The barons, who had assembled with the view of compelling the king to grant this charter, collected part of their forces in London; and whilst they remained there, imitated the king’s conduct, and broke into the residences of the Jews, and pillaged them of whatever valuables they could find; and then, pulling down the houses, carried the stones of which they were built, and used them for the purpose of repairing the walls of the city. About two hundred and sixty years ago, when Ludgate was rebuilt and enlarged, a very large stone was discovered, with the following Hebrew inscription――מצב ר׳ משה בן הרב ר׳ יצחק ח׳ ו׳――“The tombstone of Rabbi Moses, the son of the Rabbi Isaac the wise and learned.”¹ ¹ The absurd criticism of Dr. Tovey on the above epitaph has been already refuted by Dr. Jost. See _Geschichte der Israeliten_, vol. vii., p. 405. There were some, however, in this reign who were interested in the spiritual welfare of the poor persecuted Jews. The king himself was indeed an infidel,¹ and cared for no religion, and loved no God but the god of money, and therefore cared for nothing but the treasure of the Jews. There was, however, a prior, Richard by name, of Bermondsey, who, A.D. 1213, built a house for the reception of Christian Jews, and called the building “The Hospital of Converts.” The prior did it in honour to St. Thomas.² ¹ See Appendix K. ² It appears that there was an institution of that kind much earlier in the city of Oxford. See Wood’s History of the University of Oxford. The last act of King John towards the Jews was to employ them in a barbarous deed, to execute which he could not compel any of his Christian subjects. Having taken prisoners a great part of the Scotch army at Berwick, who assisted the barons, he determined to inflict such a variety of cruel and inhuman tortures upon them, that he could find none except the Jews whose obedience he was able to command. The Jews in the neighbourhood were, therefore, reluctantly obliged to become their executioners. It is not to be supposed that the Jews lamented much his decease, since even a modern Jew can yet exclaim, at the mention of his name, “Thank God that there was only one King John!”