The Prince knew all this as well as any man in the kingdom. He had remonstrated with his feeble father times without number. He had sworn to the Provisions of Oxford, and had refused to cancel his oath even when the King repudiated his own, and had bribed the Roman Pontiff to grant him absolution therefrom. The Prince was the true friend to his country, and when he should sit upon the throne all would be well. Meantime the most true and loyal servants of the King were those who sought the true welfare of the realm, and would withhold him from spoliation at the hands of foreign hirelings. Then holding his head very high, De Montfort spoke of the taunt sometimes levelled at himself of being a foreigner. He admitted freely his foreign birth, and pointed out how he had been the first to deliver up his castles of Kenilworth and Odiham after the Provisions of Oxford had been agreed upon. He had even retired altogether to Gascony after a stormy quarrel with the Earl of Gloucester; and were it for the good of the realm, whose welfare he had so deeply at heart, he would return thither willingly, and never again set foot on these shores. But over and over again he had discovered that he was necessary to the welfare of the party. At this moment he had been summoned across the seas to help in their deliberations. No one had the true welfare of the English nation more at heart than he; and alien though he might be by birth, he loved the land of his adoption with a changeless and passionate love, and would live for her or die for her whichever might be for her good. He had put his hand to the plough; he had pledged his honour and his reputation to save her from papal thraldom and the spoliation of self-seeking men; she should have her Great Charter, for which men had bled and died before, or he himself would leave his dead body upon a blood-stained battlefield! Roars of applause followed this masterly speech, spoken with all that charm of manner and lofty dignity of which De Montfort was master. Not one word did the great Earl speak of the personal wrongs inflicted upon him by the capricious monarch. Every one present knew how greatly he had suffered from the injustice of Henry--how he had spent money like water in his service in Gascony, only to be reviled and abused upon his return by a master who gave greedy and credulous heed to every word spoken against one whom he ofttimes feared and hated. True, there were moments when the old affection would break forth, when the love for his sister was in the ascendant, and a temporary peace was patched up. But far more often was the Earl the butt for the King's injustice and extortion, and the troubles over the payment of the Countess's dowry added to the chronic friction between them.