The Commons having voted supplies, albeit small and inadequate for the king’s wants, James lost no time in asking the citizens for an advance on the amount of subsidy due from them. On the 27th March (1621) the lord treasurer wrote very urgently on the matter. "I pray you," he added by way of postscript, "make noe stickinge hereatt; you shall bee sure to bee paid att the tyme named."(261) If the citizens could not advance the whole sum at short notice, they were asked to give credit for the rest to the merchant whom Baron Dohna should appoint for transferring the money to the Palatinate by bills of exchange. It was all to no purpose. The mayor and aldermen were tired of the repeated calls upon their purse, and returned answer by word of mouth of the Common Sergeant and the Remembrancer that the City hoped rather to receive part of the money already lent than to "runne in further."(262) (M106) The failure of negotiations for a Spanish match, and the return of Prince Charles after his romantic expedition in 1623 without bringing the Infanta with him, was a source of great satisfaction both to the City and the nation. The following story of the day serves to illustrate the feeling prevalent at the time relative to the Spanish match. The bishop of London had given orders to the clergy, pursuant to instructions he had himself received from James, not to "prejudicate the prince’s journey by their prayers," but only to pray to God to bring him safely home again and no more. A clergyman, who must have been a bit of a wag (for it is difficult to explain his conduct otherwise), is said to have literally carried out his bishop’s orders, and to have prayed publicly "That God would return our noble prince home again to us and no more."(263) When it became known that the prince had arrived safely at Madrid, bonfires were lighted and bells rung; but the Londoners were but half-hearted in expressing their joy, and would probably have made no display had they not received orders from the lords of the council.(264) It was otherwise when the prince returned—and without the Infanta. As soon as news reached the mayor that Charles had arrived at Guildford he issued his precept (6 Oct.) for bells to be rung and bonfires to be lighted,(265) and right gladly were his orders carried out. "I have not heard of more demonstrations of public joy than were here and everywhere, from the highest to the lowest," wrote Chamberlain from London;(266) "such spreading of tables in the streets with all manner of provisions, setting out whole hogsheads of wine and butts of sack, but specially such numbers of bonfires, both here and all along as he [the prince] went, the marks whereof we found by the way two days afterwards, is almost incredible." (M107)