y opened to them by William
Beauchamp, its owner; they advanced to Ware on their way to London,
where they held a correspondence with the principal citizens; they
were received without opposition into the capital; and finding now the
great superiority of their force, they issued proclamations, requiring
the other barons to join them, and menacing them, in case of refusal
or delay, with committing devastation on their houses and estates. In
order to show what might be expected from their prosperous arms, they
made incursions from London, and laid waste the King's parks and
palaces; and all the barons, who had hitherto carried the semblance of
supporting the royal party, were glad of this pretence for openly
joining a cause which they always had secretly favored. The King was
left at Odiham, in Hampshire, with a poor retinue of only seven
knights, and after trying several expedients to elude the blow, after
offering to refer all differences to the Pope alone, or to eight
barons, four to be chosen by himself, and four by the confederates, he
found himself at last obliged to submit at discretion.

A conference between the King and the barons was appointed at
Runnymede, between Windsor and Staines; a place which has ever since
been extremely celebrated, on account of this great event. The two
parties encamped apart, like open enemies; and after a debate of a few
days, the King, with a facility somewhat suspicious, signed and sealed
the charter which was required of him. This famous deed, commonly
called the "Great Charter," either granted or secured very important
liberties and privileges to every order of men in the kingdom: to the
clergy, to the barons, and to the people. The freedom of elections was
secured to the clergy; the former charter of the King was confirmed,
by which the necessity of a royal conge d'elire and confirmation was
superseded; all check upon appeals to Rome was removed, by the
allowance granted every man to depart the kingdom at pleasure, and the
fines to be imposed on the clergy, for any offence, were ordained to
be proportional to their lay estates, not to their ecclesiastical
benefices.

The privileges granted to the barons were either abatements in the
rigor of the feudal law or determinations in points which had been
left by that law or had become, by practice, arbitrary and ambiguous.
The reliefs of heirs succeeding to a military fee were ascertained: an
earl's and baron's at a hundred marks, a