Page:General History of Europe 1921.djvu/393

England and France during the Hundred Years' War 287 begun to be paid for their military services and no longer fur- nished troops as a condition of holding fiefs. But the companies of soldiers found their pay very uncertain and plundered their countrymen as well as the enemy. The Estates agreed in 1439 tnat the king should use a certain tax, called the taille, to support the troops necessary for the pro- tection of the frontier. This was a fatal concession, for the king now had an army and the right to collect what he chose to con- sider a permanent tax, the amount of which he later greatly in- creased ; he was not dependent, as was the English king, upon the grants made for brief periods by the representatives of the nation assembled in Parliament. 483. How Louis XI strengthened the King's Power in France. Before the king of France could establish a compact, well-organized state it was necessary for him to reduce the power of the nobles. They had already been forbidden to coin money, maintain armies of their own, or tax their subjects, but some of them still were in a position to threaten the king at the close of the Hundred Years' War. The task of further reducing their power fell to Louis XI (1461-1483), a shrewd but unscrupulous monarch. Some of his vassals, especially the dukes of Burgundy, gave him a great deal of trouble. While the English nobles were killing one another in the Wars of the Roses, Louis managed to get a number of hitherto half -independent provinces of France such as Anjou, Maine, Provence, etc. under his immediate control. He humiliated in various ways the vassals who had ventured in his early days to combine against him. Louis was an efficient mon- arch in building up a strong government, but it sometimes seemed as if he gloried in being the most rascally among rascals and the most treacherous among traitors. 484. England and France establish Strong National Govern- ments. Both England and France emerged from the troubles and desolations of the Hundred Years' War stronger than ever before. In both countries the kings had overcome the old menace of feudalism by destroying the influence of the great families. The king's government was becoming constantly more powerful.