gy and tradesfolk,
and where the outrages of nobles like Robert of Belesme forced the more
peaceful classes to call the king to their aid. In 1106 his forces met
those of his brother on the field of Tenchebray, and a decisive English
victory on Norman soil avenged the shame of Hastings. The conquered duchy
became a dependency of the English crown, and Henry's energies were
frittered away through a quarter of a century in crushing its revolts,
the hostility of the French, and the efforts of his nephew William, the
son of Robert, to regain the crown which his father had lost.

[Sidenote: Henry's rule]

With the victory of Tenchebray Henry was free to enter on that work of
administration which was to make his reign memorable in our history.
Successful as his wars had been he was in heart no warrior but a
statesman, and his greatness showed itself less in the field than in the
council chamber. His outer bearing like his inner temper stood in marked
contrast to that of his father. Well read, accomplished, easy and fluent
of speech, the lord of a harem of mistresses, the centre of a gay
court where poet and jongleur found a home, Henry remained cool,
self-possessed, clear-sighted, hard, methodical, loveless himself, and
neither seeking nor desiring his people's love, but wringing from them
their gratitude and regard by sheer dint of good government. His work of
order was necessarily a costly work; and the steady pressure of his
taxation, a pressure made the harder by local famines and plagues during
his reign, has left traces of the grumbling it roused in the pages of the
English Chronicle. But even the Chronicler is forced to own amidst his
grumblings that Henry "was a good man, and great was the awe of him." He
had little of his father's creative genius, of that far-reaching
originality by which the Conqueror stamped himself and his will on the
very fabric of our history. But he had the passion for order, the love of
justice, the faculty of organization, the power of steady and unwavering
rule, which was needed to complete the Conqueror's work. His aim was
peace, and the title of the Peace-loving King which was given him at his
death showed with what a steadiness and constancy he carried out his aim.
In Normandy indeed his work was ever and anon undone by outbreaks of its
baronage, outbreaks sternly repressed only that the work might be
patiently and calmly taken up again where it had been broken off. But in
England his wi