e this feeling the more intense. But there
were limits even to the ill-will towards aliens. The foreigner could
make himself at home in England, and the rapid naturalisation of a
Montfort in the higher walks of life is paralleled by the absorption
into the civic community of many a Gascon or German merchant, like that
Arnold Fitz Thedmar,[1] a Bremen trader's son, who became alderman
of London and probably chronicler of its history. Yet even the greatest
English towns did not become strong enough to cut themselves off from
the general life of the people. They were rather a new element in that
rich and purposeful nation that had so long been enduring the rule of
Henry of Winchester. The national energy spurned the feebleness of the
court, and the time was at hand when the nation, through its natural
leaders, was to overthrow the wretched system of misgovernment under
which it had suffered. Political retrogression was no longer to bar
national progress.

[1] See for Arnold the _Chronica majorum et vicecomitum
Londoniarum_ in _Liber de antiquis legibus_, and Riley's
introduction to his translation of _Chronicles of the Mayors
and Sheriffs of London_ (1863).

CHAPTER V.

THE BARONS' WAR.

During the early months of 1258, the aliens ruled the king and realm,
added estate to estate, and defied all attempts to dislodge them. Papal
agents traversed the country, extorting money from prelates and
churches. The Welsh, in secret relations with the lords of the march,
threatened the borders, and made a confederacy with the Scots. The
French were hostile, and the barons disunited, without leaders, and
helpless. A wretched harvest made corn scarce and dear. A wild winter,
followed by a long late frost, cut off the lambs and destroyed the
farmers' hopes for the summer. A murrain of cattle followed, and the
poor were dying of hunger and pestilence. Henry III. was in almost as
bad a plight as his people. He had utterly failed to subdue Llewelyn. A
papal agent threatened him with excommunication and the resumption of
the grant of Sicily. He could not control his foreign kinsfolk, and the
rivalry of Savoyards and Poitevins added a new element of turmoil to
the distracted relations of the magnates. His son had been forced to
pawn his best estates to William of Valence, and the royal exchequer
was absolutely empty. Money must be had at all risks, and the only way
to get it was to assemble the magnates.

On Apri