507] It is evident that the chief reason of this alteration in the sentiments of the English must be ascribed to the departure of William, who was alone able to curb the violence of his captains, and to overawe the mutinies of the people.

Nothing indeed appears more strange than that this prince, in less than three months after the conquest of a great, warlike, and turbulent nation, should absent himself in order to revisit his own country, which remained in profound tranquillity, and was not menaced by any of its neighbors; and should so long leave his jealous subjects at the mercy of an insolent and licentious army.

Were we not assured of the solidity of his genius, and the good sense displayed in all other circumstances of his conduct, we might ascribe this measure to a vain ostentation, which rendered him impatient to display his pomp and magnificence among his ancient subjects.

It is therefore more natural to believe that, in so extraordinary a step, he was guided by a concealed policy; and that though he had thought proper at first to allure the people to submission by the semblance of a legal administration, he found that he could neither satisfy his rapacious captains, nor secure his unstable government, without farther exerting the rights of conquest, and seizing the possessions of the English.

In order to have a pretext for this violence, he endeavored without discovering his intentions, to provoke and allure them into insurrections, which he thought could never prove dangerous, while he detained all the principal nobility in Normandy, while a great and victorious army was quartered in England, and while he himself was so near to suppress any tumult or rebellion.