Robert takes La Houlme success. He marched westward, and attacked La Houlme. The castle surrendered; the lord of the Peak, with eight hundred men, became the prize of the Duke's unusual display of vigour.[1]
Difficulties of Rufus.
Further taxation.
Levy of English soldiers.
The war went on; each side burned the towns and
took the men of the other side.[2] But the tide had for
the moment decidedly turned against the Red King.
The loss of Argentan and La Houlme, with their commanders
and their large garrisons, was a serious military
blow. The payment of their ransoms might be a still
more serious financial blow. And the payment of a
ransom, by which he only got back again what he had
had before, would be less satisfactory to the mind of
Rufus than the payment of bribes and wages by which
he had a hope of gaining something fresh. The hoard
at Winchester seems at last to have been running low;
but when William Rufus was king and when he had
Randolf Flambard to his minister, there could be no
lack of ways and means to fill it again. Specially
heavy were the gelds laid on England both in this year
and in the following.[3] And money was gained by one
device which surely would have come into the head
of no king and no minister save those by whom it
actually was devised. A great levy was ordered; King
William sent over his bidding that twenty thousand
Englishmen should come over to help the King in Normandy.[4]
Englishmen had by this time got used to service
- [Footnote: says nothing of Philip's coming to Longueville, he may mean his return
after that.]æt Hulme." Florence makes it the special exploit of Robert; "Comes vero Rotbertus castellum quod Holm nuncupatur obsedit, donec Willelmus Peverel et dccc. homines, qui id defendebant, illi se dederent."]*
- ↑ The Chronicler says only, after the taking of Argentan, "and syððan þone [castel
- ↑ Chron. Petrib. 1094. "And oftrædlice heora ægðer uppon oðerne tunas bærnde, and eac men læhte."
- ↑ Flor. Wig, 1094. "Interea gravi et assiduo tributo hominumque mortalitate, præsenti et anno sequenti, tota vexabatur Anglia."
- ↑ Chron. Petrib. 1094. "Ða sende se cyng hider to lande, and hét
