Page:History of England (Froude) Vol 4.djvu/446

426 On the 2nd of July the insurgent army, for so it might now be called, appeared in force before Exeter. Elsewhere the rising was exclusively among the small farmers and the peasantry. In the west, where the religious grounds of discontent were stronger than the social, it had affected a higher grade, and Sir Thomas Pomeroy, and Sir Humfrey Arundel, Coffin of the north of Devon, and other men of weight and property, were among the leaders of an organized force twenty thousand strong, which, armed, disciplined, and provided with cannon, were collected under the banner of the cross. After taking possession of Exeter, they intended to march on towards London, raising the country as they went; and when they summoned the inhabitants to surrender, they expected immediate compliance and co-operation. In the city two violent factions, a Catholic and a Protestant, were divided by a large middle party, who, though conservative in religion, were loyal to law and order—who had no love for religious changes, but had less for treason and insurrection. In their names, and with their support, in spite of a demonstration from the Catholics, Blackball the mayor kept his promise to Carew. The gates were barred and barricaded; the tradesmen were turned into a garrison. If the rebels desired to enter Exeter, they were told that they must find their own road into it.

Insurrections, to be successful, must be rapid. Had Arundel left Exeter to its fate, and gone forward, there was no force between him and London which he could not have overwhelmed; but a few days, he supposed,