especially the proud Earl of Gloucester with the Earl of Leicester,who went abroad in disgust.Then,the people began to be dissatisfied with the Barons,because they did not do enough for them.The King's chances seemed so good again at length,that he took heart enough-or caught it from his brother-to tell the Committee of Government that he abolished them-as to his oath,never mind that,the Pope said!-and to seize all the money in the Mint,and to shut himself up in the Tower of London.Here he was joined by his eldest son,Prince Edward;and,from the Tower,he made public a letter of the Pope's to the world in general,informing all men that he had been an excellent and just King for five-and-forty years.
As everybody knew he had been nothing of the sort,nobody cared much for this document.It so chanced that the proud Earl of Gloucester dying,was succeeded by his son;and that his son,instead of being the enemy of the Earl of Leicester,was (for the time)his friend.It fell out,therefore,that these two Earls joined their forces,took several of the Royal Castles in the country,and advanced as hard as they could on London.The London people,always opposed to the King,declared for them with great joy.The King himself remained shut up,not at all gloriously,in the Tower.Prince Edward made the best of his way to Windsor Castle.His mother,the Queen,attempted to follow him by water;
but,the people seeing her barge rowing up the river,and hating her with all their hearts,ran to London Bridge,got together a quantity of stones and mud,and pelted the barge as it came through,crying furiously,'Drown the Witch!Drown her!'They were so near doing it,that the Mayor took the old lady under his protection,and shut her up in St.Paul's until the danger was past.
It would require a great deal of writing on my part,and a great deal of reading on yours,to follow the King through his disputes with the Barons,and to follow the Barons through their disputes with one another-so I will make short work of it for both of us,and only relate the chief events that arose out of these quarrels.
The good King of France was asked to decide between them.He gave it as his opinion that the King must maintain the Great Charter,and that the Barons must give up the Committee of Government,and all the rest that had been done by the Parliament at Oxford:which the Royalists,or King's party,scornfully called the Mad Parliament.The Barons declared that these were not fair terms,and they would not accept them.Then they caused the great bell of St.Paul's to be tolled,for the purpose of rousing up the London people,who armed themselves at the dismal sound and formed quite an army in the streets.I am sorry to say,however,that instead of falling upon the King's party with whom their quarrel was,they fell upon the miserable Jews,and killed at least five hundred of them.They pretended that some of these Jews were on the King's side,and that they kept hidden in their houses,for the destruction of the people,a certain terrible composition called Greek Fire,which could not be put out with water,but only burnt the fiercer for it.What they really did keep in their houses was money;and this their cruel enemies wanted,and this their cruel enemies took,like robbers and murderers.
The Earl of Leicester put himself at the head of these Londoners and other forces,and followed the King to Lewes in Sussex,where he lay encamped with his army.Before giving the King's forces battle here,the Earl addressed his soldiers,and said that King Henry the Third had broken so many oaths,that he had become the enemy of God,and therefore they would wear white crosses on their breasts,as if they were arrayed,not against a fellow-Christian,but against a Turk.White-crossed accordingly,they rushed into the fight.They would have lost the day-the King having on his side all the foreigners in England:and,from Scotland,JOHN COMYN,JOHN BALIOL,and ROBERT BRUCE,with all their men-but for the impatience of PRINCE EDWARD,who,in his hot desire to have vengeance on the people of London,threw the whole of his father's army into confusion.He was taken Prisoner;so was the King;so was the King's brother the King of the Romans;and five thousand Englishmen were left dead upon the bloody grass.
For this success,the Pope excommunicated the Earl of Leicester:
which neither the Earl nor the people cared at all about.The people loved him and supported him,and he became the real King;having all the power of the government in his own hands,though he was outwardly respectful to King Henry the Third,whom he took with him wherever he went,like a poor old limp court-card.He summoned a Parliament (in the year one thousand two hundred and sixty-five) which was the first Parliament in England that the people had any real share in electing;and he grew more and more in favour with the people every day,and they stood by him in whatever he did.