CHAPTER VI.
Someone has said that "the Lord must like common people, because he made so many of them." The path for the common people in France at this time led through heavy shadows.

But a darker time was approaching.

A system of oppression was maturing which was soon to envelop them in the obscurity of darkest night.
Those Scandinavian freebooters called Northmen, and later Normans, were the scourge of the kingdom.

Nothing was safe from their insolent courage and rapacity.
The rich could intrench themselves in stone fortresses, with moats and drawbridges, and be in comparative security, but the poor were utterly defenceless against this perennial destroyer.

The result was a compact between the powerful and the weak, which was the beginning of the feudal system.