strife should cease. They would first establish peace,
if peace were possible, they said, and then answer the king's demand.
Twelve commissioners, with Earl Gilbert at their head, were appointed on
Henry's assent to arrange terms on reconciliation. They at once decided
that none should be utterly disinherited for their part in the troubles,
but that liberty of redemption should be left open to all. Furious at the
prospect of being forced to disgorge their spoil, Mortimer and the
ultra-royalists broke out in mad threats of violence, even against the life
of the Papal legate who had pressed for the reconciliation. But the power
of the ultra-royalists was over. The general resolve was not to be shaken
by the clamour of a faction, and Mortimer's rout at Brecknock by Llewelyn,
the one defeat that chequered the tide of success, had damaged that
leader's influence. Backed by Edward and Earl Gilbert, the legate met their
opposition with a threat of excommunication, and Mortimer withdrew sullenly
from the camp. Fresh trouble in the country and the seizure of the Isle of
Ely by a band of the Disinherited quickened the labours of the Twelve. At
the close of September they pronounced their award, restoring the lands to
all who made submission on a graduated scale of redemption, promising
indemnity for all wrong done during the troubles, and leaving the
restoration of the house of De Montfort to the royal will. But to these
provisions was added an emphatic demand that "the king fully keep and
observe those liberties of the Church, charters of liberties, and forest
charters, which he is expressly and by his own mouth bound to preserve and
keep." "Let the King," they add, "establish on a lasting foundation those
concessions which he has hitherto made of his own will and not on
compulsion, and those needful ordinances which have been devised by his
subjects and by his own good pleasure."

[Sidenote: Close of the Struggle]

With this Award the struggle came to an end. The garrison of Kenilworth
held out indeed till November, and the full benefit of the Ban was only
secured when Earl Gilbert in the opening of the following year suddenly
appeared in arms and occupied London. But the Earl was satisfied, the
Disinherited were at last driven from Ely, and Llewelyn was brought to
submission by the appearance of an army at Shrewsbury. All was over by the
close of 1267. His father's age and weakness, his own brilliant military
successes, lef