Hotspur, along with the magnanimous and martial Douglas, marched the troops towards Shrewsbury, where it was intended to join the forces of the Welsh under Glendower. The king, aware of the importance of celerity, hurried down to Shrewsbury before the arrival of Hotspur, whose design was to reach here first. Glendower had not brought his army up, but Hotspur nevertheless resolved to make a stand. He had a force of 14,000 carefully selected soldiers. He had, too, the advantage of choice of ground. The animosity had reached its height on both sides. A general engagement was inevitable. It was brought to a head by the impatience of Percy on the one side, and by the policy of the king on the other, the king believing that without the aid of Glendower the defeat of Percy was secure. On the evening previous to battle Percy sent to Henry a manifesto in which he renounced his allegiance, set the sovereign at defiance, enumerated the grievances of which the nation had abundant reason to complain. He upbraided him with perjury, with infidelity to the late monarch, with aiding the murder of that prince, with usurping the title of the house of Mortimer, with adopting the most crooked and cruel policy, with burdening the nation with unrighteous taxes, and with corrupting the Parliamentary elections. This added fuel to the flame. This intensified the quarrel between them. _These things indeed you have articulated_, _Proclaimed at market-crosses_, _read in churches_, _To face the garment of rebellion_ _With some fine colour that may please the eye_ _Of fickle changelings and poor discontents_, _Which gape and rub the elbow at the news_ _Of hurly-burly innovations_.