WILLIAM RUFUS.

393

wlio were obliged to melt their plate in order to chatfurnish the quota demanded of them 22 : He was v.put in possession of Normandy and Maine ; andRobert , providing himself with a magnificenttrain , set out for the Holy Land , in pursuit ofglory; and in full confidence of securing hiseternal salvation.

The smallness of this sum , with the difficultieswhich William found in raising it, suffices aloneto refute the account which is heedlessly adoptedby historians, of the enormous revenue of theconqueror. Is it credible , that Robert wouldconsign to the rapacious hands of his brothersuch considerable dominions, for a sum , which ,according to that account, made not a week’sincome of his father’s English revenue alone ? Orthat the king of England could not on demand ,without oppressing his subjects, have been ableto pay him the money ? The conqueror , it isagreed, was frugal as well as rapacious ; yet histreasure, at his death, exceeded not 60,000 pouncjs,which hardly amounted to his income for twomonths : Another certain refutation of that exag-gerated account.

The fury of the crusades, during this age, lessinfected England than the neighbouring kingdoms;probably because the Norman conquerors, findingtheir settlement in that kingdom still somewhatprecarious , durst not abandon their homes , in

2 ' Eadmer, p. 35. W. IVlalm. p. I2Z. W. Heming,

p. 467.

m