and his gifts to religious houses might even predispose monastic historians in his favor, but for all this splendor his subjects paid the bills. In spite of his great income, he was always in need of money for his extravagances; and for his fiscal exactions there was never the excuse of large measures of public policy. Indeed, so far as we can see, Richard had no public policy. "His ambition," says Stubbs, "was that of a mere warrior: he would fight for anything whatever, but he would sell everything that was worth fighting for."[1] Self-willed and self-centred, he followed wherever his desires led, with no sense of loyalty to his obligations or of responsibility as a ruler. Made duke of Aquitaine at seventeen, he sought to ride down every obstacle and bring immediate order and unity into a region which had never enjoyed either of these benefits; and he quickly had by the ears the land which he should have best understood. He was soon in revolt against his father and also at war with the Young King; for his own purposes he later went over to the king of France, and jested with his boon companions over his father's discomfiture and downfall. Even as king at the age of thirty-two, Richard remained an impetuous youth; he never really grew up. Haughty and overbearing, he alienated friends and allies; inheriting the rule of the vast Plantagenet empire, he showed no realization of imperial duty or opportunity. Thus he visited England but twice in the course of his reign of ten years and
- ↑ Constitutional History, i, p. 551.
