Thus the two great feuds which had hitherto influenced the political career of the Angevin house--the feud with Blois and the feud with Normandy--merged at last into one. The successors of Odo of Blois and those of William the Conqueror were now both represented, as against the successors of Fulk Nerra and Geoffrey Martel, by one and the same man, who yet was not, in strict law, the nearest representative of either. We shall see hereafter that some of the Normans entertained a project of making Theobald their duke; had they succeeded, the older quarrel would have revived almost in its original form, as a direct conflict between the heads of the two rival houses, only with Normandy instead of Touraine for its object and its battle-ground. Its original spirit was, however, more likely to be revived, on one side at least, by the substitution of Stephen for Theobald. Stephen had renounced all share in his father’s territories; but there was one paternal heir-loom which he could not renounce, and which descended to him, and him alone, among the sons of Stephen-Henry and Adela. This was the peculiar mental and moral constitution which the house of Blois inherited from Odo II. as surely as the Angevins inherited theirs from Fulk the Black. In the reigning Count Theobald, indeed, the type was fortunately almost lost, and in his youngest brother, Bishop Henry of Winchester, it was very greatly modified by the infusion of Norman blood derived from their mother. In Stephen, however, the Norman blood had but little influence on a nature which in its essence was that of the old counts of Blois. All the characteristic qualities and defects of the race were there, just as deeply rooted as in Odo of Champagne himself; the whole difference lay in this, that in Stephen the qualities lay uppermost and shewed themselves in their most attractive aspect, while the defects took a form so mild that till their fatal consequences were seen they appeared hardly more than amiable weaknesses. Gallant knight and courteous gentleman; warm-hearted, high-spirited, throwing himself eagerly into every enterprise; all reckless valour in the battle-field, all gentleness and mercy as soon as the fight was over; open-handed, generous, gracious to all, and apparently unstained by any personal vices:--it is easy to understand Henry’s affection for him, and the high hopes with which at the opening of his career he was regarded by all classes in the realm.[686] His good qualities were plainly visible; time and experience alone could reveal the radical defect which vitiated them all. That defect was simply the old curse of his race--lack of stedfastness; and it ruined Stephen as surely as it had ruined Odo. It was ingrained in every fibre of his nature; it acted like an incurable moral disease, mingling its subtle poison with his every thought and act, and turning his very virtues into weaknesses; it reduced his whole kingly career to a mere string of political