ngland in
Cnut's day under pretext of setting AEthelred's children on its throne,
but the wreck of his fleet in a storm put an end to a project which might
have anticipated the work of his son. It was that son, William the Great,
as men of his own day styled him, William the Conqueror as he was to
stamp himself by one event on English history, who was now Duke of
Normandy. The full grandeur of his indomitable will, his large and
patient statesmanship, the loftiness of aim which lifts him out of the
petty incidents of his age, were as yet only partly disclosed. But there
never had been a moment from his boyhood when he was not among the
greatest of men. His life from the very first was one long mastering of
difficulty after difficulty. The shame of his birth remained in his name
of "the Bastard." His father Robert had seen Arlotta, a tanner's daughter
of the town, as she washed her linen in a little brook by Falaise; and
loving her he had made her the mother of his boy. The departure of Robert
on a pilgrimage from which he never returned left William a child-ruler
among the most turbulent baronage in Christendom; treason and anarchy
surrounded him as he grew to manhood; and disorder broke at last into
open revolt. But in 1047 a fierce combat of horse on the slopes of
Val-es-dunes beside Caen left the young Duke master of his duchy and he
soon made his mastery felt. "Normans" said a Norman poet "must be trodden
down and kept under foot, for he only that bridles them may use them at
his need." In the stern order he forced on the land Normandy from this
hour felt the bridle of its Duke.

[Sidenote: William and France]

Secure at home, William seized the moment of Godwine's exile to visit
England, and received from his cousin, King Eadward, as he afterwards
asserted, a promise of succession to his throne. Such a promise however,
unconfirmed by the Witenagemot, was valueless; and the return of Godwine
must have at once cut short the young Duke's hopes. He found in fact work
enough to do in his own duchy, for the discontent of his baronage at the
stern justice of his rule found support in the jealousy which his power
raised in the states around him, and it was only after two great
victories at Mortemer and Varaville and six years of hard fighting that
outer and inner foes were alike trodden under foot. In 1060 William stood
first among the princes of France. Maine submitted to his rule. Britanny
was reduced to obedience by a