moment, appeared in
the field before him. [MN Battle of Evesham and death of Leicester.
4th Aug.] Edward made a body of his troops advance from the road
which led to Kenilworth, and ordered them to carry the banners taken
from Simon's army; while he himself, making a circuit with the rest of
his forces, purposed to attack the enemy on the other quarter.
Leicester was long deceived by this stratagem, and took one division
of Edward's army for his friends; but at last, perceiving his mistake,
and observing the great superiority and excellent disposition of the
royalists, he exclaimed that they had learned from him the art of war,
adding, "The Lord have mercy on our souls, for I see our bodies are
the prince's!" The battle immediately began, though on very unequal
terms. Leicester's army, by living on the mountains of Wales without
bread, which was not then much used among the inhabitants, had been
extremely weakened by sickness and desertion, and was soon broken by
the victorious royalists; while his Welsh allies, accustomed only to a
desultory kind of war, immediately took to flight, and were pursued
with great slaughter. Leicester himself; asking for quarter, was
slain in the heat of the action, with his eldest son Henry, Hugh le
Despenser, and about one hundred and sixty knights, and many other
gentlemen of his party. The old king had been purposely placed by the
rebels in the front of the battle; and being clad in armour, and
thereby not known by his friends, he received a wound, and was in
danger of his life; but crying out, I AM HENRY OF WINCHESTER, YOUR
KING, he was saved, and put in a place of safety by his son, who flew
to his rescue.

The violence, ingratitude, tyranny, rapacity, and treachery of the
Earl of Leicester, give a very bad idea of his moral character, and
make us regard his death as the most fortunate event which, in this
conjuncture, could have happened to the English nation; yet must we
allow the man to have possessed great abilities, and the appearance of
great virtues, who, though a stranger, could at a time when strangers
were the most odious, and the most universally decried, have acquired
so extensive an interest in the kingdom, and have so nearly paved his
way to the throne itself. His military capacity and his political
craft were equally eminent: he possessed the talents both of governing
men and conducting business: and though his ambition was boundless, it
seems neither to have ex