No noble however had as yet ventured to join him nor had any town opened its gates when London poured out to meet him with uproarious welcome.

Neither baron nor prelate was present to constitute a National Council, but the great city did not hesitate to take their place.

The voice of her citizens had long been accepted as representative of the popular assent in the election of a king; but it marks the progress of English independence under Henry that London now claimed of itself the right of election.

Undismayed by the absence of the hereditary counsellors of the crown its "Aldermen and wise folk gathered together the folk-moot, and these providing at their own will for the good of the realm unanimously resolved to choose a king." The solemn deliberation ended in the choice of Stephen, the citizens swore to defend the king with money and blood, Stephen swore to apply his whole strength to the pacification and good government of the realm.

It was in fact the new union of conquered and conquerors into a single England that did Stephen's work.