conciliate his chief adviser and supporter, Bouchard the Venerable, the greatest lord of the royal domain, and count already of Vendôme, Corbeil, and Melun, by granting him his own county of Paris. The title of ‘royal count’ of Paris suggested that Bouchard was a royal officer rather than a simple feudatory, and after Bouchard had retired into a monastery, the county of Paris was henceforth kept strictly in the king’s hands. The second Capetian acquired with Montreuil-sur-Mer a seaport near the English Channel. For a time the Capetians held the duchy of Burgundy. Moreover, they were men of energy and vigour who made the best of their limited resources. But their lot was a hard one. Even in their own domains, between the Seine and Loire, the leading mesne lords, lay and secular, exercised such extensive jurisdiction that there was little room left for the authority of the suzerain. Besides the task—as yet hopeless—of reducing the great vassals of the crown to order, the Capetian kings had the preliminary task of establishing their authority within their own domains. Even this smaller work was not accomplished for more than a century. But, luckily for the kings, each one of the great feudatories was similarly occupied. The barons of Normandy and Aquitaine gave more trouble to their respective dukes than the barons of the Isle of France gave to the lord of Paris. Power was in reality distributed among hundreds of feudal chieftains. It was so divided that no one was strong enough to really rule at all. France suffered all the miseries of feudal anarchy, when every petty lord of a castle ruled like a little king over his own domain. Yet it was something that her contests were now between Frenchmen and Frenchmen. Something was gained in the passing away of the barbarian invasions of the tenth century. [Sidenote: The first four Capetians. Hugh, 987–996.] The details of the political history of the first four Capetian reigns are insignificant, and need not be told at length. Hugh Capet reigned from 987 to 996. He had little difficulty in obtaining general recognition, even from the lords of the distant south. But he had some trouble in upholding his claims against the Carolingian claimant, Charles, Duke of Lower Lorraine, who received the powerful support of the church of Reims, after Adalbero’s death, and continued for some time to maintain himself in the old Carolingian fortress of Laon. Hugh continued with wise policy to maintain his hold over the church of Reims, and so to destroy the last possible stronghold of the Carolingians. He did not even scruple to sacrifice the trusty Gerbert to serve his dynastic ambitions. Within modest limits, the reign of the founder of the new dynasty was a successful one. [Sidenote: Robert II., the Pious, 996–1031.]