CHAPTER XV.
And yet he thinks,--ha, ha, ha, ha,--he thinks I am the tool and servant of his will.
Well, let it be; through all the maze of trouble His plots and base oppression must create, I'll shape myself a way to higher things, And who will say 'tis wrong?
-- Basil, a Tragedy No spider ever took more pains to repair the shattered meshes of his web, than did Waldemar Fitzurse to reunite and combine the scattered members of Prince John's cabal.

Few of these were attached to him from inclination, and none from personal regard.

It was therefore necessary, that Fitzurse should open to them new prospects of advantage, and remind them of those which they at present enjoyed.

To the young and wild nobles, he held out the prospect of unpunished license and uncontrolled revelry; to the ambitious, that of power, and to the covetous, that of increased wealth and extended domains.

The leaders of the mercenaries received a donation in gold; an argument the most persuasive to their minds, and without which all others would have proved in vain.