King and barons alike knew that the “peace” had been made only to be broken. The barons were the first to break it. Some of those “Northerners” from beyond the Humber by whom the strife had been originally begun had actually left Runnimead in the middle of the conference, and were now openly preparing for war, on the pretext that they “had not been present” at the settlement.[1064] Their southern allies were really doing the same; only they veiled their preparations under the guise of a tournament to be held, ostensibly in celebration of the peace, at Stamford on July 6. Robert Fitz-Walter and his companions, however, quickly discovered that if they wished to keep their hold upon London they must not venture far away from the city; they therefore postponed the tournament for a week, and transferred it from Stamford to Staines. The victor’s prize was to be “a bear, which a lady was going to send.”[1065] Meanwhile the new sheriffs--appointed since the peace, and specially charged to enforce its provisions--were meeting with a very rough reception in every shire where the “Northern” influence predominated. All over the country the barons were fortifying their castles; some were even building new ones.[1066] A more scrupulous king than John might well have deemed himself justified, under such circumstances, in doing what John did--following their example in preparing to fling the treaty to the winds and renew the war. The meeting which had been appointed for July 15 was postponed till the 16th, and the place for it changed from Westminster to Oxford. On the 15th the king came up from Clarendon into Berkshire, and on his way from Newbury to Abingdon despatched a letter to the barons stating that he “could not” meet them in person at Oxford on the morrow, but that the archbishop of Dublin, the bishop of Winchester, Pandulf, the earls Marshal, Warren, and Arundel, and the justiciar, would be there in his stead, “to do to you what we ought to do to you, and to receive from you what you ought to do to us.”[1067] The archbishop of Dublin was no longer justiciar in Ireland; Geoffrey Marsh had been, on July 6, appointed to succeed him in that office.[1068] On the same day Walter de Lacy had been reinstated in all his Irish lands.[1069] Throughout the summer of this year John, busy as he was with English affairs, had found time to pay even more attention than usual to those of his Irish dominion. From May to July the Close and Charter Rolls are full of letters and writs relating to the Irish March; charters to towns, to religious houses, to individual barons, orders concerning military arrangements and other matters of local administration,[1070] all show such constant intervention and such personal interest on the king’s part as to convey an impression that he was specially endeavouring to win for himself the support of the nobles, clergy and people of the Irish March as a counterpoise to the hostility and disaffection which