great effort which
he intended to make against France, he required the attendance of every
proprietor of land possessed of twenty pounds a year, even though he
held not of the crown, and was not obliged by his tenure to perform any
such service.[*]

These acts of violence and of arbitrary power, notwithstanding the great
personal regard generally borne to the king, bred murmurs in every order
of men; and it was not long ere some of the great nobility, jealous of
their own privileges, as well as of national liberty, gave countenance
and authority to these complaints. Edward assembled on the sea-coast an
army which he purposed to send over to Gascony, while he himself should
in person make an impression on the side of Flanders; and he intended to
put these forces under the command of Humphrey Bohun, earl of Hereford,
the constable, and Roger Bigod, earl of Norfolk, the mareschal of
England. But these two powerful earls refused to execute his commands,
and affirmed that they were only obliged by their office to attend his
person in the wars. A violent altercation ensued: and the king, in the
height of his passion, addressing himself to the constable, exclaimed,
"Sir Earl, by God, you shall either go or hang." "By God, Sir King,"
replied Hereford, "I will neither go nor hang."[**] And he immediately
departed with the mareschal and above thirty other considerable barons.

Upon this opposition, the king laid aside the project of an expedition
against Guienne, and assembled the forces which he himself purposed to
transport into Flanders. But the two earls, irritated in the contest
and elated by impunity, pretending that none of their ancestors had ever
served in that country, refused to perform the duty of their office in
mustering the army.[***] The king, now finding it advisable to proceed
with moderation, instead of attainting the earls, who possessed their
dignities by hereditary right, appointed Thomas de Berkeley and Geoffrey
de Geyneville to act in that emergence as constable and mareschal.[****]

* Walsing. p. 69.

** Heming. voL i. p. 112.

*** Rymer, vol. ii. p. 783. Walsing. p. 70.

**** M. West, p. 430.

He endeavored to reconcile himself with the church; took the primate
again into favor,[*] made him, in conjunction with Reginald de Grey,
tutor to the prince, whom he intended to appoint guardian of the kingdom
during his absence; and he even assembled a great number of the nobility
in W