to stop letters from abroad, prejudicial either to the king or the kingdom, as also any suspicious persons (Rymer, Fœd. 2, 610. Parl. Writs, 2, 428). October 12th, the king authorised Peter de Worldham and Stephen Power[1] to remove, with the sanction of the bishop of Chichester, all alien monks from the coast to places more inland ; and October 1 5th, Edmund de Passele was appointed to overlook the goods of foreigners in Surrey, Sussex, and Kent. (Close Rolls).
The king, however, had not renounced his voyage to Gascony, and in November he ordered his ships to be victualled, and commissioned Robert de Echingham, and Robert de Bavent to be ready with their forces to embark within seven days after Candlemas, "as he had arranged to go, by the aid of God, next summer season, (a procheine saison d'este personelment) (Pat. Rot. 18o Edw. II, p. 1 . m. 1 . 3.)
In the following: year 1326, there was an increasing alarm of invasion, both from the French, and from the open intrigues of Queen Isabella, who was gathering forces abroad to dethrone her husband. On August 10th, an order was given to establish beacons of fire along the southern coast in order to assemble the inhabitants in case of emergency—(signum de igne vel alia re competenti quod a longe videri posset — quod homines vicinarum partium trahere se possent ad ignem, vel ad signum de nocte si opus foret). (Rym. Fœd. t. 2, p. 610.)
In vain did the king now send out his complaints from Porchester (Sept. 2d) against the French king for detaining his son "whom he had lately sent to him in the confidence of love," and for encouraging his queen with her armed rebels. In vain he ordered ships of 30 tons to assemble speedily at Orwell in Suffolk, as well as a general levy of his liegemen, commanding Sussex to contribute to it 200 men, with their haketons and basinets (cum aketonibus et bacinettis), and 500 archers. (Rot. Pat. Edw. II, 20o p. 1, m. 18.)
The queen, however, in spite of these precautions, landed in Suffolk on September 22d, and although the king, on September 26th, issued strict orders to arrest all Frenchmen (Gallos), yet having neither capacity nor energy sufficient to compete with the daring profligacy of his queen, his ruin and death soon followed.
- ↑ See Lists of these possessions in Sussex Addl. MSS., 6164, 6165.
