chivalry of Europe against the Saracens in the East. Robert, in order
to raise money to join the first crusade, mortgaged Normandy to his
brother, and an absorption of Western France had begun, which, by means
of conquest by arms and the more peaceful conquest by marriage, would
in fifty years extend English dominion from the Scottish border to the
Pyrenees.

William's son Henry (I.), who succeeded his older brother, William
Rufus, inherited enough of his father's administrative genius to
complete the details of government which he had outlined. He organized
the beginning of a judicial system, creating out of his secretaries and
Royal Ministers a Supreme Court, whose head bore the title of
Chancellor. He created also another tribunal, which represented the
body of royal vassals who had all hitherto been summoned together three
times a year. This "King's Court," as it was called, considered
everything relating to the revenues of the state. Its meetings were
about a table with a top like a chessboard, which led to calling the
members who sat, "Barons of the Exchequer." He also wisely created a
class of lesser nobles, upon whom the old barons looked down with
scorn, but who served as a counterbalancing force against the arrogance
of an old nobility, and bridged the distance between them and the
people.

So, while the thirty-five years of Henry's reign advanced and developed
the purposes of his father, his marriage with a Saxon Princess did much
to efface the memory of foreign conquest, in restoring the old Saxon
blood to the royal line. But the young Prince who embodied this hope,
went down with 140 young nobles in the "White Ship," while returning
from Normandy. It is said that his father never smiled again, and upon
his death, his nephew Stephen was king during twenty unfruitful years.