Distinctions between Conqtteror and Conquered. 1 2 7 



the animosity and differences of tastes between tlie two nation- 

 alities, which are the subjects of this particular chapter. 

 Perhaps their hatred was inspired by the same strange motive 

 which makes a civil the bloodiest of all wars — it was a case of 

 Greek meeting Greek. Even a common religion, much less a 

 common ancestry, failed at first to soften their animosities. 

 The patriotic English primate aroused the rage of his con- 

 querors by refusing to crown their leader, and the Church 

 only escaped spoliation at the expense of its native clergy.^ 



The substitution of the Conqueror's alien nominees for the 

 Anglo-Saxon priests restored for a time the waning jurisdic- 

 tion of ecclesiastical Rome ; perhaps, too, some of the systems 

 of heathen E-ome. Though William refused the Pope his 

 homage, he re-saddled the soil with its old charge for Peter's 

 pence. 



As far as the new constitution would allow, Saxon as well 

 as Norman kept up their original habits. Under feudal law 

 the land was nominally the king's, but practically in the 

 possession of his tenants-in-chief, who paid him for it an 

 acknowledgment in homage and military services. They in 

 their turn apportioned it amongst their vassals in exchange 

 for their homage and services. This process of subinfeudation 

 progressed until every acre that could be dignified by the 

 term " soil " was held of a lord. 



But the Teutonic race was instinctively opposed to auto- 

 cracy, so that even the king (much less his barons) was never 

 allowed to usurp unlimited powers over his vassals. When, 

 therefore, the sovereign found it necessary to call upon his 

 barons and other tenants-in-chief for any extraordinary ser- 

 vice beyond what was due by their tenures, he was obliged to 

 summon them together in order to obtain their united consent. 

 This assembly was the King's Court ; to attend which, as 

 Hume points out, was both a privilege and a burden: the 

 former, because it increased the barons' power in proportion as 

 it decreased the king's ; the latter, becanse it drew them from 

 the defence and development of their lands. 



' It is right here to state that Bishop Stubbs shows that this hostility- 

 has been exaggerated. — Select Charters, p. 82. 



