But though the king appeared thus fortunate both in public and domestic
life, the discontents of his English subjects augmented daily; and
the injuries committed and suffered on both sides rendered the quarrel
between them and the Normans absolutely incurable. The insolence of
victorious masters, dispersed throughout the kingdom, seemed intolerable
to the natives; and wherever they found the Normans separate or
assembled in small bodies, they secretly set upon them, and gratified
their vengeance by the slaughter of their enemies. But an insurrection
in the north drew thither the general attention, and seemed to threaten
more important consequences. Edwin and Morcar appeared at the head
of this rebellion; and these potent noblemen, before they took arms,
stipulated for foreign succors from their nephew Blethyn, prince of
North Wales, from Malcolm, king of Scotland and from Sweyn, king of
Denmark. Besides the general discontent which had seized the English,
the two earls were incited to this revolt by private injuries. William,
in order to insure them to his interests, had on his accession promised
his daughter in marriage to Edwin; but either he had never seriously
intended to perform this engagement, or, having changed his plan of
administration in England from clemency to rigor, he thought it was
to little purpose if he gained one family, while he enraged the whole
nation.
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