Under the stress of the continuous invasions, by perfectly natural process the central authority had passed to the feudal magnates.

Many of the feudal states had actually organized into independent governing bodies.

The struggle with the Northmen ended, France, dismembered, exhausted, was lying prostrate.

A king stripped of every kingly attribute at one extreme of the social system, and a people trampled into the very dust by feudal oppression at the other.

Owners of nothing, not even of themselves, they might not fish in the streams, nor hunt in the forests, unless the privilege was bestowed; and with their lives spent in fighting the incessant private wars of their lords, there seemed no room for them in the world, nor for hope in their hearts.