This, defect is noticeable, for example, in the elaborate great seals of the Henries of the 15th century, as compared with the finer types of their predecessors.

But there was this essential difference between the position of the two Henries, that the elder aspired to be no more than.

The old Anglo-Norman houses had forgotten the tradition of their origin, and now formed but a small section of the aristocracy; the newer families, sprung from the officials of the first two Henries, had always been English in spirit.