Chapter IV: Part 4

“You are not ignorant that it is by the counsel of the divine
will that your piety presides over the realm of England.
For when, to avoid the hatred of a perverse king, you chose
to withdraw and to dwell by yourself far from the turmoil
of England, living unto God, Almighty God wrought an awful
judgment upon the perverse king. But by the vehement demand of
the whole people and by the wonderful devoutness of the new
king, you have been recalled to the primacy which for God’s
sake you abandoned. Thanks be to God that episcopal authority
ever abides in you, and that though you are set among a
barbarous folk, you cease not to proclaim truth in spite of the
violence of tyrants and the favour of the mighty, in spite of
the kindled fire and the outstretched hand. We ask therefore
that what you are doing, you continue to do, that what you
proclaim, you proclaim to the end. For the inspiration of
Him, Who in the beginning was the Word, shall not be wanting
to our words and works. Nor will we be wanting to Him Who is
the power of God and the wisdom of God. For we believe that
we have the same inspiration as our fathers, wherefore also
we now speak.... In the truth thereof we will guard against
the lies of men. Wherefore in the late Lateran council we
re-enacted the famous decrees of our fathers, proclaiming
and prohibiting that no clerk whatsoever accept churches or
ecclesiastical gifts from the hand of a layman; for this is
the root of the vice of simony, when fools strive to win the
favour of secular persons in order to receive the honours of
the church. Therefore the reverend majesty of holy councils
has decreed that ecclesiastical elections shall be guarded
from the power of secular princes, in order that, as through
Christ only is the door of the church first opened to eternal
life in baptism and at the last in death, so through Christ
only shall be appointed the door-keeper of Christ’s fold, by
whom Christ’s sheep, not for hire but for Christ, shall be led
in and out to life eternal. These things, dear brother, might
be treated at greater length both in speech and argument, but
it is enough to have set forth a few considerations to your
wisdom, which abounds in divine utterances and is familiar
with ecclesiastical arguments. Teach these things, as you know
befits your primacy, which, moreover, we confirm to you as
fully and entirely as it was ever held by your predecessors,
adding for ourselves that so long as the divine mercy shall
preserve your piety in the realm of England, you shall not be
subject to the judgment of any legate, but only of ourself.”

... On the return of the bishops and others who, as we have said, were sent to Rome, the king, summoning the chief men of the realm to London, called on Anselm by messenger according to wont, either no longer to oppose him and the customs of his predecessors, or to give up his primacy of the realm. He replied, “Let the king be pleased to permit examination of the letters which have been brought, and, saving my honour and my obedience to the apostolic see, I will do all in my power to submit to his will.” The king replied, “Let his own be examined, if he chooses, but mine shall certainly not be shown at present.” He answered, “When it shall please the king to show it at another time, he shall find me ready to meet his present demands.” The king rejoined, “I have no concern with letters, nor will I; let him say in plain speech whether he will obey my will in all things.” On hearing this many were filled with a great wonder, arguing that if the letter had coincided with the king’s wishes, he would have made the contents public of his own will, without any reference to Anselm. At that time they were not known to us, yet the more anxiously their secrecy was then preserved, the more openly were their contents known a few days later. When the letter to Anselm had been read and read again before all who would hear it, the bishops who had come from Rome asserted that they had received from the Pope at Rome a verbal assurance quite contrary to the tenour of that letter and even to the letter which they had brought to the king. Asked what it was, they declared on their word as bishops that the Pope himself had sent a message for the king’s private ears, that as long as he lived the life of a good prince in other ways, he would willingly bear with him on the matter of investitures of churches, and would refrain from imposing the ban of excommunication if he should invest religious persons by the gift of the pastoral staff. He had refused to entrust to writing the honour of a concession so great in case it should be brought to the knowledge of other princes, who might usurp the same privilege and despise the authority of the Roman pontiff....

On the first of August (1107) a council of the bishops, abbots and chief men of the realm was held at London in the king’s palace, and for three whole days the question of the investitures of churches was discussed by the king and the bishops in Anselm’s absence, some urging upon him to maintain the practice of his father and brother in defiance of the apostolic command. For the Pope, taking a firm stand upon the decree which had been published thereon, had conceded the homage which Pope Urban had prohibited equally with investitures, and thereby secured the king’s consent to his view of the investitures.... Afterwards, in the presence of Anselm, and the whole council standing, the king agreed and ordained that from that time forward no man should be invested in any bishopric or abbey by the king or the hand of any layman in England by the giving of the pastoral staff or ring, Anselm on his side granting that no man elected to be a prelate should be deprived of consecration to the dignity he had received, by reason of the homage which he should do to the king. Upon this settlement of the dispute, institutions were made by the king, without investiture of the pastoral staff or ring, by the counsel of Anselm and the chief men of the realm, to almost all the churches of England, so long bereft of their pastors.

OPPRESSIVE TAXATION UNDER HENRY I. (1105).

=Source.=--Eadmer, _Historia Novorum in Anglia_, ed. Rule, p. 184. (Rolls Series.)

The character and number of the burdens, under which the whole of England was crushed at this time, are difficult, I know, to describe. For the king, leaving Normandy because he could not conquer the whole of it by the means described above,[28] returned to England to collect larger supplies of money with which he might go back and subdue the remainder, disinheriting his brother. In the levying of this money the collectors showed no regard for pity or mercy, but all men suffered a ruthless and outrageous exaction, as those who came to us testified. Indeed you might have seen men who had nothing to give driven from their own homes, or the doors of their houses torn off and carried away, and themselves exposed to wholesale plunder; or they were reduced to extreme poverty, their mean furniture being seized, or at any rate persecuted and tortured in other shameful ways. Against those who were thought to have any wealth certain new and ingeniously devised penalties were charged, and so, when they dared not venture to implead the king for the defence of their land, their possessions were seized and themselves reduced to serious distress. But these measures perhaps will be deemed slight by some, because they were not peculiar to king Henry’s reign; many a like oppression had been committed under his brother, not to mention his father king William. Yet they were thought harder and more intolerable, because much less than usual was found to be extracted from a people already despoiled and exhausted. But further, in the council of London ... all priests and monks of England had been prohibited from marriage, and this prohibition, during Anselm’s exile, had been violated by many, who still retained or at least took back their wives. The king, refusing to allow this sin to go unpunished, ordered his ministers to implead the offenders and take fines from them to expiate their sin. But since many of them were found innocent of this offence, the money demanded for the king’s use amounted to a smaller sum than the collectors could have desired. Therefore they changed their plan, the innocent were involved with the guilty in a universal charge, and all parish churches were put in the king’s debt and every one ordered to be redeemed by the parson who served God therein. It was pitiful to behold. When the fury of this exaction was at its height, and some men, who either had nothing to give, or, in detestation of the outrageous measure, refused to give on such a ground, and were contemptuously robbed, imprisoned and tortured, the king chanced to come to London; there nearly two hundred priests assembled, it is said, robed in their albs and priestly stoles, and with naked feet approached the king on his way to the palace. But, as it happened, his thoughts were much occupied, and he was entirely unmoved to pity by their prayers, or at any rate deemed them unworthy of the honour of an answer, as if they were men destitute of all religion, and ordered them to be driven at once out of his sight. Their confusion thus worse confounded, they approached the queen and begged her to intercede; but though, it is said, she was moved by pity to tears, she was held back by fear from intervening.

THE BATTLE OF TENCHEBRAI (1106).

=Source.=--Eadmer, _Historia Novorum in Anglia_, ed. Rule, p. 184. (Rolls Series.)

Meanwhile the king conquered Normandy in battle, and forthwith notified the fact to Anselm by the following letter:

“Henry, king of the English, to Anselm, archbishop of Canterbury, greeting and affection. We make known to your paternity and holiness that Robert duke of Normandy, with all the forces of knights and footmen which he could collect by prayer or for hire, on a day named and agreed on, fought a sharp fight with me at Tenchebrai; and at last by God’s mercy we defeated him, and that without much loss on our side. What more should I say? The divine mercy has given into our hands the duke of Normandy, the count of Moretuil, William Crispin, William de Ferrers and Robert de Stuteville the elder, and other knights to the number of four hundred, and ten thousand footmen, and Normandy itself. The number of those slain by the sword was not great. This victory, however, I attribute not to my own glory or vanity or strength, but to the blessing of divine providence. Wherefore, reverend father, humbly and devoutly I bow the knee to your holiness and beseech you to beseech the supreme Judge, whose award and pleasure has granted this triumph, so glorious and so profitable to me, that it may not turn to my loss and damage, but to the beginning of good works and the service of God, and to the maintenance and strengthening of the estate of God’s Holy Church in peace and tranquillity, that henceforth it may persist in freedom and not be shaken by any shock of battle.”

Many men therefore argued that the king had gained this victory because of his agreement with Anselm.

CONSOLIDATION OF THE POWER OF HENRY I. (1107).

=Source.=--Henry of Huntingdon, _Historia Anglorum_, ed. Arnold, p. 236. (Rolls Series.)

The Lord rendered to duke Robert his deserts, because, after He had granted him glory in the wars of Jerusalem, he refused the offer of the kingdom of Jerusalem, choosing rather to be enslaved by the peace and sloth of Normandy than to sweat in the Holy City for the King of kings. Therefore God condemned him to lasting inactivity and perpetual imprisonment. In proof hereof a comet had appeared in the same year, and on the day of the Lord’s Supper two full moons were seen, one in the east and the other in the west.

In the seventh year of his reign, king Henry, having now destroyed or conquered his enemies, disposed the affairs of Normandy at his pleasure and returned to England, casting into dark dungeons his brother, the illustrious duke, and the count of Moretuil. Victorious, and now for the first time undisputed king, he held his court at Easter in Windsor, where the barons both of England and Normandy assembled in fear and trembling. For before, both while he was young and after he became king, he had been held in the greatest contempt; but God, Who judges far otherwise than the sons of men, Who exalts the humble and puts down the mighty, deposed the famous Robert from the favour of all men, and commanded that the glory of the despised Henry should shine to the ends of the earth. Freely the Lord Almighty gave to him three gifts, wisdom, victory and riches, and herewith he prospered in all things and surpassed all his predecessors.

HENRY I.’S CHARTER OF LIBERTIES TO THE CITY OF LONDON.

=Source.=--Rymer, _Fædera_, vol. i., p. 11.

Henry by the grace of God king of the English to the archbishop of Canterbury and his bishops and abbots and earls and barons and justices and sheriffs and all his trusty men, French and English, of the whole of England, greeting. Know ye that I have granted to my citizens of London that they hold Middlesex at farm for 300_l._ at account, to them and their heirs, of me and my heirs, so that the citizens appoint as sheriff whom they choose from among themselves, and as justice whom they choose from among themselves, to keep the pleas of my crown and to hold the same pleas; and no other shall be justice over the same men of London. And the citizens shall not plead outside the walls for any plea, and they shall be quit of scot and of lot, of Danegeld and murder-fine, and none of them shall suffer trial by battle. And if any of the citizens be impleaded of pleas of the crown, a man of London shall make his proof by the oath that shall be adjudged in the city. And within the walls of the city no man shall be lodged either of my household or of another’s, unless lodging be delivered to him. And all men of London and all their possessions shall be quit and free, throughout the whole of England and throughout seaports, of toll and passage[29] and lastage[30] and all other customs. And the churches and the barons and the citizens shall have and hold their sokes[31] duly and peaceably with all customs, so that guests lodged in their sokes give their customs to none save to him whose soke it is, or to the minister whom he shall set there. And a man of London shall not be adjudged to a money penalty, except to his “wer,”[32] to wit, 100_s._; I speak of pleas to which a money penalty is attached. And there shall no longer be “miskenning”[33] in the husting or in the folkmoot or in other pleas within the city. And the husting shall sit once a week, to wit, on Monday. And I will cause my citizens to have their lands and wardmoot and debts within the city and without. And I will award them right by the law of the city touching the lands whereto they shall lay claim before me. And if any man take toll or custom from the citizens of London, the citizens of London shall take from the borough or town where the toll or custom was taken as much as the man of London gave by way of toll, and further he shall take his damages. And all debtors who owe debts to the citizens shall render the same to them or shall prove in London that they owe nothing. And if they refuse to render the debts or to bring it to proof, then the citizens to whom their debts are due shall take their pledges within the city or from the county in which the debtor dwells. And the citizens shall have their chaces for chasing as well and fully as their ancestors had the same, to wit, Ciltre and Middlesex and Surrey. Witnesses:--the bishop of Winchester, Robert son of Richer, and Hugh Bigot, and Alfred de Toteneis, and William Albini, and Hubert the king’s chamberlain, and William de Montfichet, and Hagulph de Tani, and John Belet, and Robert son of Siward. Given at Westminster.

SOCIAL EVILS AND DRASTIC PUNISHMENTS (1108).

=Source.=--Eadmer, _Historia Novorum in Anglia_, ed. Rule, p. 192. (Rolls Series.)

Meanwhile king Henry, noting that wellnigh the whole of the realm had sunk for many causes into deep misery, began to consider, by the advice of Anselm and the chief men of the realm, how to palliate in some way the evils by which especially the poor were weighed down. He wisely began this good work with his own court. In the time of the king, his brother, a great number of the company that followed his court were in the habit of destroying and plundering indiscriminately, and without any check or restraint, of wasting the whole of the land through which the king passed. Another evil supervened. Most of them, drunk with their own malice, when they could not altogether consume all that they found in the houses into which they forced their way, used to have the residue taken to the market place by the very possessors and sold for their private profit, or to light a fire and destroy it, or, if it were drink, to wash their horses’ feet with it and pour the remainder on the ground, or at any rate make away with it in some other manner.... For these causes all men, on hearing of the king’s coming, used to fly from their dwellings, in their anxiety for themselves and their households, and make for the woods or other places where they hoped to secure protection. King Henry, eager to do away with this curse, published a prohibition, and with stern and steady justice punished all who could be convicted of any of the practices I have spoken of, by causing their eyes to be plucked out, or their hands or feet or other members to be cut off. This justice was suffered by many and proved a visible deterrent to the rest from inflicting injury on others, if they would save whole their own persons.

THE SHIPWRECK OF WILLIAM, SON OF HENRY I. (1120).

=Source.=--William of Malmesbury, _De gestis regum Anglorum_, ed. Stubbs, vol. ii., p. 495. (Rolls Series.)

By Matilda king Henry had a son named William, trained and destined to the succession with tender hopes and great anxiety; he was hardly twelve years old before all freemen of England and Normandy, of every condition and rank, to what lords soever they owed fealty, were compelled to become his men by homage and oaths. As a boy he espoused and took to wife the daughter of Fulk count of Anjou, herself but a girl, receiving from his father-in-law the county of Maine for her dower; moreover, when Fulk was bent on his journey to Jerusalem, he commended his county to the king, if he should live, to go to his son-in-law if he should not return. Many countries, therefore, awaited the boy’s governance, and it was thought that he would fulfil the prophecy of king Edward, and it was said that the hope of England, cut down like a tree, would burst again into flower in his person, put forth fruit, and so might an end of evil be looked for. God willed otherwise. This hope was shattered, for he was destined to an untimely end. It happened that by the exertions of his father-in-law, and of Theobald son of Stephen and Adela his aunt, Louis king of France granted the lad Normandy, that after homage done he might hold it by lawful right; this was planned and brought to effect by the astuteness of his father, that the homage, which he disdained to do himself by reason of his high sovereignty, might be done by a tender child, who, it was supposed, was unlikely to live. The negotiations and peaceable settlement of these schemes occupied the king for a space of four years, during the whole of which he stayed in Normandy. And yet the peace, so brilliant, so carefully devised, and the hopes of all men, raised so high, were brought to confusion by the uncertainty of man’s lot. It was decided to return to England, and on the evening of the 24th of November the king set sail at Barfleur; a fair breeze filled his sails and brought him safe to his realm and noble heritage. But the young man, now seventeen years of age and a little more, endowed by his father’s bounty with every honour except the name of king, ordered another ship to be made ready for himself; and almost all the young nobility, sharing with him the pleasures of youth, flocked in his train. The sailors had drunk too freely, and the drink excited their seaman’s enthusiasm; they swore that those who had started first must speedily be left astern; for the ship was excellent and fresh-fitted with new planks and rivets. The night was now dark, when the young and inexperienced band, overcome with drink, pushed out from the shore. The ship flew swifter than the winged arrow, and cutting through the curling billows, by the crew’s drunken carelessness struck on a rock rising out of the sea not far from the shore. The wretched men jumped up and shouting wildly strove long to push the ship off the rock with their iron boat-hooks; but fortune was against them and all their efforts were useless. The oars also were dragged against the rock and snapped, and the forepart hung jambed and shattered; and now some were washed overboard, and others were drowned by the inrushing water, when the ship’s boat was at length pushed off, and the king’s son put in it; he could have reached the shore in safety, had not his sister, the countess of Perche, struggling with death in the larger vessel, with shrieks implored her brother’s help, and begged him not to abandon her so cruelly. He was moved with pity, ordered the skiff to be brought close to the ship to rescue his sister, and thus through tenderness of heart pitifully met his death; for at once a crowd of men jumped into the boat and upset it, and all alike sank to the bottom. Only one man, a rustic, escaped, and by clinging to the mast all night lived to tell the whole tragic story the next day. No ship ever brought on England misery so great, no ship was so notorious throughout the world. With William perished also Richard, another son of the king, the child of a woman without rank, born before his accession to the throne, a young man of excellent parts and dear to his father for his devoted service; also Richard earl of Chester and his brother Otwell, the tutor and guardian of the king’s son; also the king’s daughter, the countess of Perche, and his niece, the sister of Theobald, countess of Chester; and indeed almost the whole flower of the court, whether knight or chaplain, and the sons of the nobility in training for knighthood; for, as I have said, they flocked to him from all sides, hoping to gain no small glory from either amusing or serving the son of the king. The disaster was increased by the difficulty of recovering their bodies, which could not easily be found by the searchers scattered along the coast; their noble limbs became food for the cruel monsters of the deep.

The news of the prince’s death caused remarkable changes. His father abandoned the celibacy observed by him after Matilda’s death, scheming to beget heirs from a new queen. His father-in-law, on the other hand, on his return home from Jerusalem, faithlessly joined the party of William, son of Robert duke of Normandy, giving to him in marriage his second daughter and the county of Maine, his wrath being roused and sharpened against the king for keeping the dowry of his daughter in England after the prince’s death.

A NORMAN PRELATE.

=Source.=--Henry of Huntingdon, _Epistola de Contemptu Mundi_, ed. Arnold, p. 299. (Rolls Series.)

Experience of evil is a fatal hook to catch at men’s hearts and enslave them to riches and transitory pleasures. This I have learned from my own life. For when I was a child, a boy and a young man, I used to see the glory of Robert, our bishop, his gallant knights, his noble pages, his costly horses, his vessels of gold and silver gilt, his store of plate, his gorgeous waiting-men, his purple robes and fine linen, and I thought there could be no happier condition. And when all men, even they who lectured in the schools on the vanity of the world, were obsequious to him, and he himself, honoured as the father and god of all, loved and valued the world overmuch, with what countenance, with what temper would I have regarded any man who should have told me then that this splendour, which all admired, was contemptible? I would have judged him more mad than Orestes, more querulous than Thersites. I thought there could be no flaw in the exalted happiness of so exalted a man. But when I became a man, I heard stories of the vilest abuse being levelled at him, and felt that I would have fainted if the same words had been spoken to me, who possess nothing, before the same high audience. I began therefore to deem of less account that inestimable happiness.

But since many worldly folk commonly experience the bitterest reverses before their death, I will relate what befel him before his end. He who had been justiciar of the whole of England and greatly feared by all men, was twice impleaded by the king at the end of his life before a justice of low birth, and twice condemned with disgrace in the heaviest damages; whereby his anguish of heart so affected him, that when I, now his archdeacon, sat by him at dinner, I saw that he had been moved to tears. I asked the cause, and he replied, “At one time my attendants were sumptuously clothed; now the fines exacted by the king, whose favour I have always sought, have reduced them to sheepskins.” After this his despair of winning the king’s friendship was so great that when the high praise lavished on him by the king in his absence was reported to him, he said with a sigh, “The king only praises a subject whom he has determined utterly to ruin.” For king Henry, if one may dare to say so, exercised consummate duplicity and possessed an inscrutable mind. A few days afterwards, at Woodstock, where the king had appointed a hunt, while conversing with the king and the bishop of Salisbury, who were the highest in the kingdom, our bishop was struck with apoplexy. Alive, but speechless, he was carried into his house, and soon afterwards died in the king’s presence. The great king, whom he had always served, whom he had loved much and feared much, whom he held in such honour, whom he trusted so entirely, no more availed him in his last necessity than a beggar. Note therefore that it was not said in vain, “Cursed be he that trusteth in man and maketh flesh his arm.” When therefore the child or the boy or the young man regards the prosperous, let him take thought of the uncertainty of their end, and remember that even in this world they may be doomed to suffer a decline full of misery. Bishop Robert was gentle and humble, advancing many and crushing none, the father of orphans, beloved by his household; yet this was the end of him.

THE ORGANISATION OF THE EXCHEQUER.

=Source.=--Richard, son of Nigel, _Dialogus de Scaccario_, ed. Hughes, Crump, and Johnson, p. 60.

_What the Exchequer[34] is, and what is the reason of this term?_

_Disciple._ What is the Exchequer?

_Master._ The Exchequer is a rectangular board about ten feet in length and five in breadth, set like a table for those who sit round it, and on every side it has an edge about four fingers high, that nothing set thereon may fall off. Over the top of the Exchequer is placed a cloth, bought in the Easter term, not any sort of cloth, but black marked with stripes, which are separated from each other by the space either of a foot or of a hand’s breadth. And in the spaces there are counters placed according to their value.... Now, though such a board is called the Exchequer, yet this term is transferred also to the court itself, when the Exchequer is sitting; so that if any man obtain aught by an award, or anything be decreed by common counsel, it is said to have been done at the Exchequer of this or that year. And where men say to-day “at the Exchequer,” they used to say “at the tallies.”

_D._ What is the reason of this term?

_M._ No better one occurs to me at present than that its shape is like that of a chessboard.

_D._ Would the wisdom of the ancients ever have so called it for its shape only, when for a like reason it might have been called “the Board?”

_M._ I was right in calling you particular. There is another but a less obvious reason. As in a game of chess there are certain ranks of combatants, which advance or stand still by certain rules or limitations, some presiding and others preceding: so here some preside and others assist by reason of their office, and none is free to transgress the established rules.... Moreover, as in chess the battle is fought between kings, so here it is mainly between two that the war is waged and the battle fought, to wit, the treasurer, and the sheriff who sits there to render account; the others sitting by as judges, to look on and give judgment.

THE DEVELOPMENT OF EXCHEQUER PROCEDURE IN RELATION TO ROYAL REVENUE.

=Source.=--Richard, son of Nigel, _Dialogus de Scaccario_, ed. Hughes, Crump, and Johnson, p. 89.

_By whom and for what cause the testing of silver was instituted?_

_D._ By whom and for what cause was the testing or combustion instituted?

_M._ In order that this may be clear to you, we must go back a little further. In the original condition of the realm after the Conquest, as we have learned from our fathers, only victuals were paid to the kings from their lands, and not gold or silver by weight, and from such payments were supplied the necessaries for the daily use of the royal household; and those who had been appointed for this purpose knew certainly how much came from each estate. But for the payments or gifts to the knights and for other necessary things, money by tale[35] accrued from the pleas of the realm and from covenants,[36] and from the cities or castles where agriculture was not pursued. This practice, then, continued during the whole time of king William I., and as late as the times of king Henry his son; in fact, I myself have seen people who saw victuals brought at stated times from the royal estates to the court; and the officials of the royal household knew precisely from which counties wheat, and from which different kinds of meat or fodder for horses or any other necessaries, were due. Upon payment of these supplies according to the established amount of each, the royal officials put them to the sheriff’s account, reducing them to a sum of money; to wit, for a measure of wheat sufficient to make bread for a hundred men, 1_s._; for the carcase of a fattened ox, 1_s._; for a ram or a sheep, 4_d._; and for the fodder of twenty horses, also 4_d._ But as time went on, when the same king was occupied beyond seas and in remote parts, repressing the tumult of war, it came to pass that the sum necessary to meet these operations was paid to him in money by tale. Meanwhile a grumbling multitude of husbandmen used to flock to the king’s court, or, what he thought worse, often used to press about him as he passed by, offering their ploughs as a sign of the decay of agriculture, for they were oppressed by innumerable hardships on account of the victuals, which they brought from their homes through all parts of the realm. The king listened to their complaints, and after taking counsel with the nobles, sent throughout the realm the wisest and most discreet men whom he knew for the purpose. They went about surveying the several estates with their own eyes, and, valuing the victuals paid from them, reduced the same to a sum of money. They decreed, further, that for the sum total of the amounts arising from all the estates in one county the sheriff of that county should be holden at the Exchequer; adding that he should pay by scale, that is, 6_d._ on each pound by tale. For they thought that in course of time it might well happen that the money, then good, might deteriorate. In this opinion they proved right. So they were forced to decree that the farm of manors should be paid not only by scale but by weight, which could only be done by making considerable additions. This rule of payment was observed for many years at the Exchequer, and so in the old yearly rolls of that king you will often find written “in the treasury 100_l._ by scale,” or, “in the treasury 100_l._ by weight.” Meanwhile an able man arose, farseeing in counsel, eloquent in speech, and by God’s grace preeminent in his immediate grasp of the deepest matters; you would say that he fulfilled what is written, “the grace of the Holy Ghost knows not slow movements.” He was summoned to the court by the king, obscure but not without nobility, and taught by his example “how extreme poverty is the school of men.” Increasing in favour with the king, the clergy and the people, he was made bishop of Salisbury, enjoyed the highest offices and honours in the realm, and possessed a consummate knowledge of the Exchequer. As to this there is no room for doubt, for the rolls themselves prove clearly that the Exchequer prospered exceedingly under him. And it is from his stores that the little knowledge we possess has trickled down. On this subject I refrain at present from speaking at length, since owing to the position which he filled, he has left behind him a lasting memorial of his high genius. Afterwards by the king’s order he came to the Exchequer; and after having sat there for some years, he found that the method of payment described above failed to satisfy the treasury to the full; for though it appeared to obtain its dues by tale and by weight, it was defrauded in actual substance. For it did not follow that if a man had paid for a pound 20_s._ by tale, even if the shillings corresponded to a pound in weight, he had therefore paid a pound of silver; for the money paid by him might have been mixed with copper or any ore, since no test was applied. In order, therefore, that the royal and the public advantage might at the same time be provided for, it was decreed, after consultation with the king himself, that the combustion or testing of the farm should be made in the aforesaid manner.

_D._ Why do you say “the public advantage?”

_M._ Because the sheriff, feeling aggrieved by the combustion of the debased money, when he is about to pay his farm, takes careful heed that the moneyers set under him do not transgress the established law; and when offenders are caught, they are so punished that others may be deterred by the example made of them.

THE OATH OF THE BARONS TO SUPPORT THE SUCCESSION OF MATILDA THE EMPRESS (1126).

=Source.=--William of Malmesbury, _De gestis regum Anglorum_, ed. Stubbs, vol. ii., p. 528. (Rolls Series.)

In the twenty-seventh year of his reign, king Henry came to England in the month of September, bringing his daughter with him; and at Christmas following he summoned to London a large number of the clergy and the barons, and there gave the county of Salop to his wife, the daughter of the Count of Louvain, whom he had wedded after Matilda’s death; grieved that she had no issue, and fearing that she would remain childless, he was meditating, with well-founded anxiety, the question of his successor to the throne. This matter had already been debated at length, and at this council he constrained and bound with an oath all the barons of the whole realm, and bishops and abbots also, to accept as their lady his daughter Matilda, formerly empress, without any delay or hesitation, if he should die without heir male. He pointed out how disastrous to the country had been the loss of his son, William, to whom the realm of right belonged; now there survived his daughter, in whom alone inhered the lawful succession, from her grandfather, her uncle and her father, all kings, and on her mother’s side, for centuries past....

So all who were thought to be of weight in this council, took the oath; first, William, archbishop of Canterbury, then the rest of the bishops, and the abbots also. The first of the laity to take the oath was David, king of Scotland, the empress’s uncle; then Stephen, count of Mortain and Boulogne, nephew of king Henry by his sister Adela; then Robert, the king’s son, born before he came to the throne, whom he had created earl of Gloucester.... There was, it is said, a remarkable dispute between Robert and Stephen, who strove in generous rivalry to be the first to take the oath, the one alleging the son’s privilege, the other the nephew’s rank. Thus all the barons were bound by fealty and oath, whereupon each departed to his own home. After Whitsuntide, however, the king sent his daughter to Normandy, ordering the archbishop of Rouen to betroth her to the son of Fulk (count of Anjou), a prince of great nobility and famous courage; the king himself made no delay in taking ship to Normandy and uniting them in marriage. Whereupon all men foretold prophetically that after his death they would break their oath. I have myself often heard Roger, bishop of Salisbury, say that he was loosed from the oath made to the empress, for he had sworn it on condition that the king would not give his daughter in marriage out of the realm without the advice of him and the rest of the baronage; and that no one authorized, no one had knowledge of the marriage except Robert, earl of Gloucester, Brian Fitz Count, and the bishop of Louviers. I do not relate this because I believe to be true the words of a man who knew how to adapt himself to every change of fickle fortune, but as a credible historian I set in writing common opinion.

THE DISPUTED ELECTION OF AN ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY (1123).

=Source.=--_The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle_, ed. Thorpe, vol. i., p. 374. (Rolls Series.)

Then ... the king sent his writ over all England and bade his bishops and his abbots and all his thegns that they should come to his council on Candlemas Day (2 February) at Gloucester to meet him, and so they did. When they were there gathered, the king bade them that they should choose them an archbishop of Canterbury, whomsoever they would. Then spake the bishops among themselves and said that never more would they have a monkish man to be archbishop over them; and they all went together to the king and prayed that they might choose a man of the clergy, whomsoever they would, for archbishop; and the king granted the same to them. This was all afore done through the bishop of Salisbury and through the bishop of Lincoln before he was dead; for that they loved never the rule of a monk, but were ever against monks and their rule. And the prior and the monks of Canterbury and all the other monkish men that were there withstood it full two days, but it availed nothing, for the bishop of Salisbury was strong and ruled all England, and was against it all that he might and could be. Then chose they a clerk, William of Corbeil by name; he was canon of a monastery called Chich (St. Osyth). And they brought him before the king, and the king gave him the archbishopric, and all the bishops accepted him, but the monks and earls and almost all the thegns that were there withstood him. At the same time the envoys of the count (of Anjou) departed from the king unsatisfied and cared nought for his favour. At the same time there came a legate from Rome by name Henry; he was abbot of the monastery of St. Jean d’Angely, and he came for the Romescot. And he said to the king that it was against right that a clerk should be set over monks, and therefore had the monks before chosen an archbishop in their chapter according to right. But the king would not undo it for love of the bishop of Salisbury. Then soon thereafter the archbishop went to Canterbury, and was there received, though it was against their will, and was there forthwith consecrated as bishop by the bishop of London and the bishop Ernulf of Rochester and the bishop William Giffard of Winchester and the bishop Bernard of Wales and the bishop Roger of Salisbury. Then soon after in Lent the archbishop went to Rome for his pall, and with him went the bishop Bernard of Wales, and Sigfrid abbot of Glastonbury, and Anselm abbot of St. Edmunds, and John archdeacon of Canterbury and Giffard, who was the king’s household chaplain. At the same time the archbishop Thurstan of York went to Rome at the Pope’s command, and came thither three days before the archbishop of Canterbury came, and was there received with great worship. Then came the archbishop of Canterbury and was there full seven nights before he could come to speech with the Pope. That was because it had been given to the Pope to understand that he had received the archbishopric against the will of the monks of the monastery, and against right. But that overcame Rome which overcomes all the world, that is, gold and silver. And the Pope was appeased and gave him his pall; and the archbishop swore obedience to him in all things that the Pope enjoined upon him, on the altar of St. Peter and St. Paul; and the Pope sent him home then with his blessing.

THE DEATH AND CHARACTER OF HENRY I.

=Source.=--Henry of Huntingdon, _Historia Anglorum_, ed. Arnold, p. 253. (Rolls Series.)

In the thirty-fifth year King Henry stayed continuously in Normandy, and though destined never to return, he often purposed to return to England; but his daughter detained him through constant quarrels arising from many causes by her intrigues between the king and the count of Anjou. These vexations irritated the king to anger and bitterness, which resulted, some say, in a natural torpor, and afterwards, it is thought, caused his death. At any rate, on his return from hunting at St. Denis in the Forêt des Lions, he ate a dish of lampreys, of which he was always fond, though they always disagreed with him. A physician had forbidden him to eat them, but the king ignored his sound advice on the poet’s principles--

“Ever we strive against the law,
And love to taste forbidden fruit.”

So this meal brought on an evil humour and was followed by the old violent symptoms, which resulted in a complete collapse, his aged frame sinking into a deadly lethargy, the natural struggle of his constitution provoked an acute fever in the effort to throw off the poison in his system, but his powers of resistance failing, the great king died on 1 December after a reign of thirty-five years and three months....

On the death of the great king Henry, his character was freely discussed by the people, as is usual in the case of the departed. Some asserted that three splendid gifts especially distinguished him; supreme wisdom, for he was profound in counsel, acutely farseeing and brilliant in speech; success in war, for apart from other famous exploits he overcame the king of France in battle; and wealth, in which he far surpassed all his predecessors. Others, however, took a different point of view, and urged that he was tainted by three vices; avarice, because, like all his house, though rich, he impoverished the poor with taxes and exactions, and snared them in the toils of the informer; cruelty also, because he put out the eyes of his kinsman, the count of Moretuil, when in captivity (this horrible crime could not be known until death laid bare the king’s secret acts), and other instances also were alleged, of which I say nothing; and excess also.... Such was the common division of opinion. But in the terrible time that followed, amid the savage anarchy of the Norman traitors, all that Henry had done, whether as king or despot, seemed more than excellent in comparison with worse evil.

THE ACCESSION OF STEPHEN (1135).

=Source.=--_Gesta Stephani_, ed. Howlett, vol. iii., p. 3. (Rolls Series, Chronicles of Stephen, Henry II., and Richard I.)

When king Henry, giver of peace to his country and father of his people, passed away in death, the unhappy event threw the whole country into anarchy and total confusion. The land, which during his reign had been the seat of justice and the home of law, became on his decease a sink of iniquity and a hotbed of all malice. England, formerly the abode of right, the habitation of peace, the throne of piety, the mirror of religion, became the dwelling-place of perversity, the refuge of discord, the school of disorder, and the mistress of all rebellion. The reverend bonds of sacred friendship were straightway broken among the people, the most intimate ties of mutual kinship were loosed, and those who had worn the garments of daily tranquillity were whelmed by the noise of battle and the madness of war. For every man was seized with a new passion for barbarity, to run riot against his neighbour, and to reckon his glory by the measure of his wrongs to the innocent.

The established laws, that restrain an undisciplined people, were wholly neglected, nay rather annulled, and men straightway accomplished any crime which their unlawful passions inspired. To use the words of the prophet, “There was no soundness from the sole of the foot to the crown of the head,” for from the lowest to the highest their minds were sick, and either they wrought havoc or assented to the havoc which others wrought. Even the wild beasts, which were aforetime peaceably preserved in every district, as though confined by enclosures, were everywhere loosed and hunted by all and slain by all indiscriminately and without fear. This, indeed, was a lesser evil, and a matter of small complaint; none the less it was amazing how so many thousands of beasts, that before had covered the whole country in thronging herds, were now suddenly annihilated, so that out of so vast a number you would scarcely discover two together. When at length this great and indescribable plenty began so to decline that, as men say, a bird was a rarity and scarce a stag could anywhere be seen, folk turned their violence against each other and robbed their neighbours, each plundering each in turn, and plotting ambush and destruction for each other, as the prophet said, “Man rose up without mercy against man, and everyone was set against his neighbour.” Whatever crime was suggested by passion in times of peace, was now swiftly brought to an issue, when vengeance might seize its opportunity; dissembled hatred and hidden malice burst forth to light and was openly avowed.

While the English were indulging in this disastrous anarchy, breaking the restraints of justice and freely rioting in all sorts of wickedness, Stephen, count of Boulogne, a man of illustrious and noble lineage, landed in England with a few followers. King Henry, the peacemaker, loved him above all his nephews, not only because of his close tie of kinship, but for the manifold excellencies that specially distinguished and adorned him. What is rare indeed in our times, he combined riches with modesty, generosity with courtesy; yet in all military encounters and any siege of his enemies, he was daring and courageous, cautious and persistent. Being the man he was, as soon as rumours of king Henry’s death reached him, he conceived a bold design in his heart, like Saul, and since he was beyond seas, hurried to the coast, and obtaining by good fortune a favourable breeze, steered for England on which his thoughts were set. Landing, as said before, with a very small following, he hastened to London, the metropolis and queen of the whole country. Stirred by his coming, the whole city came out to meet him with a noisy welcome, dancing with joy and festivity to have recovered in Stephen another Henry, the loss of whose guardianship they were but now deploring. So the elder and more prominent men summoned a council, and making common provision, in their judgment, for the good estate of the realm, unanimously conspired to elect him king. They urged that the whole realm was liable to the chances of evil fortune, where the fount of all governance and the head of justice was lacking. It was vital to them at once to establish a king, who should restore peace for the common good, punish rebels by force of arms, and justly administer the laws. Moreover it was their right, their special privilege, on the death of their king, themselves to set his successor on the throne. There was no other at hand to fulfil a king’s part and put an end to the perils of the realm, save only Stephen, who, it seemed, had been brought to them by the will of Heaven; he was worthy of the dignity in the eyes of all, as well by the distinction of his birth as by the excellence of his character. These points were heard and welcomed by all without open contradiction, and by common counsel they decided to offer him the throne and to appoint him king with their unanimous support, both parties covenanting by a treaty confirmed, it is said, by mutual oaths, that the citizens on the one hand would support him with their wealth and maintain him with their strength during his life, and that he, on the other hand, should devote all his energies to the pacification of the realm for the benefit of them all.

THE PERJURY OF THE BARONS (1135).

=Source.=--Henry of Huntingdon, _Historia Anglorum_, ed. Arnold, p. 256. (Rolls Series.)

In haste came Stephen, younger brother of Theobald, count of Blois, an active and resolute man, and though he had sworn an act of fealty to king Henry’s daughter, yet, relying on swift and bold measures, he tempted God by seizing the crown of the realm. William, archbishop of Canterbury, the first to take the oath to the king’s daughter, to his shame, blessed him as king, wherefore God decreed against him the same judgment which he had decreed against the priest who smote Jeremiah, to wit, that he should die within a year. Roger too, the great bishop of Salisbury, the second to take the aforesaid oath, and dictator of the oath to all the rest, added his weighty support to Stephen’s claims; wherefore afterward by the just judgment of God he was seized and tortured by the king whom he had made, and suffered a miserable end. But why linger? All who had sworn the oath, prelates and earls and barons alike, offered their allegiance to Stephen and did him homage. It was an evil omen that the whole of England, without hesitation, without a struggle, in the twinkling of an eye, so suddenly submitted to him.

THE CORONATION OATH OF KING STEPHEN (1136).

=Source.=--William of Malmesbury, _De gestis regum Anglorum_, ed. Stubbs, vol. ii., p. 541. (Rolls Series.)