In order to have
a pretext for this violence, he endeavored without discovering his
intentions, to provoke and allure them into insurrections, which he
thought could never prove dangerous, while he detained all the principal
nobility in Normandy, while a great and victorious army was quartered
in England, and while he himself was so near to suppress any tumult or
rebellion. But as no ancient writer has ascribed this tyrannical purpose
to William, it scarcely seems allowable, from conjecture alone, to throw
such an imputation upon him.
But whether we are to account for that measure from the king's vanity or
from his policy, it was the immediate cause of all the calamities which
the English endured during this and the subsequent reigns, and gave rise
to those mutual jealousies and animosities between them and the Normans,
which were never appeased till a long tract of time had gradually united
the two nations, and made them one people. The inhabitants of Kent, who
had first submitted to the conqueror, were the first that attempted to
throw off the yoke; and in confederacy with Eustace, count of Boulogne,
who had also been disgusted by the Normans, they made an attempt, though
without success, on the garrison of Dover.
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