he legate, Nicholas, in filling those numerous vacancies which had
fallen in England during an interdict of six years, had proceeded in
the most arbitrary manner; and had paid no regard, in conferring
dignities, to personal merit, to rank, to the inclination of the
electors, or to the customs of the country. The English Church was
universally disgusted; and Langton himself, though he owed his
elevation to an encroachment of the Romish see, was no sooner
established in his high office than he became jealous of the privilege
annexed to it, and formed attachments with the country subjected to
his jurisdiction. These causes, though they opened slowly the eyes of
men, failed not to produce their effect; they set bounds to the
usurpations of the papacy; the tide first stopped, and then turned
against the sovereign Pontiff; and it is otherwise inconceivable how
that age, so prone to superstition, and so sunk in ignorance, or
rather so devoted to a spurious erudition, could have escaped falling
into an absolute and total slavery under the court of Rome.

About the time that the Pope's letters arrived in England, the
malcontent barons, on the approach of the festival of Easter, when
they were to expect the King's answer to their petition, met by
agreement at Stamford; and they assembled a force consisting of above
two thousand knights, besides their retainers and inferior persons
without number. Elated with their power, they advanced in a body to
Brackley, within fifteen miles of Oxford, the place where the court
then resided; and they there received a message from the King, by the
Archbishop of Canterbury and the Earl of Pembroke, desiring to know
what those liberties were which they so zealously challenged from
their sovereign. They delivered to these messengers a schedule,
containing the chief articles of their demands; which was no sooner
shown to the King than he burst into a furious passion, and asked why
the barons did not also demand of him his kingdom; swearing that he
would never grant them such liberties as must reduce himself to
slavery.

No sooner were the confederate nobles informed of John's reply than
they chose Robert Fitz-Walter their general, whom they called "the
mareschal of the army of God and of Holy Church "; and they proceeded
without further ceremony to levy war upon the King, They besieged the
castle of Northampton during fifteen days, though without success; the
gates of Bedford castle were willingl