Born to a life of warfare, the Conquest had been but the
culminating point of a career spent in the tented field--but on
that one event he staked his all.
For had he been vanquished at Senlac there was no hope of flight;
the English commanded the sea, while his suzerain of France, ever
on the watch to regain those Norman dominions which Rollo had won,
would have taken instant advantage of the loss of its military
leaders to re-annex Normandy to the French crown, and must have
succeeded.
Had William fallen in England the Norman name and glory would have
perished at Hastings.
Doubtless, he felt how great was the stake he had placed at the
hazard of the die, and having won it, he used it as his own.
Yet he was not all of stone. The Anglo-Saxon chronicler says of
him--"He was mild to those good men who loved God, although stern
beyond measure to those who resisted his will."
Hence the power which men like Lanfranc or Anselm had over him; and
it must be added that his life was exemplary as a private
individual, his honour unsullied, his purity unstained.
Stern was the race of which he was the head and the ruling spirit.
Well does the old chronicler, Henry of Huntingdon, say:
"God had chosen the Normans to humble the English nation, because
He perceived that they were more fierce than any other people.
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