which makes the great and fundamental characteristic of the middle ages.

Let us turn our eyes towards other communities, towards the earliest stages, for instance, of Greek society, towards that heroic age of which Homer's poems are the faithful reflection. There is nothing there like the contrasts by which we are struck in the middle ages. We do not see that, at the period and amongst the people of the Homeric poems, there was abroad in the air or had penetrated into the imaginations of men any idea more lofty or more pure than their every-day actions; the heroes of Homer seem to have no misgiving about their brutishness, their ferocity, their greed, their egotism, there is nothing in their souls superior to the deeds of their lives. In the France of the middle ages, on the contrary, though practically crimes and disorders, moral and social evils abound, yet men have in their souls and their imaginations loftier and purer instincts and desires; their notions of virtue and their ideas of justice are very superior to the practice pursued around them and amongst themselves; a certain moral ideal hovers above this low and tumultuous community, and attracts the notice and obtains the regard of men in whose life it is but very faintly reflected. The Christian religion, undoubtedly, is, if not the only, at any rate the princ.i.p.al cause of this great fact; for its particular characteristic is to arouse amongst men a lofty moral ambition by keeping constantly before their eyes a type infinitely beyond the reach of human nature, and yet profoundly sympathetic with it. To Christianity it was that the middle ages owed knighthood, that inst.i.tution which, in the midst of anarchy and barbarism, gave a poetical and moral beauty to the period. It was feudal knighthood and Christianity together which produced the two great and glorious events of those times, the Norman conquest of England and the Crusades.

CHAPTER XV.----CONQUEST OF ENGLAND BY THE NORMANS.

At the beginning of the eleventh century, Robert, called "The Magnificent," the fifth in succession from the great chieftain Rollo who had established the Northmen in France, was duke of Normandy. To the nickname he earned by his n.o.bleness and liberality some chronicles have added another, and call him "Robert the Devil," by reason of his reckless and violent deeds of audacity, whether in private life or in warlike expeditions. Hence a lively controversy amongst the learned upon the question of deciding to which Robert to apply the latter epithet. Some persist in a.s.signing it to the duke of Normandy; others seek for some other Robert upon whom to foist it. However that may be, in 1034 or 1035, after having led a fair life enough from the political point of view, but one full of turbulence and moral irregularity, Duke Robert resolved to undertake, barefooted and staff in hand, a pilgrimage to Jerusalem, "to expiate his sins if G.o.d would deign to consent thereto."

The Norman prelates and barons, having been summoned around him, conjured him to renounce his plan; for to what troubles and perils would not his dominions be exposed without lord or a.s.sured successor? "By my faith,"

said Robert, "I will not leave ye lordless. I have a young b.a.s.t.a.r.d who will grow, please G.o.d, and of whose good qualities I have great hope.

Take him, I pray you, for lord. That he was not born in wedlock matters little to you; he will be none the less able in battle, or at court, or in the palace, or to render you justice. I make him my heir, and I hold him seized, from this present, of the whole duchy of Normandy." And they who were present a.s.sented, but not without objection and disquietude.

There was certainly ample reason for objection and disquietude. Not only was it a child of eight years of age to whom Duke Robert, at setting out on his pious pilgrimage, was leaving Normandy; but this child had been p.r.o.nounced b.a.s.t.a.r.d by the duke his father at the moment of taking him for his heir. Nine or ten years before, at Falaise, his favorite residence, Robert had met, according to some at a people's dance, according to others on the banks of a stream where she was was.h.i.+ng linen with her companions, a young girl named Harlette or Harleve, daughter of a tanner in the town, where they show to this day, it is said, the window from which the duke saw her for the first time. She pleased his fancy, and was not more strait-laced than the duke was scrupulous; and Fulbert, the tanner, kept but little watch over his daughter. Robert gave the son born to him in 1027 the name of his glorious ancestor, William Longsword, the son and successor of Rollo. The child was reared, according to some, in his father's palace, "right honorably as if he had been born in wedlock," but, according to others, in the house of his grandfather, the tanner; and one of the neighboring burgesses, as he saw pa.s.sing one of the princ.i.p.al Norman lords, William de Bellesme, surnamed "The Fierce Talvas," stopped him, ironically saying, "Come in, my lord, and admire your suzerain's son." The origin of young William was in every mouth, and gave occasion for familiar allusions more often insulting than flattering. The epithet b.a.s.t.a.r.d was, so to speak, incorporated with his name; and we cannot be astonished that it lived in history, for, in the height of his power, he sometimes accepted it proudly, calling himself, in several of his charters, William the b.a.s.t.a.r.d (Gulielmus Notlzus). He showed himself to be none the less susceptible on this point when in 1048, during the siege of Alencon, the domain of the Lord de Bellesme, the inhabitants hung from their walls hides all raw and covered with dirt, which they shook when they caught sight of William, with cries of "Plenty of work for the tanner!" "By the glory of G.o.d," cried William, "they shall pay me dear for this insolent bra-very!" After an a.s.sault several of the besieged were taken prisoners; and he had their eyes pulled out, and their feet and hands cut off, and shot from his siege-machines these mutilated members over the walls of the city.

Notwithstanding his recklessness and his being engrossed in his pilgrimage, Duke Robert had taken some care for the situation in which he was leaving his son, and some measures to lessen its perils. He had appointed regent of Normandy, during William's minority, his cousin, Alain V., duke of Brittany, whose sagacity and friends.h.i.+p he had proved; and he had confided the personal guardians.h.i.+p of the child, not to his mother. Harlette, who was left very much out in the cold, but to one of his most trusty officers, Gilbert Crespon, count of Brionne; and the strong castle of Vaudreuil, the first foundation of which dated back, it was said, to Queen Fredegonde, was a.s.signed for the usual residence of the young duke. Lastly, to confirm with brilliancy his son's right as his successor to the duchy of Normandy, and to a.s.sure him a powerful ally, Robert took him, himself, to the court of his suzerain, Henry I., king of France, who recognized the t.i.tle of William the b.a.s.t.a.r.d, and allowed him to take the oath of allegiance and homage. Having thus prepared, as best he could, for his son's future, Robert set out on his pilgrimage. He visited Rome and Constantinople, everywhere displaying his magnificence, together with his humility. He fell ill from sheer fatigue whilst crossing Asia Minor, and was obliged to be carried in a litter by four negroes. "Go and tell them at home," said he to a Norman pilgrim he met returning from the Holy Land, "that you saw me being carried to Paradise by four devils." On arriving at Jerusalem, where he was received with great attention by the Mussulman emir in command there, he discharged himself of his pious vow, and took the road back to Europe.

But he was poisoned, by whom or for what motive is not clearly known, at Nicaea, in Bithynia, where he was buried in the basilica of St. Mary--an honor, says the chronicle, which had never been accorded to anybody.

From 1025 to 1042, during William's minority, Normandy was a prey to the robber-like ambition, the local quarrels, and the turbulent and brutal pa.s.sions of a host of petty castle-holders, nearly always at war, either amongst themselves or with the young chieftain whose power they did not fear, and whose rights they disputed. In vain did Duke Alain of Brittany, in his capacity as regent appointed by Duke Robert, attempt to re-establish order; and just when he seemed on the road to success he was poisoned by those who could not succeed in beating him. Henry I., king of France, being ill-disposed at bottom towards his Norman neighbors and their young duke, for all that he had acknowledged him, profited by this anarchy to filch from him certain portions of territory. Attacks without warning, fearful murders, implacable vengeance, and sanguinary disturbances in the towns, were evils which became common, and spread.

The clergy strove with courageous perseverance against the vices and crimes of the period. The bishops convoked councils in their dioceses; the laic lords, and even the people, were summoned to them; the peace of G.o.d was proclaimed; and the priests, having in their hands lighted tapers, turned them towards the ground and extinguished them, whilst the populace repeated in chorus, "So may G.o.d extinguish the joys of those who refuse to observe peace and justice." The majority, however, of the Norman lords, refused to enter into the engagement. In default of peace, it was necessary to be content with the truce of G.o.d. It commenced on Wednesday evening at sunset and concluded on Monday at sunrise. During the four days and five nights comprised in this interval, all aggression was forbidden; no slaying, wounding, pillaging, or burning could take place; but from sunrise on Monday to sunset on Wednesday, for three clays and two nights, any violence became allowable, any crime might recommence.

Meanwhile William was growing up, and the omens that had been drawn from his early youth raised the popular hopes. It was reported that at his very birth, when the midwife had put him unswaddled on a little heap of straw, he had wriggled about and drawn together the straw with his hands, insomuch that the midwife said, "By my faith, this child beginneth full young to take and heap up: I know not what he will not do when he is grown." At a little later period, when a burgess of Falaise drew the attention of the Lord William de Bellesme to the gay and st.u.r.dy lad as he played amongst his mates, the fierce va.s.sal muttered between his teeth, "Accursed be thou of G.o.d! for I be certain that by thee mine honors will be lowered." The child on becoming man was handsomer and handsomer, "and so lively and spirited that it seemed to all a marvel." Amongst his mates, command became soon a habit with him; he made them form line of battle, he gave them the word of command, and he const.i.tuted himself their judge in all quarrels. At a still later period, having often heard talk of revolts excited against him, and of disorders which troubled the country, he was moved, in consequence, to fits of violent irritation, which, however, he learned instinctively to bide, "and in his child's heart," says the chronicle, "he had welling up all the vigor of a man to teach the Normans to forbear from all acts of irregularity." At fifteen years of age, in 1042, he demanded to be armed knight, and to fulfil all forms necessary "for having the right to serve and command in all ranks."

These forms were in Normandy, by a relic, it is said, of the Danish and pagan customs, more connected with war and less with religion than elsewhere; the young candidates were not bound to confess, to spend a vigil in the church, and to receive from the priest's hands the sword he had consecrated on the altar; it was even the custom to say that "he whose sword had been girded upon him by a long-robed cleric was no true knight, but a cit without spirit." The day on which William for the first time donned his armor was for his servants and all the spectators a gala day. "He was so tall, so manly in face, and so proud of bearing, that it was a sight both pleasant and terrible to see him guiding his horse's career, flas.h.i.+ng with his sword, gleaming with his s.h.i.+eld, and threatening with his casque and javelins." His first act of government was a rigorous decree against such as should be guilty of murder, arson, and pillage; but he at the same time granted an amnesty for past revolts, on condition of fealty and obedience for the future.

For the establishment, however, of a young and disputed authority there is need of something more than brilliant ceremonies and words partly minatory and partly coaxing. William had to show what he was made of.

A conspiracy was formed against him in the heart of his feudal court, and almost of his family. He had given kindly welcome to his cousin Guy of Burgundy, and had even bestowed on him as a fief the counts.h.i.+ps of Vernon and Brionne. In 1044 the young duke was at Valognes; when suddenly, at midnight, one of his trustiest servants, Golet, his fool, such as the great lords of the time kept, knocked at the door of his chamber, crying, "Open, open, my lord duke: fly, fly, or you are lost. They are armed, they are getting ready; to tarry is death." William did not hesitate; he got up, ran to the stables, saddled his horse with his own hands, started off, followed a road called to this day the duke's way, and reached Falaise as a place of safety. There news came to him that the conspiracy was taking the form of insurrection, and that the rebels were seizing his domains. William showed no more hesitation at Falaise than at Valognes; he started off at once, repaired to Poissy, where Henry I., king of France, was then residing, and claimed, as va.s.sal, the help of his suzerain against traitors. Henry, who himself was brave, was touched by this bold confidence, and promised his young va.s.sal effectual support.

William returned to Normandy, summoned his lieges, and took the field promptly. King Henry joined him at Argence, with a body of three thousand men-at-arms, and a battle took place on the 10th of August, 1047, at Val des Dunes, three leagues from Caen. It was very hotly contested. King Henry, unhorsed by a lance-thrust, ran a risk of his life; but he remounted and valiantly returned to the melley. William dashed in wherever the fight was thickest, showing himself everywhere as able in command as ready to expose himself. A Norman lord, Raoul de Tesson, held aloof with a troop of one hundred and forty knights. "Who is he that bides yonder motionless?" asked the French king of the young duke. "It is the banner of Raoul de Tesson," answered William; "I wot not that he hath aught against me." But, though he had no personal grievance, Raoul de Tesson had joined the insurgents, and sworn that he would be the first to strike the duke in the conflict. Thinking better of it, and perceiving William from afar, he p.r.i.c.ked towards him, and taking off his glove struck him gently on the shoulder, saying, "I swore to strike you, and so I am quit: but fear nothing more from me."

"Thanks, Raoul," said William; "be well disposed, I pray you." Raoul waited until the two armies were at grips, and when he saw which way victory was inclined, he hasted to contribute thereto. It was decisive: and William the b.a.s.t.a.r.d returned to Val des Dunes really duke of Normandy.

He made vigorous but not cruel use of his victory. He demolished his enemies' strong castles, magazines as they were for pillage no less than bulwarks of feudal independence; but there is nothing to show that he indulged in violence towards persons. He was even generous to the chief concocter of the plot, Guy of Burgundy. He took from him the counts.h.i.+ps of Vernon and Brionne, but permitted him still to live at his court, a place which the Burgundian found himself too ill at ease to remain in, so he returned to Burgundy, to conspire against his own eldest brother.

William was stern without hatred and merciful without kindliness, only thinking which of the two might promote or r.e.t.a.r.d his success, gentleness or severity.

There soon came an opportunity for him to return to the king of France the kindness he had received. Geoffrey Martel, duke of Anjou, being ambitious and turbulent beyond the measure of his power, got embroiled with the king his suzerain, and war broke out between them. The duke of Normandy went to the aid of King Henry and made his success certain, which cost the duke the fierce hostility of the count of Anjou and a four years' war with that inconvenient neighbor; a war full of dangerous incidents, wherein William enhanced his character, already great, for personal valor. In an ambuscade laid for him by Geoffrey Martel he lost some of his best knights, "whereat he was so wroth," says a chronicle, "that he galloped down with such force upon Geoffrey, and struck him in such wise with his sword that he dinted his helm, cut through his hood, lopped off his car, and with the same blow felled him to earth. But the count was lifted up and remounted, and so fled away."

William made rapid advances both as prince and as man. Without being austere in his private life, he was regular in his habits, and patronized order and respectability in his household as well as in his dominions.

He resolved to marry to his own honor, and to the promotion of his greatness. Baldwin the Debonnair, count of Flanders, one of the most powerful lords of the day, had a daughter, "Matilda, beautiful, well-informed, firm in the faith, a model of virtue and modesty."

William asked her hand in marriage. Matilda refused, saying, "I would rather be veiled nun than given in marriage to a b.a.s.t.a.r.d." Hurt as he was, William did not give up. He was even more persevering than susceptible; but he knew that he must get still greater, and make an impression upon a young girl's imagination by the splendor of his fame and power. Some years later, being firmly established in Normandy, dreaded by all his neighbors, and already showing some foreshadowings of his design upon England, he renewed his matrimonial quest in Flanders, but after so strange a fas.h.i.+on that, in spite of contemporary testimony, several of the modern historians, in their zeal, even at so distant a period, for observance of the proprieties, reject as fabulous the story which is here related on the authority of the most detailed account amongst all the chronicles which contain it. "A little after that Duke William had heard how the damsel had made answer, he took of his folk, and went privily to Lille, where the duke of Flanders and his wife and his daughter then were. He entered into the hall, and, pa.s.sing on, as if to do some business, went into the countess's chamber, and there found the damsel daughter of Count Baldwin. He took her by the tresses, dragged her round the chamber, trampled her under foot, and did beat her soundly. Then he strode forth from the chamber, leaped upon his horse, which was being held for him before the hall, struck in his spurs, and went his way. At this deed was Count Baldwin much enraged; and when matters had thus remained a while, Duke William sent once more to Count Baldwin to parley again of the marriage. The count sounded his daughter on the subject, and she answered that it pleased her well. So the nuptials took place with very great joy. And after the aforesaid matters, Count Baldwin, laughing withal, asked his daughter wherefore she had so lightly accepted the marriage she had aforetime so cruelly refused. And she answered that she did not then know the duke so well as she did now; for, said she, if he had not great heart and high emprise, he had not been so bold as to dare come and beat me in my father's chamber."

Amongst the historians who treat this story as a romantic and untruthlike fable, some believe themselves to have discovered, in divers doc.u.ments of the eleventh and twelfth centuries, circ.u.mstances almost equally singular as regards the cause of the obstacles met with at first by Duke William in his pretensions to the hand of Princess Matilda, and as regards the motive for the first refusal on the part of Matilda herself. According to some, the Flemish princess had conceived a strong pa.s.sion for a n.o.ble Saxon, Brihtric Meaw, who had been sent by King Edward the Confessor to the court of Flanders, and who was remarkable for his beauty. She wished to marry him, but the handsome Saxon was not willing; and Matilda at first gave way to violent grief on that account, and afterwards, when she became queen of England, to vindictive hatred, the weight of which she made him feel severely. Other writers go still farther, and say that, before being sought in marriage by William, Matilda had not fallen in love with a handsome Saxon, but had actually married a Flemish burgess, named Gerbod, patron of the church of St. Dertin, at St. Omer, and that she had by him two and perhaps three children, traces of whom recur, it is said, under the reign of William, king of England. There is no occasion to enter upon the learned controversies of which these different allegations have been the cause; it is sufficient to say that they have led to nothing but obscurity, contradiction, and doubt, and that there is more moral verisimilitude in the account just given, especially in Matilda's first prejudice against marriage with a b.a.s.t.a.r.d, and in her conversation with her father, Count Baldwin, when she had changed her opinion upon the subject. Independently of the testimony of several chroniclers, French and English, this tradition is mentioned, with all the simplicity of belief, in one of the princ.i.p.al Flemish chronicles; and as to the ruffianly gallantry employed by William to win his bride, there is nothing in it very singular, considering the habits of the time, and we meet with more than one example of adventures, if not exactly similar, at any rate very a.n.a.logous.

However that may be, this marriage brought William an unexpected opportunity of entering into personal relations with one of the most distinguished men of his age, and a man destined to become one of his own most intimate advisers. In 1019, at the council of Rheims, Pope Leo IX., on political grounds rather than because of a prohibited degree of relations.h.i.+p, had opposed the marriage of the duke of Normandy with the daughter of the duke of Flanders, and had p.r.o.nounced his veto upon it.

William took no heed; and, in 1052 or 1053, his marriage was celebrated at Rouen with great pomp; but this ecclesiastical veto weighed upon his mind, and he sought some means of getting it taken off. A learned Italian, Lanfranc, a juris-consult of some fame already, whilst travelling in France and repairing from Avranches to Rouen, was stopped near Brionne by brigands, who, having plundered him, left him, with his eyes bandaged, in a forest. His cries attracted the attention of pa.s.sers-by, who took him to a neighboring monastery, but lately founded by a pious Norman knight retired from the world. Lanfranc was received in it, became a monk of it, was elected its prior, attracted to it by his learned teaching a host of pupils, and won therein his own great renown whilst laying the foundation for that of the abbey of Bee, which was destined to be carried still higher by one of his disciples, St. Anselm.

Lanfranc was eloquent, great in dialectics, of a sprightly wit, and lively in repartee. Relying upon the pope's decision, he spoke ill of William's marriage with Matilda. William was informed of this, and in a fit of despotic anger, ordered Lanfranc to be driven from the monastery and banished from Normandy, and even, it is said, the dependency which he inhabited as prior of the abbey, to be burned. The order was executed; and Lanfranc set out, mounted on a sorry little horse given him, no doubt, by the abbey. By what chance is not known, but probably on a hunting-party, his favorite diversion, William, with his retinue, happened to cross the road which Lanfranc was slowly pursuing. "My lord," said the monk, addressing him, "I am obeying your orders; I am going away, but my horse is a sorry beast; if you will give me a better one, I will go faster." William halted, entered into conversation with Lanfranc, let him stay, and sent him back with a present to his abbey.

A little while afterwards Lanfranc was at Rome, and defended before Pope Victor II. William's marriage with Matilda: he was successful, and the pope took off the veto on the sole condition that the couple, in sign of penitence, should each found a religious house. Matilda, accordingly, founded at Caen, for women, the abbey of the Holy Trinity; and William, for men, that of St. Stephen. Lanfranc was the first abbot of the latter; and when William became king of England, Lanfranc was made archbishop of Canterbury and primate of the Church of England, as well as privy counsellor of his king. William excelled in the art, so essential to government, of promptly recognizing the worth of men, and of appropriating their influence to himself whilst exerting his own over them.

About the same time he gave his contemporaries, princes and peoples, new proofs of his ability and power. Henry I., king of France, growing more and more disquieted at and jealous of the duke of Normandy's ascendency, secretly excited against him opposition and even revolt in his dominions.

These dealings led to open war between the suzerain and the va.s.sal, and the war concluded with two battles won by William, one at Mortemer near Neuchatel in Bray, the other at Varaville near Troarrh "After which,"

said William himself, "King Henry never pa.s.sed a night tranquilly on my ground." In 1059 peace was concluded between the two princes. Henry I.

died almost immediately afterwards, and on the 25th of August, 1060, his son Philip I. succeeded him, under the regency of Baldwin, count of Flanders, father of the d.u.c.h.ess Matilda. Duke William was present in state at the coronation of the new king of France, lent him effectual a.s.sistance against the revolts which took place in Gascony, reentered Normandy for the purpose of holding at Caen, in 1061, the Estates of his duchy, and at that time published the famous decree observed long after him, under the name of the law of curfew, which ordered "that every evening the bell should be rung in all parishes to warn every one to prayer, and house-closing, and no more running about the streets."

The pa.s.sion for orderliness in his dominion did not cool his ardor for conquest. In 1063, after the death of his young neighbor Herbert II., count of Maine, William took possession of this beautiful counts.h.i.+p; not without some opposition on the part of the inhabitants, nor without suspicion of having poisoned his rival, Walter, count of Vexin. It is said that after this conquest William meditated that of Brittany; but there is every indication that he had formed a far vaster design, and that the day of its execution was approaching.

From the time of Rollo's settlement in Normandy, the communications of the Normans with England had become more and more frequent, and important for the two countries. The success of the invasions of the Danes in England in the tenth century, and the reigns of three kings of the Danish line, had obliged the princes of Saxon race to take refuge in Normandy, the duke of which, Richard I., had given his daughter Emma in marriage to their grandfather, Ethelred II. When, at the death of the last Danish king, Hardicanute, the Saxon prince Edward ascended the throne of his fathers, he had pa.s.sed twenty-seven years of exile in Normandy, and he returned to England "almost a stranger," in the words of the chronicles, to the country of his ancestors; far more Norman than Saxon in his manners, tastes, and language, and surrounded by Normans, whose numbers and prestige under his reign increased from day to day. A hot rivalry, nationally as well as courtly, grew up between them and the Saxons. At the head of these latter was G.o.dwin, count of Kent, and his five sons, the eldest of whom, Harold, was destined before long to bear the whole brunt of the struggle. Between these powerful rivals, Edward the Confessor, a pacific, pious, gentle, and undecided king, wavered incessantly; at one time trying to resist, and at another compelled to yield to the pretensions and seditions by which he was beset. In 1051 the Saxon party and its head, G.o.dwin, had risen in revolt. Duke William, on invitation, perhaps, from King Edward, paid a brilliant visit to England, where he found Normans everywhere established and powerful, in Church as well as in State; in command of the fleets, ports, and princ.i.p.al English places. King Edward received him "as his own son, gave him arms, horses, hounds, and hawking-birds," and sent him home full of presents and hopes. The chronicler, Ingulf, who accompanied William on his return to Normandy, and remained attached to him as private secretary, affirms that, during this visit, not only was there no question, between King Edward and the duke of Normandy, of the latter's possible succession to the throne of England, but that never as yet had this probability occupied the attention of William.

It is very doubtful whether William had said nothing upon the subject to King Edward at that time; and it is certain, from William's own testimony, that he had for a long while been thinking about it. Four years after this visit of the duke to England, King Edward was reconciled to and lived on good terms with the family of the G.o.dwins. Their father was dead, and the eldest son, Harold, asked the king's permission to go to Normandy and claim the release of his brother and nephew, who had been left as hostages in the keeping of Duke William. The king did not approve of the project. "I have no wish to constrain thee," said he to Harold: "but if thou go, it will be without my consent: and, a.s.suredly, thy trip will bring some misfortune upon thee and our country. I know Duke William and his crafty spirit; he hates thee, and will grant thee nought unless he see his advantage therefrom. The only way to make him give up the hostages will be to send some other than thyself." Harold, however, persisted and went. William received him with apparent cordiality, promised him the release of the two hostages, escorted him and his comrades from castle to castle, and from entertainment to entertainment, made them knights of the grand Norman order, and even invited them, "by way of trying their new spurs," to accompany him on a little warlike expedition he was about to undertake in Brittany. Harold and his comrades behaved gallantly: and he and William shared the same tent and the same table. On returning, as they trotted side by side, William turned the conversation upon his youthful connection with the king of England. "When Edward and I," said he to the Saxon, "were living like brothers under the same roof, he promised, if ever he became king of England, to make me heir to his kingdom; I should very much like thee, Harold, to help me to realize this promise; and be a.s.sured that, if by thy aid I obtain the kingdom, whatsoever thou askest of me, I will grant it forthwith." Harold, in surprise and confusion, answered by an a.s.sent which he tried to make as vague as possible. William took it as positive. "Since thou dost consent to serve me," said he, "thou must engage to fortify the castle of Dover, dig a well of fresh water there, and put it into the hands of my men-at-arms; thou must also give me thy sister to be married to one of my barons, and thou must thyself espouse my daughter Adele." Harold, "not witting," says the chronicler, "how to escape from this pressing danger," promised all the duke asked of him, reckoning, doubt-less, on disregarding his engagement; and for the moment William asked him nothing more.

But a few days afterwards he summoned, at Avranches according to some, and at Bayeux according to others, and, more probably still, at Bonneville-sur-Touques, his Norman barons; and, in the midst of this a.s.sembly, at which Harold was present, William, seated with his naked sword in his hand, caused to be brought and placed upon a table covered with cloth of gold two reliquaries. "Harold," said he, "I call upon thee, in presence of this n.o.ble a.s.semblage, to confirm by oath the promises thou didst make me, to wit, to aid me to obtain the kingdom of England after the death of King Edward, to espouse my daughter Adele, and to send me thy sister to be married to one of my people." Harold, who had not expected this public summons, nevertheless did not hesitate any more than he had hesitated in his private conversation with William; he drew near, laid his hand on the two reliquaries, and swore to observe, to the best of his power, his agreement with the duke, should he live and G.o.d help. "G.o.d help!" repeated those who were present. William made a sign; the cloth of gold was removed, and there was discovered a tub filled to the edge with bones and relies of all the saints that could be got together. The chronicler-poet, Robert Wace, who, alone and long afterwards, recounts this last particular, adds that Harold was visibly troubled at sight of this saintly heap; but he had sworn. It is honorable to human nature not to be indifferent to oaths even when those who exact them have but small reliance upon them, and when he who takes them has but small intention of keeping them. And so Harold departed laden with presents, leaving William satisfied, but not over-confident.

When, on returning to England, Harold told King Edward what had pa.s.sed between William and himself, "Did I not warn thee," said the king, "that I knew William, and that thy journey would bring great misfortunes upon thyself and upon our nation? Grant Heaven that those misfortunes come not during my life!" The king's wish was not granted. He fell ill; and on the 5th of January, 1066, he lay on his couch almost at the point of death. Harold and his kindred entered the chamber, and prayed the king to name a successor by whom the kingdom might be governed securely. "Ye know," said Edward, "that I have left my kingdom to the Duke of Normandy; and are there not here, among ye, those who have sworn to a.s.sure his succession?" Harold advanced, and once more asked the king on whom the crown should devolve. "Take it, if it is thy wish, Harold," said Edward; "but the gift will be thy ruin; against the duke and his barons thy power will not suffice."--Harold declared that he feared neither the Norman nor any other foe. The king, vexed at this importunity, turned round in his bed, saying, "Let the English make king of whom they will, Harold or another; I consent;" and shortly after expired. The very day after the celebration of his obsequies, Harold was proclaimed king by his partisans, amidst no small public disquietude, and Aldred, archbishop of York, lost no time in anointing him.

William was in his park of Rouvray, near Rouen, trying a bow and arrows for the chase, when a faithful servant arrived from England, to tell him that Edward was dead and Harold proclaimed king. William gave his bow to one of his people, and went back to his palace at Rouen, where he paced about in silence, sitting down, rising up, leaning upon a bench, without opening his lips and without any one of his people's daring to address a word to him. There entered his seneschal William de Bretenil, of whom "What ails the duke?" asked they who were present. "Ye will soon know,"

answered he. Then going up to the duke, he said, "Wherefore conceal your tidings, my lord? All the city knows that King Edward is dead; and that Harold has broken his oath to you, and had himself crowned king." "Ay,"

said William, "it is that which doth weigh me down." "My lord," said William Fitz-Osbern, a gallant knight and confidential friend of the duke, "none should be wroth over what can be mended: it depends but on you to stop the mischief Harold is doing you; you shall destroy him, if it please you. You have right; you have good men and true to serve you; you need but have courage: set on boldly." William gathered together his most important and most trusted counsellors; and they were unanimous in urging him to resent the perjury and injury. He sent to Harold a messenger charged to say, "William, duke of the Normans, doth recall to thee the oath thou swarest to him with thy mouth and with thy hand, on real and saintly relics." "It is true," answered Harold, "that I swore, but on compulsion; I promised what did not belong to me; my kings.h.i.+p is not mine own; I cannot put it off from me without the consent of the country. I cannot any the more, without the consent of the country, espouse a foreigner. As for my sister, whom the duke claims for one of his chieftains, she died within the year; if he will, I will send him the corpse." William replied without any violence, claiming the conditions sworn, and especially Harold's marriage with his daughter Adele. For all answer to this summons Harold married a Saxon, sister of two powerful Saxon chieftains; Edwin and Morkar. There was an open rupture; and William swore that "within the year he would go and claim, at the sword's point, payment of what was due to him, on the very spot where Harold thought himself to be most firm on his feet."

And he set himself to the work. But, being as far-sighted as he was ambitious, he resolved to secure for his enterprise the sanction of religious authority and the formal a.s.sent of the Estates of Normandy.

Not that he had any inclination to subordinate his power to that of the Pope. Five years previously, Robert de Grandmesnil, abbot of St. Evroul, with whom William had got embroiled, had claimed to re-enter his monastery as master by virtue solely of an order from Pope Nicholas II.

"I will listen to the legates of the Pope, the common father of the faithful," said William, "if they come to me to speak of the Christian faith and religion; but if a monk of my Estates permit himself a single word beyond his place, I will have him hanged by his cowl from the highest oak of the nearest forest." When, in 1000, he denounced to Pope Alexander II. the perjury of Harold, asking him at the same time to do him justice, he made no scruple about promising that, if the Pope authorized him to right himself by war, he would bring back the kingdom of England to obedience to the Holy See. He had Lanfranc for his negotiator with the court of Rome, and Pope Alexander II. had for chief counsellor the celebrated monk Hildebrand, who was destined to succeed him under the name of Gregory VII. The opportunity of extending the empire of the Church was too tempting to be spurned, and her future head too bold not to seize it whatever might be the uncertainty and danger of the issue; and in spite of hesitation on the part of some of the Pope's advisers, the question was promptly decided in accordance with William's demand. Harold and his adherents were excommunicated, and, on committing his bull to the hands of William's messenger, the Pope added a banner of the Roman Church and a ring containing, it is said, a hair of St. Peter set in a diamond.

The Estates of Normandy were less easy to manage. William called them together at Lillebonne; and several of his va.s.sals showed a zealous readiness to furnish him with vessels and victual and to follow him beyond the sea, but others declared that they were not bound to any such service, and that they would not lend themselves to it; they had calls enough already, and had nothing more to spare. William Fitz-Osbern scouted these objections. "He is your lord, and hath need of you," said he to the recalcitrants; "you ought to offer yourselves to him, and not wait to be asked. If he succeed in his purpose, you will be more powerful as well as he; if you fail him, and he succeed without you, he will remember it: show that you love him, and what ye do, do with a good grace." The discussion was keen. Many persisted in saying, "True, he is our lord; but if we pay him his rents, that should suffice: we are not bound to go and serve beyond the seas; we are already much burdened for his wars." It was at last agreed that Fitz-Osbern should give the duke the a.s.sembly's reply; for he knew well, they said, the ability of each.

"If ye mind not to do what I shall say," said Fitz-Osbern, "charge me not therewith." "We will be bound by it, and will do it," was the cry amidst general confusion. They repaired to the duke's presence. "My lord,"

said Fitz-Osbern, "I trow that there be not in the whole world such folk as these. You know the trouble and labor they have already undergone in supporting your rights; and they are minded to do still more, and serve you at all points, this side the sea and t'other. Go you before, and they will follow you; and spare them in nothing. As for me, I will furnish you with sixty vessels, manned with good fighters." "Nay, nay,"

cried several of those present, prelates and barons, "we charged you not with such reply; when he hath business in his own country, we will do him the service we owe him; we be not bound to serve him in conquering another's territory, or to go beyond sea for him." And they gathered themselves together in knots with much uproar.

"William was very wroth," says the chronicler, "retired to a chamber apart, summoned those in whom he had most confidence, and by their advice called before him his barons, each separately, and asked them if they were willing to help him. He had no intention, he told them, of doing them wrong, nor would he and his, now or hereafter, ever cease to treat with them in perfect courtesy; and he would give them, in writing, such a.s.surances as they were minded to devise. The majority of his people agreed to give him, more or less, according to circ.u.mstances; and he had everything reduced to writing." At the same time he made an appeal to all his neighbors, Bretons, Manceaux, and Angevines, hunting up soldiers wherever he could find them, and promising all who desired them lands in England if he effected its conquest. Lastly he repaired in person, first to Philip I., king of France, his suzerain, then to Baldwin V., count of Flanders, his father-in-law, asking their a.s.sistance for his enterprise.

Philip gave a formal refusal. "What the duke demands of you," said his advisers, "is to his own profit and to your hurt; if you aid him, your country will be much burdened; and if the duke fail, you will have the English your foes forever." The count of Flanders made show of a similar refusal; but privately he authorized William to raise soldiers in Flanders, and pressed his va.s.sals to follow him. William, having thus hunted up and collected all the forces he could hope for, thought only of putting them in motion, and of hurrying on the preparations for his departure.

Whilst, in obedience to his orders, the whole expedition, troops and s.h.i.+ps, were collecting at Dives, he received from Conan II., duke of Brittany, this message: "I learn that thou art now minded to go beyond sea and conquer for thyself the kingdom of England. At the moment of starting for Jerusalem, Robert, duke of Normandy, whom thou feignest to regard as thy father, left all his heritage to Alain, my father and his cousin: but thou and thy accomplices slew my father with poison at Vimeux, in Normandy. Afterwards thou didst invade his territory because I was too young to defend it; and, contrary to all right, seeing that thou art a b.a.s.t.a.r.d, thou hast kept it until this day. Now, therefore, either give me back this Normandy which thou owest me, or I will make war upon thee with all my forces." "At this message," say the chronicles, "William was at first somewhat dismayed; but a Breton lord, who had sworn fidelity to the two counts, and bore messages from one to the other, rubbed poison upon the inside of Conan's hunting-horn, of his horse's reins, and of his gloves. Conan, having unwittingly put on his gloves and handled the reins of his horse, lifted his hands to his face, and the touch having filled him with poisonous infection, he died soon after, to the great sorrow of his people, for he was an able and brave man, and inclined to justice. And he who had betrayed him quitted before long the army of Conan, and informed Duke William of his death."

Conan is not the only one of William's foes whom he was suspected of making away with by poison: there are no proofs; but contemporary a.s.sertions are positive, and the public of the time believed them, without surprise. Being as unscrupulous about means as ambitious and bold in aim, William was not of those whose character repels such an accusation. What, however, diminishes the suspicion is that, after and in spite of Conan's death, several Breton knights, and, amongst others, two sons of Count Eudes, his uncle, attended at the trysting-place of the Norman troops and took part in the expedition.