WILLIAM THE CONQUEROR.

THERE is nothing more memorable in history than the actions, fortunes, and character of this great man; whether we consider the grandeur of the plans he formed, the courage and wisdom with which they were executed, or the splendour of that success which, adorning his youth, continued without the smallest reverse to support his age, even to the last moments of his life. He lived above seventy years, and reigned within ten years as long as he lived; sixty over his dukedom, above twenty over England; both of which he acquired or kept by his own magnanimity, with hardly any other title than he derived from his arms; so that he might be reputed, in all respects, as happy as the highest ambition, the most fully gratified, can make a man. The silent inward satisfactions of domestic happiness, he neither had, nor sought. He had a body suited to the character of his mind-erect, firm, large, and active; whilst to be active was a praise; a countenance stern, and which became command. Magnificent in his living, reserved in his conversation, grave in his common deportment, but relaxing with a wise facetiousness, he knew how to relieve his mind and preserve his dignity; for he never forfeited by a personal acquaintance that esteem he had acquired by his great actions. Unlearned in books, he formed his understanding by the rigid discipline of a large and complicated experience. He knew men much, and therefore generally trusted them but little but when he knew any man to be good, he reposed in him an

entire confidence, which prevented his prudence from degenerating into a vice. He had vices in his composition, and great ones; but they were the vices of a great mind: ambition, the malady of every extensive genius; and avarice, the madness of the wise: one chiefly actuated his youth, the other governed his age. The vices of young and light minds, the joys of wine, and the pleasures of love, never reached his aspiring nature. The general run of men he looked on with contempt, and treated with cruelty when they opposed him. Nor was the rigour of his mind to be softened but with the appearance of extraordinary fortitude in his enemies, which, by a sympathy congenial to his own virtues, always excited his admiration, and ensured his mercy. So that there were often seen in this one man, at the same time, the extremes of a savage cruelty, and a generosity that does honour to human nature. Religion too seemed to have a great influence on his mind, from policy, or from better motives; but his religion was displayed in the regularity with which he performed its duties, not in the submission he showed to its ministers, which was never more than what good government required. Yet his choice of a counsellor was, not according to the mode of that time, out of that order, and a choice that does honour to his memory. This was Lanfranc, a man of great learning for the times, and extraordinary piety. He owed his elevation to William; but, though always inviolably faithful, he never was the tool or flatterer of the power which raised him; and the greater freedom he showed, the higher he rose in the confidence of his master. By mixing with the

concerns of state he did not lose his religion and conscience, or make them the covers or instruments of ambition; but tempering the fierce policy of a new power by the mild lights of religion, he became a blessing to the country in which he was promoted. The English owed to the virtue of this stranger, and the influence he had on the king, the little remains of liberty they continued to enjoy; and at last such a degree of his confidence as in some sort counterbalanced the severities of the former part of his reign.

BURKE.

ROBERT AND WILLIAM RUFUS. ROBERT, though in an advanced age at his father's death, was even then more remarkable for those virtues which make us entertain hopes of a young man, than for that steady prudence which is necessary when the short career we are to run will not allow us to make many mistakes. He had indeed a temper suited to the genius of the time he lived in, and which therefore enabled him to make a considerable figure in the transactions which distinguished that period. He was of a sincere, open, candid nature; passionately fond of glory, ambitious without having any determinate object in view; vehement in his pursuits, but inconstant; much in war, which he understood and loved. But guiding himself both in war and peace solely by the impulses of an unbounded and irregular spirit, he filled the world with an equal admiration and pity of his splendid qualities and great misfortunes.

WILLIAM was of a character very different. His views were short, his designs few, his genius narrow, and his manners brutal; full of craft, rapacious, without faith, without religion; but circumspect, steady and courageous for his ends, not for glory.

BURKE.

Of the violent character of William, his rapacity, despotism, and voluptuousness, the reader will have formed a sufficient notion from the preceding pages. In person he was short and corpulent, with flaxen hair, and a ruddy complexion: from which last circumstance he derived the name of Rufus, or the red. In ordinary conversation his utterance was slow and embarrassed; in the hurry of passion precipitate and unintelligible. He assumed in public a haughty port, rolling his eyes with fierceness on the spectators, and endeavouring, by the tone of his voice and the tenor of his answers, to intimidate those who addressed him. But in private he descended to an equality with his companions, amusing them with his wit, which was chiefly pointed against himself; and seeking to lessen the odium of his excesses, by making them subjects of laughter. LINGARD.

HENRY THE FIRST.

A CONTEMPORARY writer has left us the character of Henry as it was differently drawn by his friends and enemies after his death. By the former he was ranked among the wisest, richest,

and bravest of our monarchs: the latter loaded his memory with the reproach of cruelty, avarice, and incontinence. To an indifferent observer at the present day his reign will offer little worthy of praise, unless it be the severity with which he punished offences. This was a real benefit to his people, as it not only contributed to extirpate the robbers by profession, but also checked the rapacity and violence of the barons. Still his merit will be very equivocal. As long as each conviction brought with it a fine or forfeiture to the royal exchequer, princes were stimulated to the execution of the laws by a sense of personal interest. Henry, at the same time that he visited the injustice of others, scrupled not to commit injustice himself. Probably in both cases he had in view the same object, his own emolument.

The great aim of his ambition was to aggrandize his family by augmenting his possessions on the continent. His success in this favourite project obtained for him the reputation of political wisdom; but it was purchased at the expense of enormous sums wrung from a suffering and impoverished people. If, however, the English thus paid for acquisitions in which they had little interest, they derived from them one advantage; the king's attention to foreign politics rendered him anxious to preserve peace with his more immediate neighbours. He lived on the most friendly terms with Alexander and David, successively kings of Scotland. The former had

married his natural daughter Sybilla: both were the brothers of his wife Matilda. It was more difficult to repress the active and predatory dis