What always strikes one as remarkable in reading history, is the youth of the principal actors. Robert was but twenty-two when he murdered his brother for the ducal crown. Falaise was one of his favourite seats, the hunting was good, the country pleasant, and the security of the stronghold reassuring. Once, as he returned from hunting, he had espied a tanner’s daughter, of rare beauty, washing clothes in the little stream that runs beneath the mighty rock; when he looked out of the high narrow window the next day, he had no difficulty in recognising the same girl again; and subsequently he introduced himself to her in the guise of a lover. Tanning was looked upon by the Normans as being a very low trade indeed, and though Fulbert, the Conqueror’s grandsire, added to it the avocation of brewing, he could never shake off the odium which clung to his name on account of his principal business. The base-born brat of the tanner’s daughter would hardly be considered at first as even a pawn in the great game of statecraft. But the boy was dear to his father’s heart. His mother, Arlotta, was taken into the castle, and there was none to rival her, for Robert was not married. Yet strangely enough he did not make her his wife, and so render brighter the prospects of the sturdy boy, whom he regarded with much affection. He could not bring himself to recognise Arlotta even by the sort of ceremony his ancestors had considered sufficient; his pride was too great to give the tanner’s daughter a right to share his throne, and he preferred that his son should start more heavily weighted for the race than he need have been. When Robert made up his mind to go on a crusade to the Holy Land, the position became one of great difficulty; he was worse than childless, and men began dimly to foresee that this only son of his would prove a heavy stumbling-block in the way of any other succession. But Robert’s selfishness being immeasurably stronger than his paternal love, he departed, leaving it to be well understood that in case of accidents William was to be his heir. But there were a number of the descendants of the great Rollo still alive, strong men, soldiers, nobles with retinues of their own, and each and all put his own claim prior to that of this nameless boy. Looked at thus, it seems little short of miraculous that William should ever have raised himself to the throne at all, a more wonderful feat than even his conquest of England in later years. The boy was but eight when, after various warning rumours of failing health, the news came definitely that his father was dead. Duke Robert had left him in charge of Alain, Count of Brittany, who, though a relative, could not himself hope to ascend the throne, and the choice was wise. Alain fulfilled his trust loyally, and the exceptional talent and courage of the young duke seem from the first to have attached to him a number of nobles, so that his position gradually gained solidarity, though the marvel that he should have escaped knife or poison in an age where such means of riddance were frequently employed remains the same. Full credit for his safety at this dangerous time must be given to the nobles of the Côtentin, especially to Neel of St Sauveur, who is mentioned again in the chapter on that district. The bitterness of the stain upon his birth was early felt by William, and there are instances in his career which point to the smarting of a hidden sore shown by a man ordinarily self-possessed. His treatment of the burghers of Alençon, because they had openly taunted him with his birth, is one case in point; the other is his own unexampled domestic life, which stands out in strong contrast with those of his predecessors; he seems early to have made up his mind with iron will that what he had suffered through his father, none should suffer through him.
At thirteen he took upon himself responsibility, and really began to rule. His mother had been separated from him, and had no share in the government. She had married a knight named Herlouin, by whom she had two children, of both of whom we hear much in history. The elder, Odo, became Bishop of Bayeux. He it was who encouraged his half-brother’s troops at Hastings, going before and calling them on. As Odo’s dealings had more to do with England than Normandy, we may dispose of him here in a few words. After the Conquest, vast wealth and many estates were bestowed upon him; he was viceroy in William’s absence, and second in power to the king himself. His overweening pride made him overbearing; he aspired to sit on the papal throne. William, discovering in him many treasonable practices, kept him prisoner at Rouen. On his half-brother’s death, however, he once more became prominent, led insurrections against his nephew William the Red, and joined with Duke Robert in his fraternal wars. At last this turbulent, vigorous, astute man went crusading with Robert, and died at Palermo in 1097.
Arlotta’s other son, Robert of Mortain, was a loyal brother; he prepared a hundred and twenty ships for the great flotilla, and lived peaceably during the Conqueror’s lifetime, though he too warred against William the Red. He is mentioned again in connection with Mortain.
The generally received opinion of William the Conqueror in England is, that he was a stern and cruel man; stern he certainly was, stern with the sternness of strength which serves as a shield against familiarity, and enables its possessor to go straight on his own way, regardless of unfavourable opinions or specious arguments.
“This King William that we speak about,” says the chronicler, “was a very wise man, and very rich; more worshipful and strong than any of his foregangers were. He was mild to the good men that loved God, and beyond all metes stark to them who withstood his will. Else, he was very worshipful.” This is the testimony of one who was almost his contemporary, and who had nothing to fear from him, nor aught to gain by praising him.
The idea of William’s cruelty is based on his harrying of Northumberland, an act that could never have originated in the mind of a soft-hearted or imaginative man; but William’s bent was not toward cruelty, and considering the age in which he lived, the well-authenticated cases which we have of his clemency are remarkable. When he was only twenty, an age when if there be any hardness in a man’s nature it is at its worst, unsoftened by personal experience of sorrow, he spared the lives of those of his vassals who had risen against him not openly but with treachery. The manner of it was thus. Guy of Burgundy, William’s first cousin, entered into a conspiracy with many of the most powerful nobles of Normandy to assassinate the duke. It is easy to be seen what was Guy’s motive; though he could only claim through his mother, he meant to make himself Duke of Normandy; but it is more difficult to see what the others expected to gain by a move which proposed to substitute one duke for another. It was not the first time that rebellion and revolt against the duke had risen, but it was the most serious plot, and the turning-point of William’s career.
So secretly had the conspiracy been planned that he was all unaware of it. He was at this time in his twentieth year, and, as Wace tells us, “the barons’ feuds continued; they had no regard for him; everyone according to his means made castles and fortresses.” Up till now William had lived, but he had not been master. “Affrays and jealousies, maraudings and challengings” had continued in spite of him, but this deadly conspiracy was to bring matters to a head in a way its projectors little thought. William was in the castle of Alleaumes close to Valognes; he had retired for the night, when he was awakened by the agonised entreaties of the court fool, who told him that the nobles were even now on the point of arriving in order to seize him unprepared, and murder him. William must have had great confidence in his jester, for he rose straightway, and apparently without waiting for attendants saddled his horse, and rode off into the dark night. The whole story is mysterious; were there then no men-at-arms to guard the duke, no attendant to go with him? would it not have been safer to barricade the castle rather than to have fled alone? Whatever the cause, William’s midnight ride is a matter of history. There were no smooth, easy roads then; the country, from various accounts in charters and deeds of the tenth century, was covered with woods, and much waste ground; and, as we know, wolves abounded, for much later (1326), forty-five wolves were taken in the district of Coutances, twenty-two in that of Carentan, and nineteen in that of Valognes, in the Easter term alone. The young duke could only have had the stars to guide him, and safety was far off. He meant to get to Falaise, where he could feel tolerably secure; but even as the crow flies Falaise is over seventy miles from Valognes, and the way would be difficult to find. The account of this dramatic episode is circumstantially given by the old chronicler, who tells us that even as William left the town he heard the clatter of the enemies’ horses entering it. The enemy, finding he had fled, and knowing they had implicated themselves far too deeply to think of pardon, set off in hot pursuit, and the duke was only saved by hiding in a thicket, whence he saw them go by. He did not follow the direct route, but kept along by the sea-coast, until the next morning on a worn and jaded steed he found himself at Ryes, between Bayeux and the coast, where he revealed himself to the lord of the manor-house, a man named Hubert. Hubert promptly rehorsed him, and sent him on his way with two of his own sons as guides. Thus the duke managed to reach the stronghold of Falaise in safety.
Later on William constructed a raised road, running through the country in the direction of his flight; it ran from Valognes to Bayeux and thence to Falaise, part of it may still be seen between Quilly-le-Tessin, Caitheoux, and Fresni-le-Pucceux. It is said that it was the forced task of the very conspirators who had compelled the fight, an instance of grim justice!
The malcontents must have trembled when they knew that their powerful overlord was free, and fully aware of their guilt; there was no escape now, open revolt was their only chance, so they gathered their forces and attacked Caen.
William, for his part, collected his men, and leaving a garrison in Falaise, marched to Rouen; but too much depended on a battle, to risk it against a greatly superior and better prepared force. He resolved on a stroke of policy, no less than to call for protection from his own overlord the King of France, who had formerly been his invader and enemy. King Henry responded to the appeal, possibly feeling that Normandy might slip from him altogether, and France itself be menaced, were the handful of nobles to win power by their swords.