marshalship.  The form of Edward’s request at Salisbury gave them a technical advantage which they were not slow to seize.  Ignoring the broader issues which lay between them and the king, they took their stand on their traditional rights as constable and marshal to attend the king in person.  “Freely,” declared the earl marshal, “will I go with thee, O king, and march before thee in the first line of thy army, as my hereditary duty requires.”  Edward answered:  “Thou shalt go without me along with the rest to Gascony”.  The marshal replied:  “I am not bound to go save with thee, nor will I go”.  Edward flew into a passion:  “By God, sir earl, thou shalt either go or hang”.  Norfolk replied with equal spirit:  “By that same oath, sir king, I will neither go nor hang”.  The parliament broke up in disorder.  Before long a force of 1,500 men-at-arms gathered together under the leadership of the constable and marshal.

During these stormy times Edward had been straining every nerve to equip an adequate army for foreign service.  Once more he laid violent hands upon the wool and hides of the merchants, while a huge male—­tolt, varying from forty shillings a sack for raw wool to sixty-six shillings and eightpence a sack for carded wool, was exacted for such wool as the king’s officers suffered to remain in the owner’s possession.  Moreover, vast stores of wheat, barley, and oats, salt pork and salt beef were requisitioned all over the land.  Men said that the king’s tyranny could no longer be borne, and that the rights decreed to all Englishmen by the Great Charter were in imminent danger.  The movement, which had begun as a defence of feudal right, became a popular revolt in favour of national liberty.  The commons joined the barons and clergy in the general opposition to the headstrong king.

Edward saw that he must divide his enemies if he wished to effect his purpose.  The clergy were the easiest to deal with.  Boniface VIII. was already yielding in his struggle against Philip the Fair.  In the bull Romana mater of February 2, 1297, he had authorised voluntary contributions of the French clergy in the case of pressing necessity, without previous recourse to the permission of the apostolic see.  The same attitude had already been taken up by the royalist clergy in England, who redeemed their outlawry by offering to the king the fifth of their revenues.  In March Edward made things easier for the recalcitrants by suspending the edict confiscating the lay fees of the Church.  Even Winchelsea saw the wisdom of abandoning his too heroic attitude.  In a convocation, held on March 24, he practically applied the doctrine of Romana mater to the English situation.  “Let each man,” he declared, “save his own soul and follow his own conscience.  But my conscience does not allow me to offer money for the king’s protection or on any other pretext.”  In the event nearly all the clergy bought off the king’s wrath by the voluntary payment of a fifth.