Charles then marched away to Nottingham, where he raised his standard on the 25th of August, according to Clarendon; on the 22nd, according to Rushworth. It was a most tempestuous time; the standard, which was raised on the castle-hill, an elevated and exposed place, was blown down in the night, an ominous occurrence in the opinion of both soldiers and people, and it was three days before it could be erected again, owing to the fierceness of the wind. Besides the prostration of the standard, the condition of the king's affairs was equally discouraging. The people showed no enthusiasm in flocking to the royal banner, the arms and ammunition did not arrive from York, and the royal arms had received a severe repulse at Coventry. News came that the Earl of Essex was at the head of fifteen thousand men at Northampton, and the Earl of Southampton and his other officers entreated the king to make overtures of peace to the Parliament, telling him that if they refused them, it would turn the tide of popular favour against them. At first Charles listened to such counsels with anger, but at length despatched Sir John Colepepper to London to treat. But the Parliament would not hear of any accommodation till the king had pulled down his standard, and withdrawn his proclamations of high treason against the Earl of Essex, the accused Members of Parliament, and all who had supported them. In fact, all attempts at agreement were become useless, and were rendered more so by the conduct of Charles's nephew, Prince Rupert, who, with his younger brother Maurice, sons of Charles's sister, Elizabeth of Bohemia, had arrived in England, and were placed at the head of the royal cavalry. Whilst Colepepper was trying to effect a peace in London, Rupert, with that rashness which afterwards grew so notorious, and so fatal to Charles's army, was making war through the midland counties, insulting all who advocated peace, ordering rather than inviting men to the king's standard, and plundering towns and villages at will for the supply of his troopers.