"I thank you, my friends," said the Prince, as the cheers died away. "And now, having done me thus much honour, I will ask you to have patience whilst I speak a few more words. It is said by some, it is feared by more, that ere the kingdom sees peace and stability once again, the sword will be unsheathed, and Englishman will meet Englishman upon a field of battle. I pray God that this may not be. War with a foreign foe is a glorious thing, provided the cause be just; with those of our own race and name it is a horror and a disgrace! But such things have been before, and they may be again. I stand before you this day, whilst the realm is still at peace and before that peace has been broken, to say a thing in your ears from which I shall not go back when the day for action comes. You know that I love liberty and hate oppression. You know that I honour and respect the men of the realm who have made so bold a stand for liberty. I have been one with them--I have their cause at heart still. But listen again. I am the King's son. He is my father; I owe him filial love and obedience. If his subjects take up arms against him, thus breaking their oath of allegiance, I, his son, repudiate my own oath sworn at Oxford, and I fly to his side to help him with all the power that I have. At such a moment as that, if it come (which God forbid), it could not be that I should stand by an idle spectator. I must and I will join myself to one side or the other; and here I tell all ye assembled that no power on earth shall induce me to take up arms against my father and my King. The moment danger of personal violence menaces him, I, his son, fly to his side, and in his cause I fight to the last drop of my blood!" The Prince stood perfectly still for several seconds after he had spoken these words, his head slightly thrown back, his eyes full of fire. Dead silence reigned in the hall. Not a man there but felt the power of the challenge thus thrown down, and a sense of reverence for the royal youth who had uttered it. But to many the words seemed those of evil omen, for these men were bound heart and soul to the cause of the Barons, and they had begun to count upon Prince Edward as their ally, and even to whisper sometimes between themselves as to the possibility of setting him upon the throne in his father's place. The minute after the Prince had spoken these words his face changed. A kindlier, softer look came into it, and turning towards his uncle and aunt with a courteous mien, he said in an altogether different tone,--