Page:The Ifs of History (1907).pdf/40

 conversion to Christianity." If the succession of native kings had continued, says the same authority, "freedom might have died out step by step, as it did in some other lands. As it was, the main effect of the conquest was to call out the ancient English spirit in a new and antagonistic shape, to give the English nation new leaders in the conquerors who were gradually changed into countrymen, and by the union of the men of both races, to win back the substance of the old institutions under new forms."

In other words, the Norman Princess Emma brought with her John Bull as a part of her dowry, when she came to weak Ethelred as his bride.