raze the City to the ground.” He ordered the Mayor, the Sheriffs, the Aldermen, and four-and-twenty principal men of the City to attend him to Nottingham there to answer for these grievous disorders. It was very soon discovered that the King meant mischief. The citizens threw themselves upon his mercy as the shortest and perhaps the cheapest way out of the quarrel. He committed the Mayor to prison at Windsor, and the Sheriffs to Odysham and Wallingford. He then appointed a commission under the Great Seal—his uncles the Dukes of York and Gloucester being the Commissioners—to inquire into the misgovernment of the City. The prisoners had to pay a fine of 1000 marks for the first offence, whatever that was, of which they were convicted; 2000 marks for the second; and in the third the Liberties of the City were seized by the King, contrary to the Charters. The Mayor was degraded, the Sheriffs and Aldermen deposed and others appointed in their place, and a Custos was given to the City—Sir Edward Dalyngrigge. Richard then summoned the Aldermen to Windsor and imposed a fine of £100,000 upon the City. But it does not appear that he meant it to be paid, for in the following month he announced his intention of riding through the City. Then the citizens humbled themselves and made a very expensive effort to win back the King’s favour. They prepared a most magnificent reception for him. First, at St. George’s Church, Southwark, he was met by the Bishop of London, all the clergy, and five hundred choristers in surplices: at London Bridge he was presented with a splendid charger richly clad in cloth of gold, and to the Queen was given a stately white pad with rich furniture: the streets through which he passed were lined with the City Companies in order: the conduits ran wine: and the people shouted. At the Standard in Cheapside stood a boy in white raiment, representing an angel, who presented the King a crown of gold and the Queen with another: he also offered wine from a golden cup. Then the Mayor and the City Fathers rode with the King to Westminster. The next day, to complete this show of loyalty, they sent the King two silver gilt basins in each of which lay a thousand nobles of gold: and a picture of the Trinity said to have been valued at eight hundred pounds—one cannot believe there was then any picture in the world valued at so much. The King remitted the fine of £100,000 and restored the Charters. The citizens on receiving back their Charters proceeded to institute certain reforms. They resolved that their Aldermen should be elected for life, and not year by year: a measure which diminished the factious quarrels over the elections. They also divided the Ward of Farringdon into two.