It was the last day of September--the festival of St. Keyne, a virgin princess of rare sanctity, who had, in the fifth century, for pious purposes, visited the Mount; and, on such an occasion, the monks were not likely to be in any very skeptical mood. Proud, in all probability, of their saint's reputation, and not doubting his power to inspire zeal, they opened their gates and admitted the pilgrims. No sooner were they admitted, however, than the scene changed. Each man, throwing aside his pilgrim's habit, stood before the astonished monks a warrior in mail, with a dagger in his girdle, a sword by his side, and in his eye the determination to use those weapons in the event of resistance. At the head of this band was a man of thirty or thereabouts, who announced that he was John De Vere, Earl of Oxford, and that he had come to take possession of St. Michael's Mount in the name of Lancaster. Between his escape from Barnet and his arrival at St. Michael's Mount the chief of the De Veres had passed through some remarkable adventures. When Oxford, bewildered by the consequences of his silver star being mistaken for Edward's sun, and thrown off his guard by the shouts of "Treason!" rode through the mist and fled from the field, he directed his course northward with the intention of seeking refuge in Scotland; but, after riding some distance, and taking time to reflect, the earl came to the conclusion that the journey was too long to be accomplished with safety, and, turning aside, he rode, in the company of Lord Beaumont, toward the Welsh Marches, with the hope of joining Jasper Tudor. Whether or not he reached Wales is not quite clear; but it appears from a letter written in April to his countess, Warwick's sister, that, after Queen Margaret had landed and her friends had resolved on another campaign, Oxford recovered the spirit he had displayed at Coventry, and indulged in the hope of a Lancastrian triumph. "Right reverend and worshipful lady," writes the earl to his countess, "I recommend me to you, letting you weet that I am in great heaviness at the making of this letter; but, thanked be God, I am escaped myself, and suddenly departed from my men; for I understand my chaplain would have betrayed me.... "Ye shall give credence to the bringer of this letter, and I beseech you to reward him to his costs; for I am not in power at the making of this letter to give him but as I was put in trust by favor of strange people. Also, ye shall send me, in all haste, all the ready money ye can make, and as many of my men as can come well horsed, and that they come in divers parcels. Also, that my best horses be sent with my steel saddles, and bid the yeoman of the horse cover them with leather.