the truth was that the peculiar constitution of the German kingdom and
the peculiar problems raised by German expansion towards the East were
such as to make the ideal policy the safest. Though Henry the Fowler had
sedulously limited his attention to German problems, his son, working on
the same lines, found himself led by the natural sequence of events to
cross the Alps, seize Italy and take the imperial crown from the Pope's
hands.

Henry the Fowler, elected after nineteen years of nominal kingship and
unbridled anarchy, defined his position by a series of compacts with the
great Dukes. Suabia, Bavaria and Lotharingia became dependent
principalities, whose rulers attended national Diets, occasionally
appeared at court, and still more occasionally rendered military
service. Under their sway the new feudalism, which they encouraged as
the means of creating armies both for defence and for pursuing an
independent foreign policy, took root and throve as a legal institution.
Within the borders of the duchies Henry had little power except as the
patron of the church. He claimed the right of nominating bishops--though
in Bavaria this claim was not made good till the next reign--and
religious foundations held their privileges by his grace. The
ecclesiastical councils which legislated with his sanction were more
important than the Diets composed indifferently of laymen and prelates.
His general policy gave greater cause for satisfaction to the clergy
than to the remainder of his subjects. The assertion of supremacy over
Lotharingia (925), and Bohemia (929), and the defeat of the Hungarians
at the Unstrut (933), were national achievements; but for nine years
before the battle of the Unstrut the King had allowed the Hungarians to
work their will in Bavaria and Suabia, having secured the immunity of
his own duchy by a separate truce. He had chiefly employed those years
in building strong towns for the defence of Saxony, and in extending