horses, and surrendered on 30 November.⁴⁹  The siege is said to have cost John 55,000 marks,⁵⁰ and in his first fury at their long resistance he threatened to hang every man in the place, but was persuaded by one of his followers to take milder measures. About the same time Tonbridge, the stronghold of the Clares, was captured,⁵¹ and John withdrew to Windsor.
   In the spring of 1216 the barons offered the crown to the Dauphin Louis, and John kept moving between Sandwich, Dover, Folkestone and Romney on the watch for the expected French invasion. But his fleet was scattered by a gale,⁵²  and when Louis landed at Stonor on 21 May he retired to Winchester, leaving Hubert de Burgh to hold Dover.⁵³  Louis at once advanced to Canterbury; Rochester Castle opened its gates to him on 30 May, and he proceeded to London. Then he returned to blockade Dover Castle, and spent fifteen weeks bombarding the place with engines brought over from France,⁵⁴  receiving during this time a visit from Alexander, king of Scotland, who came to do him homage.⁵⁵  De Burgh agreed to surrender if no help came from John; ⁵⁶ but the king’s death, 19 October, changed the face of affairs, and in Kent the tide at once turned strongly in favour of the boy king Henry. Hubert refused to surrender the castle, as it was the key of England, and Louis at last raised the siege and withdrew to London.⁵⁷  The Cinque Ports harassed Louis’ shipping.
   After a short truce spent in France, Louis returned to England with reinforcements on 22 April 1217, bent on a speedy capture of the royal castles. He intended to land at Dover, but as he approached the shore Wilkin of the Weald, and Oliver, a bastard son of King John, burnt the huts of the French who still beset the castle and, afraid to land in face of these foes, he disembarked at Sandwich, proceeding next day by land to Dover.⁵⁸  Here he concluded a short truce with Hubert de Burgh, and hurried off to the relief of the castle held for him at Winchester. The news that Hubert had broken the truce brought him back to blockade Dover once more. But he abandoned the siege as hopeless after the fall of Lincoln, and retired to London.
   The final blow to his hopes was dealt by a small English fleet which set sail from Dover under Hubert de Burgh, and fell boldly on the reinforcements crossing to him under Eustace the Monk,⁵⁹  a renegade clerk turned pirate, well known in the Channel. The skill of the mariners of the Cinque Ports turned the day against the larger forces of their opponents, and the fleet of Eustace was utterly destroyed.⁶⁰  He himself was beheaded, and his head displayed on a pole through the streets of Canterbury.
   After this defeat, by which the English won complete control of the narrow seas, Louis began negotiations, and on 11 September 1217 a treaty was signed.
   ⁴⁹  Roger of Wendover, Flores Hist. (Rolls Ser.), ii, 148-151.
   ⁵⁰ Matth. Paris, Chron. Majora (Rolls Ser.), ii, 626.
   ⁵¹ 28 November; Roger of Wendover, op. cit. ii, 163.      ⁵² Ralph of Coggeshall, op. cit. 181.
   ⁵³ Roger of Wendover, op. cit. ii, 180; Roger says that John distrusted his foreign mercenaries. 
   ⁵⁴  Ibid. op. cit. ii, 191.       ⁵⁵  Ralph of Coggeshall, op. cit. 183.         ⁵⁶  Ibid. 182.
   ⁵⁷  Roger of Wendover, op. cit. ii, 199.
   ⁵⁸  Ann. Mon. (Rolls. Ser.), iii, 45-51. Wilkin has been identified with William de Casingeham, who was granted the seven hundreds of the Weald in 1216 (Cal. Pat. 1216-20  p. 56).
   ⁵⁹  Ibid. This fleet was making for the mouth of the Thames; William Marshal and Hubert de Burgh held Sandwich, and it was considered hopeless to attempt to effect a landing in Kent.
   ⁶⁰ Ibid. Roger of Wendover, op. cit.  221-2.