The abashed clerks obeyed that voice, and retired to their various domiciles; but before three days had passed, Oxford had lost hundreds of her scholars and a considerable number of masters also. An exodus like this not unfrequently followed upon an outbreak of ill-will betwixt "town and gown."
Afraid of what the King's verdict might be, and perhaps with a view to greater liberty upon the outbreak of war, scholars and masters alike vacated their quarters, and made their way to Northampton, where fugitives both from Oxford and Cambridge often assembled, and where there was talk of establishing a third University.
And so ended the "great riot of 1264."
CHAPTER XXI.
KING AND STUDENTS.
Oxford was all in a ferment. The ordinary life of the University was suspended. Lecture-rooms were deserted alike by masters and scholars, and these were to be seen standing in knots about the streets, talking, gesticulating, arguing—excitement written on every face, and generally wrath and scorn as well. In other quarters clerks were to be seen issuing forth from their lodgings with their worldly goods strapped upon their backs, calling out farewells to their friends, and marching away towards the city gates, generally in parties of six or eight, and singing songs in praise of De Montfort or in despite of the King, but betraying beneath their jauntiness of outward mien an inward secret wrath.
The citizens, too, looked anxious and perturbed, and there was a prevailing unrest throughout the town. The wealthier scholars might be seen talking earnestly together, looking to their arms and accoutrements, and comparing notes as to their horses. It was plain that something very unusual was afoot, and that, too, of a nature disquieting to all.
In point of fact, the King had sent a decree ordering all the students of Oxford to depart to their own homes. The Chancellor had reported to his Majesty on the subject of the recent riot, and it was supposed by a great number of the students that this decree was made as a sort of punishment for their unruly behaviour. But there was another and more personal motive as well.
The King had just summoned a Parliament to Oxford, and it was generally shrewdly supposed that this Parliament would practically annul those famous Provisions of Oxford which had, during the past six years, been the war-cry of the Barons' party. Now the temper of the city was known to be easily aroused, and Oxford was almost unanimous in its support of the cause of the Barons. It would be a bold act on the part of the King to trust himself within the city walls had he come as the confessed foe of De Montfort—at least if the members of the University were assembled there in force; so to get rid of them by some plausible expedient was a wily and politic move.