hat each of
you will pay as much as he can to aid the common cause. I have here a
list of your names. My son will take it round to each, and will write
down how many men each of you may think to bring with him to the war. No
man must be taken unwillingly. I want only those whose hearts are in the
cause. My son is grieving that he is not old enough to ride with us; but
should aught befall me in the strife, I have bade him ride and take his
place among you."

Another cheer arose, and Harry went round the table taking down the
names and numbers of the men, and when his total was added up, it was
found that those present believed that they could bring a hundred men
with them into the field.

"This is beyond my hopes," Sir Harry said, as amid great cheering he
announced the result. "I myself will raise another fifty from my grooms,
gardeners, and keepers, and from brave lads I can gather in the village,
and I shall be proud indeed when I present to his majesty two hundred
men of Furness, ready to die in his defense."

After this there was great arrangement of details. Each tenant gave a
list of the arms which he possessed and the number of horses fit for
work, and as in those days, by the law of the land each man, of
whatsoever his degree, was bound to keep arms in order to join the
militia, should his services be required for the defense of the kingdom,
the stock of arms was, with the contents of Sir Henry's armory, found to
be sufficient for the number of men who were to be raised. It was eight
o'clock in the evening before all was arranged, and the party broke up
and separated to their homes.

For the next week there was bustle and preparation on the Furness
estates, as, indeed, through all England. As yet, however, the
Parliament were gathering men far more rapidly than the king. The
Royalists of England were slow to perceive how far the Commons intended
to press their demands, and could scarcely believe that civil war was
really to break out. The friends of the Commons, however, were
everywhere in earnest. The preachers in the conventicles throughout the
land denounced the king in terms of the greatest violence, and in almost
every town the citizens were arming and drilling. Lord Essex, who
commanded the Parliamentary forces, was drawing toward Northampton with
ten thousand men, consisting mainly of the train-bands of London; while
the king, with only a few hundred followers, was approaching Nottingham,
where he pr