[796] R. Diceto as above, p. 382. _Gesta Hen._ as above. Rob. Torigni, a. 1174. [797] Will. Newb., l. ii. c. 35 (Howlett, vol. i. p. 189), says he stayed in London in order to be bled. In the middle of the night of July 17 a courier from the north came knocking wildly for admittance at the palace-gate. The porters remonstrated with him in vain; he bore, he said, good news which the king must hear that very night. He hurried to the door of the king’s chamber, and, despite the expostulations of the chamberlains, made his way to the bedside and woke the king from his sleep. “Who art thou?” demanded Henry. “A servant of your faithful Ralf de Glanville, and the bearer of good tidings from him to you.” “Is he well?” “He is well; and lo! he holds your enemy the king of Scots in chains at Richmond castle.” Not till he had seen Ralf’s own letters could Henry believe the tidings; then he burst into thanksgivings for the crowning triumph which had come to him, as he now learned, almost at the moment when his voluntary humiliation at Canterbury was completed.[798] The garrison of Carlisle had pledged themselves to surrender to the Scot king at Michaelmas if not previously relieved. In the interval William laid siege to Odelin de Umfraville’s castle of Prudhoe on the Tyne.[799] Here he was rejoined by Roger de Mowbray, who came to intreat the Scot king’s aid in the recovery of his lost castles.[800] Meanwhile, however, the king’s return had apparently brought with it the return of the sheriff of Yorkshire, Robert de Stuteville. Under his leadership and that of his son William the whole military forces of the shire, with those of William de Vesci, Ralf de Glanville, Bernard de Balliol and Odelin de Umfraville, and Archbishop Roger’s men under his constable Ralf de Tilly, gathered and marched northward to oppose the Scots.[801] They reached Newcastle on July 12[802]--the day of Henry’s penitential entry into Canterbury--but only to find that on the rumour of their approach William the Lion had retired from Prudhoe, and was gone to besiege Alnwick with his own picked followers, while the bulk of his host, under the earls of Fife and Angus and the English traitor Richard de Morville, dispersed over all Northumberland to burn, plunder and slay in the old barbarous Scottish fashion which seems hardly to have softened since the days of Malcolm Canmore.[803] The English leaders now held a council of war. Their forces consisted only of a few hundred knights, all wearied and spent with their long and hurried march, in which the foot had been unable to keep up with them at all. The more cautious argued that enough had been done in driving back the Scots thus far, and that it would be madness for a band of four hundred men to advance against a host of eighty thousand. Bolder spirits, however, urged that the justice of their cause must suffice to prevail against any odds; and it was decided to continue the march to Alnwick.