wn; but when quelled in one quarter they soon broke out in another,
and they kept William and his forces almost always employed.

But William was not a mere warrior. He was well aware that the
permanence and stability of his own and his successor's sway in England
would depend finally upon the kind of basis on which the civil
institutions of the country should rest, and on the proper consolidation
and adjustment of the administrative and judicial functions of the
realm. In the intervals of his campaigns, therefore, William devoted a
great deal of time and attention to this subject, and he evinced a most
profound and statesmanlike wisdom and sagacity in his manner of treating
it.

He had, in fact, a Herculean task to perform--a double task--viz., to
amalgamate two _nations_, and also to fuse and merge two _languages_
into one. He was absolutely compelled, by the circumstances under which
he was placed, to grapple with both these vast undertakings. If, at the
time when, in his park at Rouen, he first heard of Harold's accession,
he had supposed that there was a party in England in his favor strong
enough to allow of his proceeding there alone, or with a small Norman
attendance, so that he might rely mainly on the English themselves for
his accession to the throne, the formidable difficulties which, as it
was, he had subsequently to encounter, would all have been saved. But
there was no such party--at least there was no evidence that there was
one of sufficient strength to justify him in trusting himself to it. It
seemed to him, then, that if he undertook to gain possession of the
English throne at all, he must rely entirely on the force which he could
take with him from Normandy. To make this reliance effectual, the force
so taken must be an overwhelming one. Then, if Normans in great numbers
were to go to England for the purpose of putting him upon the English
throne, they must be rewarded, and so vast a number of candidates for
the prizes of honor and wealth could be satisfied only in England, and
by confiscations there. His possessions in Normandy would obviously be
insufficient for such a purpose. It was evident, moreover, that if a
large number of Norman adventurers were placed in stations of trust and
honor, and charged with civil offices and administrative functions all
over England, they would form a sort of class by themselves, and would
be looked upon with jealousy and envy by the original inhabitants, and
that