is small safety in death-bed repentance. It is too late now to do,
through fear of the devil, what we omitted to do through zeal for the
Church. The sole question is, 'Fight or make terms.' Ye say we lack
men; verily, yes, while no leaders are found! Walworth, my
predecessor, saved London from Wat Tyler. Men were wanting then till
the mayor and his fellow-citizens marched forth to Mile End. It may
be the same now. Agree to fight, and we'll try it. What say you,
Nicholas Alwyn?--you know the temper of our young men."

Thus called upon, Alwyn rose, and such was the good name he had
already acquired, that every murmur hushed into eager silence.

"My lord mayor," he said, "there is a proverb in my country which
says, 'Fish swim best that's bred in the sea;' which means, I take it,
that men do best what they are trained for! Lord Warwick and his men
are trained for fighting. Few of the fish about London Bridge are
bred in that sea. Cry, 'London to the rescue!'--put on hauberk and
helm, and you will have crowns enough to crack around you. What
follows?--Master Stokton hath said it: pillage and rape for the city,
gibbet and cord for mayor and aldermen. Do I say this, loving the
House of Lancaster? No; as Heaven shall judge me, I think that the
policy King Edward hath chosen, and which costs him his crown to-day,
ought to make the House of York dear to burgess and trader. He hath
sought to break up the iron rule of the great barons,--and never peace
to England till that be done. He has failed; but for a day. He has
yielded for a time; so must we. 'There's a time to squint, and a time
to look even.' I advise that we march out to the earl, that we make
honourable terms for the city, that we take advantage of one faction
to gain what we have not gained with the other; that we fight for our
profit, not with swords, where we shall be worsted, but in council and