POLITICAL HISTORY 



turned back, tired but exultant, to seek their friends, of whose success in 

 the struggle proceeding out of their sight at the foot of the hills they 

 appear to have had no doubt. 



Meanwhile the fortunes of the rival parties had fared very 

 differently on the other parts of the field. The left wing under the 

 King of the Romans had pressed forward, but had been staggered by the 

 shower of stones and arrows directed upon them from the high ground, 

 and Montfort seeing his advantage hurled his reserves upon them. The 

 fight was stern, but the advantage of the ground was with the barons, 

 and also, probably, the advantage of better discipline ; for if we may 

 judge from the Dover Chronicle, the previous night's debauchery had 

 unfitted many of the knights for fighting, as Henry Percy acknowledged 

 that several knights on taking the field ' could scarcely see their 

 opponents or hold their swords ' ; it is true the pious chronicler ascribes 

 this to the influence of the spirits of St. Thomas of Canterbury and St. 

 George,' rather than the wine of the Prior of Lewes. At last the 

 royalists broke and fled ; many leaders, including Fitz-Alan, Bardolf, 

 Percy, Bohun,' and Robert Brus, John Comyn and John Balliol who 

 were in command of the Scottish contingent, surrendered.^ The King of 

 the Romans, with his young son Edward, fled to a windmill, where he 

 was captured by a young squire or knight, whom Robert of Gloucester 

 calls Sir John de Befs.^ This rather ignominious downfall of the 

 avaricious and magnificent King was a subject of great delight to the 

 people and political ballad-mongers of the time, whose mockery must 

 have been very trying to the ' ever august ' Richard. 



The defeat of the left wing, and the absence of the right wing in 

 its rash pursuit of the Londoners, left the centre, under King Henry, to 

 bear the full weight of the attack by the concentrated forces of the 

 barons. The fighting was desperate, Henry himself being in the thick 

 of it and having two horses killed under him, besides being wounded 

 severely ; but here too at length the royal forces had to give way.* 

 Their natural goal would have been the castle, but the barons seem to 

 have worked round to the north and secured the Westgate, thus forcing 

 them to seek refuge in the priory, whose great precinct wall constituted 

 a formidable defence. 



Thus, when Prince Edward and his comrades reached the town the 

 castle, to which they first turned, and the priory, to which the Prince 

 afterwards forced his way, were the only points not in the enemy's 

 hands. Seeing the desperate state of affairs a large number of the 

 royalist leaders, including the King's brothers,. William de Valence and 

 Guy de Lusignan, the Earl of Warenne and Hugh Bigot fled through 

 the town and across the bridge over the Ouse, where many of the 

 fugitives were drowned, to Pevensey castle and thence to France.^ 

 Their flight was dishonourable, but they could have done nothing to 

 retrieve the day had they remained, and they were able to do much for 



• Gerv, of Canterbury (Rolls Ser.), ii. 238. 2 Blaauw, op. cit. 198. 



3 Ibid. 203. * Ibid. 198. 6 Ibid. 205. 



499 



