Meanwhile, the barons in London had made no use of the reinforcements sent to them by Louis. They seem to have despaired of overcoming John by any means short of an invasion headed by Louis in person with the whole forces of the French kingdom at his back. Towards the close of the year Saher de Quincy and Robert Fitz-Walter went on another embassy to Philip and Louis, “urgently imploring the father that he would send his son to reign in England, and the son that he would come thither to be crowned.” How or by whom he was to be crowned, when the only prelate competent to perform the rite was in exile and under suspension, and the rival sovereign was under the direct protection of the Pope, they did not explain. Philip refused to entertain their proposals without further security, and demanded “twenty-four hostages at least, of the noblest of the whole land.” The hostages were sent under the charge of the earls of Gloucester and Hereford. When they arrived, Louis began to prepare eagerly for his expedition; but there were still weighty reasons why, as an English chronicler says, “he himself could not hastily set out to undertake so arduous a matter.” So, “to raise the hopes of the barons and try their fidelity,”[1147] he sent his marshal and some others of his vassals with a second contingent, some three hundred knights and cross-bowmen and a proportionate number of foot soldiers, all of whom, together with the English earls, sailed up the Thames and arrived in London just after Epiphany 1216 {_c._ Jan. 8}; he himself promising on oath that he would be at the coast, ready to cross, “with a great multitude of people,” at latest on the octave of S. Hilary, January 20.[1148]