auveur took up arms against the
disputed title of that sovereign, in consequence of which, his lands
were confiscated, and he himself compelled to seek an asylum in
Brittany. This is supposed to have happened in 1047; but the anger of
the offended duke was short-lived; for the very next year, there is an
account of William's restoring to Neel the lordship of St. Sauveur, "in
consideration of the services he had rendered him." The same lenity,
however, was not shewn with regard to Neel's lordship of Nehou; for this
was permanently alienated, and was granted to the family of Riviers, or
Redvers, who, some years afterwards, became powerful in England, where
they had a grant of the Isle of Wight, in fee, and were created, by
Henry I. Earls of Devonshire. The collegiate church, founded in the
castle of St. Sauveur during the preceding century, was suppressed in
1048, on account of some umbrage taken by the chieftain at the conduct
of the canons; and he established, in their room, a convent of
Benedictines, whose successors, removing without the precincts of the
fortress, erected the abbey, the subject of the following plate.

[Illustration: Plate 13. CASTLE OF ST. SAUVEUR LE VICOMTE.]

The name of St. Sauveur is to be found in the list of officers who
accompanied the Conqueror to England; and the records of those times
also preserve the remembrance of one Neel, who was slain at Cardiff, in
1078. The troops, however, of the Cotentin, were at the conquest,
commanded by Robert, Count of Mortain, half-brother to the duke, who,
most probably, was indebted to this near degree of relationship for so
proud a mark of distinction. The family of Neel did not retain much
longer possession of St. Sauveur: the lord of the castle died in 1092,
leaving only a daughter, named Laetitia, who married Jourdain Taisson, or
Tesson, and brought to him these possessions as her dowry. After the
expiration of about a century, a similar event deprived the Taissons of
St. Sauveur. Jane, the last of that family, formed an alliance with the
Harcourts, and with them the lordship remained till the middle of the
fourteenth century, when the domains of Geoffroy d'Harcourt were
confiscated for felony, and the castle would have passed into the hands
of a new master, had not the successes of our sovereign, Edward III.
interfered, and stopped the effects of the confiscation.

History, from this time forward, speaks more decidedly as to the
strength of the for