Then he went down to the coast and prepared to embark. Putting great faith in the continued support of the people, he addressed to them an eloquent plea for loyalty to the crown as against the barons. He spoke of the exactions of money to which they had been subjected, and declared that, severe as was the pain which had been inflicted upon the people, equally great was his own distress; that the money had been spent for “le commun profit du reaume, pur son pople honyr et destruyre.”[173] The barons, on the other hand, immediately came forward with a list of grievances which they presented to the king, complaining, amongst other things, of the aids, tallages, and prises which the king had lately levied. So afflicted were they with “divers tallages, aids, and prises,” such as those upon corn, oats, malt, wool, hides, oxen, kine, and salt meat, that it would have been impossible for them to equip for any foreign expedition. More than that, they could make no grant of an aid, because of their great poverty following the exaction of the aforesaid tallages and prises; indeed, there were “many who had no sustenance, and who could not till their lands.” The tax on wool was much too heavy, no less than 40_s._ on the sack; wool comprised half the wealth of the nation, and the tax was equivalent to a fifth part of the value of the whole land. Magna Carta and the Charter of the Forest were both disregarded, and many acts were done in defiance of them.[174] [Edward embarks for Flanders] Edward did not return a definite answer; the call to war sounded too loudly. Before he embarked he issued orders for the collection of a third of clerical temporalities in a most peremptory manner; on the 10th August the clergy had expressed hopes of being able to gain the Pope’s permission to disregard the provisions of “Clericis laicos,” but of late they had showed a disposition to stand with the baronage. Finally, on the 22d August, Edward succeeded in getting up sail and made for Flanders. But he could not escape the issue. Almost before England had sunk below his horizon Bohun and Bigod were at the Exchequer loudly protesting against the collection of the aid which had been irregularly granted to Edward five weeks previously. They went to the extreme of forbidding the Barons of the Exchequer to proceed with their work of taking the tax until Edward should make formal confirmation of the Charters.[175] The Londoners forgot their loyalty to the king, and swore by the earls. The young Prince Edward, afterward king, whom Edward had left as his regent, tried to throw a dam across the swelling river by promising that the eighth should not be taken into precedent.[176] This was published in proclamation on the 28th August, but it availed nothing. The fifth which had been asserted as owing from the cities and boroughs was lost sight of.