the masterpiece of government.

[Sidenote: A.D. 1073.]

If men who have engaged in vast designs could ever promise themselves
repose, William, after so many victories, and so many political
regulations to secure the fruit of them, might now flatter himself with
some hope of quiet. But disturbances were preparing for his old age from
a new quarter, from whence they were less expected and less
tolerable,--from the Normans, his companions in victory, and from his
family, which he found not less difficulty in governing than his
kingdom. Nothing but his absence from England was wanting to make the
flame blaze out. The numberless petty pretensions which the petty lords
his neighbors on the continent had on each other and on William,
together with their restless disposition and the intrigues of the French
court, kept alive a constant dissension, which made the king's presence
on the continent frequently necessary. The Duke of Anjou had at this
time actually invaded his dominions. He was obliged to pass over into
Normandy with an army of fifty thousand men. William, who had conquered
England by the assistance of the princes on the continent, now turned
against them the arms of the English, who served him with bravery and
fidelity; and by their means he soon silenced all opposition, and
concluded the terms of an advantageous peace. In the mean time his
Norman subjects in England, inconstant, warlike, independent, fierce by
nature, fiercer by their conquest, could scarcely brook that
subordination in which their safety consisted. Upon some frivolous
pretences, chiefly personal disgusts,[75] a most dangerous conspiracy
was formed: the principal men among the Normans were engaged in it; and
foreign correspondence was not wanting. Though this conspiracy was
chiefly formed and carried on by the Normans, they knew so well the use
which William on this occasion would not fail to make of his English
subjects, that they endeavored, as far as was consistent with secrecy,
to engage several of that nation, and above all, the Earl Waltheof, as
the first in rank and reputation among his countrymen. Waltheof,
thinking it base to engage in any cause but that of his country against
his benefactor, unveils the whole design to Lanfranc, who immediately
took measures for securing the chief conspirators. He dispatched
messengers to inform the king of his danger, who returned without delay
at the head of his forces, and by his presence, and his usua