e towns,
or a cultivated field. The poor died of hunger, and those who had been
formerly well-off begged their bread from door to door. Whoever had it
in his power to leave England did so. Never was a country delivered up
to so many miseries and misfortunes; even in the invasions of the pagans
it suffered less than now. Neither the cemeteries nor the churches were
spared; they seized all they could, and then set fire to the church. To
till the ground was useless. It was openly reported that Christ and his
saints were sleeping."

One cannot but think that this frightful picture is somewhat overdrawn;
yet nothing could indicate better the condition of a Middle-Age country
under a weak king, and torn by the adherents of rival claimants to the
throne.

Let us leave this tale of torture and horror and turn to that of war. In
the conflict between Stephen and Maud the king took the first step. He
led his army against Bristol. It proved too strong for him, and his
soldiers, in revenge, burnt the environs, after robbing them of all they
could yield. Then, leaving Bristol, he turned against the castles on the
Welsh borders, nearly all of whose lords had declared for Maud.

From the laborious task of reducing these castles he was suddenly
recalled by an insurrection in the territory so far faithful to him. The
fens of Ely, in whose recesses Hereward the Wake had defied the
Conqueror, now became the stronghold of a Norman revolt. A baron and a
bishop, Baldwin de Revier and Lenior, Bishop of Ely, built stone
intrenchments on the island, and defied the king from behind the watery
shelter of the fens.

Hither flocked the partisans of Maud; hither came Stephen, filled with
warlike fury. He lacked the qualities that make a king, but he had those
that go to make a soldier. The methods of the Conqueror in attacking
Hereward were followed by Stephen in assailing his foes. Bridges of
boats were built across the fens; over these the king's cavalry made
their way to the firm soil of the island; a fierce conflict ensued,
ending in the rout of the soldiers of Baldwin and Lenior. The bishop
fled to Gloucester, whither Maud had now proceeded.

Thus far the king had kept the field, while his rival lay intrenched in
her strongholds. But her party was earnestly at work. The barons of the
Welsh marches, whose castles had been damaged by the king, repaired
them. Even the towers of the great churches were filled with war-engines
and converted int