nces
of his people. The barons who had been appointed as sheriffs at the
opening of his reign had governed after the old corrupt traditions, or
perhaps themselves suffering under the ruthless pressure of the barons of
the Exchequer, had been driven to a like severity of extortion. By an
edict of the king every sheriff throughout the country was struck from
his post; of the twenty-seven only seven were restored to their places,
and new sheriffs were appointed, all of whom save four were officers of
the King's Court. The great local noble who had lorded it as he chose over
the suitors of the Court for fifteen years, and fined and taxed and
forfeited as seemed good to him, suddenly, without a moment's warning,
saw his place filled by a stranger, a mere clerk trained in the Court
among the royal servants, a simple nominee of the king; he could no
longer doubt that the royal supremacy was now without rival, without
limit, irresistible, complete. Such an act of absolute authority had
indeed, as Dr. Stubbs says, "no example in the history of Europe since
the time of the Roman Empire, except possibly in the power wielded by
Charles the Great."

Nor was this Henry's only act of high-handed government. On the 10th of
April he called a council to London to consult about the coronation of
his son. It was a dangerous innovation, against all custom and tradition,
for no such coronation of the heir in his father's lifetime had ever taken
place in England. But Henry was no mere king of England, nor did he
greatly heed barbaric or insular prejudice when he had even before his
eyes the example not only of the French Court, but of the Holy Roman
Empire. The coronation was a necessary step in the completion of the plan
unfolded at Montmirail for the ordering of the second empire of the West.
Moreover, the settlement probably seemed to him more imperative than ever
from the restlessness and discontent of the land. No king of England since
the Conquest had succeeded peaceably to his father. The reign of Stephen
had abundantly proved how vain were oaths of homage to secure the
succession; and the sacred anointing, which in those days carried with it
an inalienable consecration, was perhaps the only certain way of securing
his son's right. It may well be, too, that, threatened as he was with
interdict, he saw the advantage of providing for the peace and security of
England by crowning as her king an innocent boy with whom the Church had
no qua