e.
The same evil fortune attended the division that followed Lancaster.
The archers of Harclay obeyed his orders so well that the Lancastrian
cavalry scarcely dared enter the water. Lancaster lost his nerve, and
besought Harclay for a truce until the next morning. His request was
granted, but during the night all the followers of Hereford dispersed,
thinking that there was no need for them to remain after the death of
their lord. Lancaster's own troops were likewise thinned by desertions.
The sheriff of York came up early in the morning with an armed force
from the south, joined Harclay, and cut off the last hope of retreat.
Further resistance being useless, Lancaster, Audley, Clifford, Mowbray,
and the other leaders surrendered in a body.

Edward was then at Pontefract in the chief castle of his deadliest
enemy. Thither the prisoners of Boroughbridge were sent for their
trial, and there they were hastily condemned by a body of seven earls
and numerous barons, presided over by the king himself. Lancaster, not
allowed to say a word in his defence, was at once sentenced to death as
a rebel and a traitor. In consideration of his exalted rank, the
grosser penalties of treason were commuted, as in the case of Gaveston,
to simple decapitation. On the morning of March 22 Thomas was led out
of his castle, clad in the garb of a penitent and mounted on a sorry
steed. He was conducted to a little hill outside the walls. The crowd
mocked at his sufferings and in scorn called him "King Arthur". In two
or three blows of the axe, his head was struck off from his body. Nor
was he the only victim. Audley, spared his life by reason of his
marriage to the king's niece, was, like the two Mortimers, consigned to
prison. Clifford and Mowbray were hanged at York, and Badlesmere at
Canterbury. In all, more than twenty knights and barons paid the
penalty of death.

It is hard to waste much pity on Lancaster. He was the victim of his
own fierce passions and, still more, of his own utter incompetence. His
attitude all through the crisis had been inept in the extreme, and the
poor fight that he made for his life at Boroughbridge was a fitting
conclusion to a feeble career. But with all his faults he remained
popular to the end, especially with the clergy and commons. He was
hailed as a martyr to freedom and sound government. Pilgrimages were
made to the scene of his death, and miracles were wrought with his
relics. A chapel arose on the little h