Finding that Hubert de Burgh was proof against threats and promises, Louis became very irritable, and treated the Anglo-Norman barons with a disdainful indifference which sorely galled them, and at the same time gave much offence by bestowing the earldoms of Wiltshire and Surrey on the Count of Nevers, who was very avaricious and exceedingly unpopular. Jealousy was already at work in the camp before Dover, and many of the barons were beginning to think less unkindly of King John, and were inclined to return to their allegiance, when a story which was spread abroad gave them an excellent excuse for changing sides, and in the long run did better service to the royal cause than could have been rendered by a thousand knights.
While Louis was prosecuting the siege of Dover, the Viscount of Melun, who had remained in London, was attacked by a malady which his physicians assured him could not fail to end fatally; and, finding himself drawing near to the gates of death, he sent for Hugh de Moreville and others of the barons who were then in the capital, and, turning on his couch, he informed them that he had something on his conscience, of which he felt bound to relieve it before going to his account.
“Your fate,” continued the viscount, “grieves me, for you are doomed. Our lord Louis and sixteen of his comrades, on leaving France, bound themselves by an oath, as soon as the realm of England is conquered and he is crowned king, to banish for ever you who have joined his standard, as traitors, who are not to be trusted. Moreover, your whole offspring will be exterminated or beggared. Doubt not my words. I who lie here dying was one of the conspirators. Look to your safety.”
And, having given this warning, the Viscount of Melun lay back on his couch and died.
Naturally enough, this story, when it reached the camp at Dover, made a strong impression, and the barons regarded the movements of their foreign allies with grave suspicion, and communicated their thoughts to each other in whispers. But they had placed themselves in such a predicament that they knew not what steps to take. In fact, Louis had them under his thumb. He had made himself master of the whole South of England. In the West and in the North his power was great, supported in one quarter by the Prince of Wales and in the other by the King of Scots.
“We are like woodcocks caught in our springe,” said one.
“And ere long,” remarked others, “we may be dealt with as deer in a buckstall.”
“In truth,” observed Hugh de Moreville, “our lord Louis is a deceiver, and we are his dupes. But patience, and the tables will be turned, without our cause being lost. It is possible to dupe the deceiver. Meantime, let us use these Frenchmen while they believe they are using us. Patience, I say, and one day they will discover with amazement that the tables are turned. By St. Moden, I swear it!”
“Our friends are already beginning to fall away from our cause, as rats desert a falling house,” said the first speaker bitterly.
“It is true,” said De Moreville; and he sighed as he thought of Walter Merley.