ilitated his measures. But whilst he was thus employed,
his absence from England gave an opportunity to several humors to break
out, which the late change had bred, but which the amazement likewise
produced by that violent change, and the presence of their conqueror,
wise, vigilant, and severe, had hitherto repressed. The ancient line of
their kings displaced, the only thread on which it hung carried out of
the kingdom and ready to be cut off by the jealousy of a merciless
usurper, their liberties none by being precarious, and the daily
insolencies and rapine of the Normans intolerable,--these discontents
were increased by the tyranny and rapaciousness of the regent, and they
were fomented from abroad by Eustace, Count of Boulogne. But the people,
though ready to rise in all parts, were destitute of leaders, and the
insurrections actually made were not carried on in concert, nor directed
to any determinate object; so that the king, returning speedily, and
exerting himself everywhere with great vigor, in a short time dissipated
these ill-formed projects. However, so general a dislike to William's
government had appeared on this occasion, that he became in his turn
disgusted with his subjects, and began to change his maxims of rule to a
rigor which was more conformable to his advanced age and the sternness
of his natural temper. He resolved, since he could not gain the
affections of his subjects, to find such matter for their hatred as
might weaken them, and fortify his own authority against the enterprises
which that hatred might occasion. He revived the tribute of Danegelt, so
odious from its original cause and that of its revival, which he caused
to be strictly levied throughout the kingdom. He erected castles at
Nottingham, at Warwick, and at York, and filled them with Norman
garrisons. He entered into a stricter inquisition for the discovery of
the estates forfeited on his coming in; paying no regard to the
privileges of the ecclesiastics, he seized upon the treasures which, as
in an inviolable asylum, the unfortunate adherents to Harold had
deposited in monasteries. At the same time he entered into a resolution
of deposing all the English, bishops, on none of whom he could rely, and
filling their places with Normans. But he mitigated the rigor of these
proceedings by the wise choice he made in filling the places of those
whom he had deposed, and gave by that means these violent changes the
air rather of reformation th