n return for
this indulgence. The king issued writs anew to the sheriffs,
enjoining the observance of the charter; but he inserted a remarkable
clause in the writs, that those who paid not the fifteenth should not
for the future be entitled to the benefit of those liberties [y].
[FN [x] M. West. p. 282. [y] Clause 9. H. 3. m. 9. and m. 6. d.]

The low state into which the crown was fallen made it requisite for a
good minister to be attentive to the preservation of the royal
prerogatives, as well as to the security of public liberty. Hubert
applied to the pope, who had always great authority in the kingdom,
and was now considered as its superior lord, and desired him to issue
a bull declaring the king to be of full age, and entitled to exercise
in person all the acts of royalty [z]. In consequence of this
declaration, the justiciary resigned into Henry's hands the two
important fortresses of the Tower and Dover Castle, which had been
intrusted to his custody; and he required the other barons to imitate
his example. They refused compliance: the Earls of Chester and
Albemarle, John Constable of Chester, John de Lacy, Brian de l'Isle,
and William de Cantel, with some others, even formed a conspiracy to
surprise London, and met in arms at Waltham with that intention: but
finding the king prepared for defence, they desisted from their
enterprise. When summoned to court in order to answer for their
conduct, they scrupled not to appear, and to confess the design: but
they told the king, that they had no bad intentions against his
person, but only against Hubert de Burgh, whom they were determined to
remove from his office [a]. They appeared too formidable to be
chastised; and they were so little discouraged by the failure of their
first enterprise, that they again met in arms at Leicester, in order
to seize the king, who then resided at Northampton: but Henry,
informed of their purpose, took care to be so well armed and attended
that the barons found it dangerous to make the attempt; and they sat
down and kept Christmas in his neighbourhood [b]. The archbishop and
the prelates, finding every thing tending towards a civil war,
interposed with their authority, and threatened the barons with the
sentence of excommunication, if they persisted in detaining the king's
castles. This menace at last prevailed: most of the fortresses were
surrendered; though the barons complained that Hubert's castles were
soon after restored t