She Therefore
Went To King Henry I., And Declared With Assertions More Vindictive
Than True, And Corroborated By An Oath, That Her Son Mahel Was Not
The Son Of Bernard, But Of Another Person With Whom She Had Been
Secretly Connected.
Henry, on account of this oath, or rather
perjury, and swayed more by his inclination than by reason, gave
Away her eldest daughter, whom she owned as the legitimate child of
Bernard, in marriage to Milo Fitz-Walter, {46} constable of
Gloucester, with the honour of Brecheinoc as a portion; and he was
afterwards created earl of Hereford by the empress Matilda, daughter
of the said king. By this wife he had five celebrated warriors;
Roger, Walter, Henry, William, and Mahel; all of whom, by divine
vengeance, or by fatal misfortunes, came to untimely ends; and yet
each of them, except William, succeeded to the paternal inheritance,
but left no issue. Thus this woman (not deviating from the nature
of her sex), in order to satiate her anger and revenge, with the
heavy loss of modesty, and with the disgrace of infamy, by the same
act deprived her son of his patrimony, and herself of honour. Nor
is it wonderful if a woman follows her innate bad disposition: for
it is written in Ecclesiastes, "I have found one good man out of a
thousand, but not one good woman;" and in Ecclesiasticus, "There is
no head above the head of a serpent; and there is no wrath above the
wrath of a woman;" and again, "Small is the wickedness of man
compared to the wickedness of woman." And in the same manner, as we
may gather grapes off thorns, or figs off thistles, Tully,
describing the nature of women, says, "Men, perhaps, for the sake of
some advantage will commit one crime; but woman, to gratify one
inclination, will not scruple to perpetrate all sorts of
wickedness." Thus Juvenal, speaking of women, say,
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