It was on this occasion that Henry was made fully aware of the spirit which now actuated his young nobles; and the result was another civil war, and another siege of the Castle of Rochester by Simon de Montfort. The Castle at that time was held by Earl Warren for the King; and on Montfort’s arrival on the west bank of the Medway, opposite the fortress, he found an army strongly posted, and ready to dispute with him the passage of the bridge. He determined, nevertheless, to try the fortune of war. He condensed his strength, and, having sent Gilbert de Clare to attack the town on the south, so as to draw off part of the enemy’s force and divert his attention from the design in progress, he then ordered vessels to be filled with combustibles, and setting fire to them, sent them adrift on the stream, which, running strong at this point, bore them immediately down against the wooden bridge which then crossed the river. The bridge having caught fire, the smoke and flames which issued from the timber arches drove the enemy from their position in the centre of the bridge, where they had charge of a tower, with a drawbridge which cut off all communication with the opposite side. During the obscurity and confusion which this stratagem occasioned, Montfort, seizing the favourable instant, passed the river in boats, and commenced his attack upon the outposts with such resolution and success that he entered the city in the evening of Good Friday--spoiled the Church, and vigorously attacked the Castle. Warren and his gallant supporters, however, defended the citadel with such courage and determination that, after a siege of seven days and nights, Leicester had only captured some of the outworks. Yet owing to the state of the Castle at that time, it is very probable that had the siege been continued only a short time longer, it must have fallen into his hands. But the great cause in which he had embarked demanding his presence in London, which was threatened with a hostile visitation from the king, he drew off the main body of his army to defend the capital, and thus the Castle of Rochester was spared the disgrace of another surrender. Shortly after this, Montfort, as Earl of Leicester, fought the battle of Lewes, where, as already described in a former part of this work, he gained a victory which richly compensated for the sudden retreat from the Castle of Rochester. Subsequently to this period, the Castle of Count Odo--as this fortress is sometimes called--continued to be held by successive constables, men of high military standing in the country. But from the above period downwards it has not been the scene of any remarkable event, and consequently its history is little more than an enumeration of its castellans and the local incidents and irritations with which their caprice or authority diversified the not always “even tenor” of their sway[125].