re not to be counted
on. The populace are all with Lord Warwick, even though he brought the
devil at his back. If you hold out, look to rape and plunder before
sunset to-morrow. If ye yield, go forth in a body, and the earl is not
the man to suffer one Englishman to be injured in life or health who
once trusts to his good faith. My say is said."

"Worshipful my lord," said a thin, cadaverous alderman, who rose
next, "this is a judgment of the Lord and His saints. The Lollards and
heretics have been too much suffered to run at large, and the wrath of
Heaven is upon us."

An impatient murmuring attested the unwillingness of the larger part
of the audience to listen further; but an approving buzz from the elder
citizens announced that the fanaticism was not without its favourers.
Thus stimulated and encouraged, the orator continued; and concluded an
harangue, interrupted more stormily than all that had preceded, by an
exhortation to leave the city to its fate, and to march in a body to
the New Prison, draw forth five suspected Lollards, and burn them at
Smithfield, in order to appease the Almighty and divert the tempest!

This subject of controversy once started might have delayed the audience
till the ragged staves of the Warwickers drove them forth from their
hall, but for the sagacity and promptitude of the mayor.

"Brethren," he said, "it matters not to me whether the counsel suggested
be good or bad, in the main; but this have I heard,--there is small
safety in death-bed repentance. It is too late now to do, through fear
of the devil, what we omitted to do through zeal for the Church. The
sole question is, 'Fight or make terms.' Ye say we lack men; verily,
yes, while no leaders are found! Walworth, my predecessor, saved
London from Wat Tyler. Men were wanting then till the mayor and his
fellow-citizens marched forth to Mile End. It may be the same now. Agree
to fight, and we'll try it. What say you, Nicholas Alwyn?--you know the
temper of our young men."

Thus called upon, Alwyn rose, and such was the good name he had already
acquired, that every murmur hushed into eager silence.

"My lord mayor," he said, "there is a proverb in my country which says,
'Fish swim best that's bred in the sea;' which means, I take it, that
men do best what they are trained for! Lord Warwick and his men are
trained for fighting. Few of the fish about London Bridge are bred in
that sea. Cry, 'London to the rescue!'--put on hauberk an