The joy of the cardinal and his friends was unbounded. They congratulated each other, they clapped their hands;[252] the game was won. They made promises one to another of diligent service, discretion, and fidelity. They encountered however some few difficulties. The king required before all else an invasion, and he wanted to be able to say to the nobles, ‘Where you fell back I advanced and have conquered.’ How proceed so as to insure success in the enterprise? They resolved to select as the battle-field not the east, in the direction of Berwick, where the forces of Henry VIII. lay, but the northwestern quarter, which was stripped, left without an army, almost without a garrison. Carlisle would presently be taken, and James would triumph at the same time over the nobles and the king of England. He attached the utmost importance to this deed of arms. The royal banner was secretly brought out, letters were addressed to the men selected by the priests, inviting them to meet the king on such a day, at such a place. The bishops undertook to bear the expenses of this affair. The cardinal and the earl of Arran, by way of diversion, went eastward, as if the Scots purposed to pass the frontier in that quarter, where frequent combats had taken place between them and the English. The king, satisfied with all these preparations, and entertaining no doubt of success, accepted the fatal list presented by the cardinal and put it into his pocket. Immediately after his triumph and in the very midst of his glory, all those suspected should be seized and executed. The Reformation should be extinguished, and Rome should definitively reign. Everything was to be done with the strictest secrecy. On the night before the day appointed for setting out, James slept at Lochmaben,[253] where stood one of the royal castles. There, without incurring any danger, he was as near as possible to the scene of the exploits all the honor of which he wished to reap. Troops arrive from all sides, without any knowledge of what was wanted with them. On the day fixed, at midnight, the trumpets sound, the companies are formed, and the command is given to march forward ‘in the suite of the king,’ who was supposed to be with the expedition. At daybreak begins the campaign which is to deliver up Scotland into the cruel hands of the cardinal. The Scots approach the territory of England and pass the water without meeting any resistance. They set fire to the houses and corn fields which lie on their way, and the poor dwellers in those country places, starting out of their sleep, see before them to their great amazement an army of ten thousand men, and flames shooting up on all sides. They tremble with fright and resign themselves to despair, wondering in themselves how such an army could possibly have advanced so far without their having the faintest suspicion of it. Whence comes it? Whither is it going? Is it come from the abyss of hell? [Sidenote: ROUT OF THE SCOTS.]