Note 70 — PART II HISTORICAL STUDIES

Now if it were not for the fortunate preservation of the Vetera Analecta in the case of Le Mans, Mr Freeman would there also, as at Exeter, have been hoodwinked by 'the Norman version'.70 I am anxious not to employ a phrase which might be deemed offensive or unjust, so I restrict myself to that which he himself applied to his predecessor, Palgrave, when, speaking of the story of Eadric and his brother, he wrote that Sir Francis Palgrave 'swallowed the whole tale'.71 Whether my solution be accepted or not, it is, I repeat, conjectural. I have, at least, shown that there is a mystery to be solved, that Mr Freeman's version fails to solve it, and that, so far from Domesday recording the punishment inflicted upon Exeter, it actually heightens the mystery of the case by proving that Exeter obtained exceptionally favourable treatment.