CHAPTER VII
THE CONSTANCY OF THE KING
The fifteen commissioners had left the King; Sir Harry Vane, perhaps the sincerest republican of all, had stayed behind a moment to entreat Charles—as Pym—as Cromwell—had entreated him—"to be sincere."
The King, grave, composed, courtly, had answered him as he had answered Pym and Cromwell—"In all these dealings I have been sincere."
And so they left him, and the wearisome yet desperate negotiations, which had been protracted from the middle of the September after Preston Rout to nearly the end of November, were over.
Charles had given way; he had consented to the temporary abolition of the bishops, for three years at least; the coalition of Royalist and Presbyterian was formed against Cromwell and the army; the treaty which made a third Civil War imminent was signed.
After the commissioners had departed, Lord Digby came to Charles, who still sat at the head of the table at which he had so often held his own in caustic argument and learned dispute on the subject of Episcopacy.
"Bring me," said the King, "a little wine."
Lord Digby, without calling a servant, served the King himself.
The winter twilight was falling; the sea fog drifting over the island thickened the sad atmosphere that filled the room in which the King sat. A private house at Newport had been for some weeks now his residence, and carried with it less state, but more semblance of freedom, than Carisbrooke Castle.
The King wore grey. Since his own servants had been taken from him he had grown more and more neglectful of his attire; there was nothing either fine or splendid in his garments, and he wore no jewels. His face showed a more cheerful expression than had been of late usual to him, and when he had drunk the alicant, a faint colour came into his cheeks and a sparkle to his eyes.
"Digby," he said, "I think I shall yet be able to undo these rogues, these traitors, these villains—but come, I must write to my Lord Ormonde, for I have had to publicly give orders that he is to do nothing in Ireland, and he may be misled."
To most these words, the first he had spoken since he had assured Sir Harry Vane of his sincerity, would have appeared indeed startling and ironical, but Lord Digby knew the whole of his master's tortuous intrigues. He was aware that from the moment the negotiations with the Parliament began, Charles had been planning to escape from the Isle of Wight, and join that portion of the navy which was now under the command of Rupert and the Prince of Wales, and thus make a descent on Ireland, where the incredible exertions of the Marquess of Ormonde kept alive a royalist party, and from there attempt another such invasion of England as had just ended so fatally at Preston Rout.
Such was the wild, vague, and desperate scheme which the King nursed in preference to returning triumphantly to London as the ally of the Parliament, and from there dealing with the army, now his open enemies.
But this, though it might seem the surest proof of his levity and falsity, was in reality the uttermost testimony he could give of his constancy to principles which he accounted Divine.
The price the Parliament asked was the sacrifice of Episcopacy, and that was what Charles would never consent to. Far preferable was the wild hazard, the desperate risk, the almost certain danger of trusting to Rupert and his lawless little fleet, or Ormonde and his inadequate forces, or Ireland and her uncertain loyalty, than keeping the pact with the Presbyterian, who refused the Divine form of Church government.
Now, almost before the commissioners had entered their coaches, he was hurriedly writing to Ormonde and to the Queen.
"Do not be astonished at any concession I may make," he wrote to the Marquess, "for it will come to nothing, and heed no public commands I may give, until you hear that I am free; but keep alive with all vigour the spirit of loyalty in Ireland."
To his wife he wrote—"The great concessions I have made to-day were merely in order to my escape."
When these hasty letters, in the writing of which the King seemed to relieve some of the feelings that he had had to contain in his bosom during the long hours of his conference with the representatives of Parliament, were finished and locked into the secret drawers of the King's desk, Lord Digby lit the candles and closed the shutters over the mournful, wet, misty night.
"I would, sir," he said, with a little shudder, "that we were well out of this cursed island."
Charles rose from the little desk; his eyes were brilliant, his mouth hardly set under the delicate moustaches.
"If I were once in Ireland," he said, "fortune would look differently on me."
He had always been so—always, under the most cruel mortification hopeful, trustful in some expedient. Ever since his overthrow he had trusted first in Rupert and Montrose, then in the foreign armies the Queen would raise, then in Hamilton, then in the divisions of his enemies, and now in Rupert and his elusive ships.
Lord Digby could not fail to see this incurable hopefulness of his master, nor to argue ill from it; but he was himself light-spirited and fantastical, and his remonstrances were few and faint.
Yet he hazarded one now.
"As the army is deadly disloyal and much raised up of late, and as the Parliament is your one sure refuge from it, sir, would it not be wiser to observe this treaty, at least for a while?"
"Never!" cried Charles fiercely. "Never will I yield! I have sworn that I will defend the Church of England and my rights—even unto death. I will not deal with these rebels save by the sword. The sword? Nay, the halter. I hope, Digby, that God will give me the day when I can see these rogues marched to Tyburn. Thou canst scarcely conceive," he added, with great intensity, "what a hatred I have for them—how my mortifications, my humiliations, my losses, all the loyal blood shed for me cry out for repayment! How I loathe them and their heretical opinions and their canting speech—how I detest them for mine own helplessness!"
He flung himself into the arm-chair beside the hearth, where a feeble fire burnt neglected.
"Hamilton's a prisoner," he said gloomily. "What will they do with my faithful lord? How many noble lives have I not to avenge?"
As he spoke he thought (as he thought often now, too often for his own peace) of Strafford, his first great, awful, and useless sacrifice.
"If it cost my heart's blood I will not submit," he muttered, biting his lip.
But Lord Digby would not so easily relinquish his point—that the Parliament was a surer refuge from the army than Rupert or Ormonde, or any possible ships or possible men either of these Cavaliers might be able to command.
"Fairfax," he reminded the King, "sent Ireton to the House with a remonstrance from the army, protesting against the Parliament dealing with Your Majesty, and even daring to say that you should be brought to trial."
"But the House," replied the King, with a grim smile, "refused to consider these demands of 'armed sectaries.'"
"But the army," persisted Lord Digby, "hath the power."
"I will be free of all of them," cried Charles passionately. "Of the army, of the Parliament, of all their cursed sects and heresies."
He lapsed into a melancholy silence again. My lord put another log on the fire and stirred the faint flames to a blaze.
"In the Queen's letter of this morning," said Charles suddenly, "she mentioned that loyal gentlewoman, Margaret Lucas—she hath fallen ill. When she had the news of the end of her brother, Sir Charles, she was as one who had received a death-sentence."
Tears moistened his own eyes. He was not usually very sensible of the sorrows of those who were ruined in his service, and gratitude was no part of his character or tradition; yet there was something in the story of the gallant young Lucas, who, after an heroic defence of Colchester, had surrendered on terms which bargained for quarter for the inferiors, but left the superiors at the mercy of the enemy, yet who had been taken out with his fellow-officer, Sir George Lisle, and shot like a dog before those walls he had so valiantly defended through three months of famine and misery, which moved the King, even to tears.
"Ireton's doing," he cried. "Jesus God! grant that I may send Ireton to Tyburn one day."
"From an officer who came here recently I heard an account of it," said Lord Digby, in a low voice. "They neither of them thought to have died, seeing they had surrendered to mercy, but they made no grief of it. Sir Charles was shot first, and Sir George bent and kissed him while he was yet warm (and conscious, I hope) and spoke to the wretched rebels, 'Come nearer and make sure of me.' And upon one of the dogs replying, 'I warrant you we shall hit you, Sir George,' he smiled and said, 'Ay! but I have been nearer to you, many a time, my friends, and you have missed me,—I would I had been there to give them company.'"
"And they are gone!" sighed Charles. "How many of the young and brave have I not lost! Ah, Digby, mine hath been a dismal fate, to ruin all those I would most advance, to bring down those whom I would most exalt."
He was not thinking now of Sir Charles Lucas, but of the Queen; his thoughts were never long from her. The image of her in her exile, in her poverty and humiliation, in her beaten pride and broken splendour was the most lively of all his mortifications, the most exquisite of all his secret tortures; he felt that he had abjectly failed towards her, towards her children, and, keenest sting of all, that she must despise him for his failure and his misfortune.
His head sank lower and lower on his breast, and two tears forced themselves from his tired eyes and hung burning on his faded cheeks.
"Digby, my faithful lord," he said, "I do sometimes think that it would have been better for me to have died at Naseby. By now the Lord would have judged me, and I should have been at peace—peace, peace! How the word dangles before us while the thing is never to be found, this side of heaven."
Digby dropped on one knee beside him.
"May Your Majesty soon find it," he said, in a broken voice, "and live long to enjoy it."
"If it were possible!" murmured Charles. "But we must get to Ireland—it is very needful that we should get to Ireland."
Lord Digby lowered his voice, as if somewhere in this lonely, desolate-looking room a spy of Parliament or army might lurk.
"The preparations are all complete," he said. "It only needs to wait until the commissioners have left the Island."
A little shudder shook the King.
"What will it feel, Digby," he murmured, "to be free again—free!"
Then, as if rousing himself from thoughts that threatened to be overwhelming, he put out his hand and took up a small brown volume tooled in gold, and, turning over the thin pages rough with print, let slip his mind from the leases of care and suffered himself to be distracted by Lucan's Pharsalia.
The mist changed to rain, which slashed at the window; a winter wind disturbed the tapestry and flickered the flames on the deep hearth, which hissed beneath the drops falling down the wide chimney.
Charles, sunk in the deep, worn leather chair, with one thin hand supporting his thin face, the long curls flowing over his breast, gathered consolation from those ancient deeds of melancholy heroism and fated endeavour.
Lord Digby left the room to concert with the few personal attendants left the King about the final arrangements for the King's flight from Newport as soon as the Parliamentarians should have returned to London.
But again Charles Stewart proved unfortunate.
The day before his projected escape Colonel Hammond, the Governor of the Island, sent an escort to remove His Majesty from Newport to Hurst Castle, a dreary residence near the coast, on the sea shingle, where Charles was closely guarded beyond all hope of escape, even if his word of honour not to escape had not been extracted from him: and this was a point where he would admit of no sophistries. So the dream of Rupert and his ships and Ormonde and his loyal Catholics vanished, as all Charles' dreams had vanished, into the bitter obscurity of disappointment.
CHAPTER VIII
IN THE BALANCE
It was the army who had ordered the King's removal to a place of greater security, the army who had now resolved to make an end of these long negotiations between King and Parliament.
On the day after Charles was closed into Hurst Castle the army marched into London, Cromwell not yet with them; but other men, embued with his spirit, were his representatives. He had proposed that the Parliament should be forcibly dissolved and a new one elected, and a Declaration to this effect had been issued by the army now openly at variance with the assembly, which had flung aside their great Remonstrance. Leading officers spoke darkly, yet unmistakably, of what they would do to the King, ay, and to the Parliament.
The Commons, undaunted, voted that the King's concessions were sufficient ground for treating of a general peace; the reply of the army was to send Colonel Pride down to the House to arrest every member who had voted to continuing negotiations with the King.
"It was the only way," said Henry Ireton, "to save the kingdom from a new war into which King and Parliament conjointly would plunge us—that is our warrant and our law for what we do."
Cromwell, coming the evening of that day to London, approved. "Since it is done, I am glad of it," he said, "and will endeavour to maintain it."
Meanwhile, Harrison had gone down to Hurst Castle and removed the King from that melancholy solitude to Windsor.
The now purged House of Commons, which consisted of a mere handful of Independent members, was nothing but the mouthpiece of the army, who were now the masters of the hour. In council they decided against bringing the King to trial if he could be brought by any means to reason, and Lord Denbigh was sent to Windsor again—once more and for the last time—to offer Charles terms.
The same terms—the abandonment of Episcopacy and of his own absolute sovereignty.
All illusion was at last stripped from the proceedings; no meaningless courtesies or formalities obscured the issue. The army were treating Charles as they would treat a vanquished enemy, and he at last saw it—saw there was no hope, no evasion possible, no succour at hand, no shift, no expedient to which he could turn; saw, too, for the first time, the sharp and bitter nature of the alternative of his refusal of these terms.
The army talked freely of his trial and death; there was barely a disguise given to the fact that Lord Denbigh gave him his choice between the Church of England, his Crown—and his life.
This struck not at the King's ambition or lust of power or love of authority, but at his conscience, for he believed as firmly that he was there to uphold the Divine ordinance in Church and State as Cromwell believed that God was mocked by Lawd's surplices, candles, and genuflexions.
On the gloomy day in the end of December when the return of Lord Denbigh with the King's answer was expected, Henry Ireton was with his father-in-law in his house in Drury Lane. Both men showed signs of the tremendous physical and spiritual stress they had lately undergone. Cromwell especially was haggard; the burden which he had assumed was no light one, nor was the responsibility he was about to undertake one which could be worn easily.
Up to the very last he had hoped that the King would give way. Lord Denbigh's journey had been on his recommendation, and he still clung to the possibility that Charles, now absolutely with his back against the wall, might make those concessions which would enable the army to spare him.
But the other and more likely alternative had to be faced.
"Can we," said Henry Ireton, in a tone almost of awe, "bring to trial the crowned and anointed King?"
The thing was indeed unheard of, appalling in its audacity even to the men who had been already years in arms against their King—a thing without precedent, full of a nameless horror. But Oliver Cromwell was not troubled by this consideration. He was uplifted by his stern enthusiasm from all fears of laws and tradition; he knew himself capable of moulding the movement to suit the need; and he was of an incalculable courage.
Yet in this affair he had shown himself more moderate, almost more hesitating, than many of his colleagues; he did not see clearly; he was not sure what God had meant him to do, and his personal feeling, despite his absolute refusal to deal further with Charles after his treachery had been made manifest, was still towards some arrangement by which the King could be returned to the throne and forced to keep his people's laws.
His trust in the King had been utterly scattered; his sentiments had become almost republican; yet in his heart he struggled to find some means of saving the King as he had struggled since the end of the first civil war.
He still hesitated before committing himself to the fierce measures advocated by the great body of the army; yet Charles had done some things which Cromwell could never forgive.
Notably the calling in of the Scots.
To the Englishman, English of the English in every fibre, this "attempt to vassalage us to a foreign nation," as he had called it, was the intolerable, unforgivable wrong—a thing which burnt the blood to think of—a wrong which the Scots, beaten back across the border and Hamilton waiting death in London, did not soften or make amends for. Cromwell had broken the Scots, but he could not forgive them.
"Had he not done that," he cried aloud, "it had been easier to forget his manifold deceits."
"God hath witnessed against him," replied Ireton.
But he, too, was for moderation; he had suggested a trial of the King and then a decorous imprisonment.
Such a compromise did not please the Lieutenant-General, who was waiting for the indication for swift, prompt action. He wanted an impetus to an irrecoverable decision, not an expedient for avoiding it; nothing in the nature of a shift was ever tolerable to him.
"Until Lord Denbigh return," he broke out, "we can decide on nothing. I know not what the Providence of God may put upon us; but this I know, the King hath one more chance, and if he take it not—there will be no excuse but folly and cowardice to delay our dealings with him."
"And when we have dealt with him—what then?" asked Ireton, and he looked gloomy and apprehensive, like a man oppressed with many heavy thoughts.
Oliver Cromwell rose from the table at which both had been sitting; through his air of weariness the indomitable fire of his inner conviction, his inner faith glowed. Ireton, looking at him, thought that he always, even in his moments of deepest dejection or melancholy, gave that impression of one carrying a flame.
"I have much rested on these words of late," he said: "'They that shine with thee shall perish. They that war against thee shall be as nothing; and as a thing of nought. For I the Lord thy God will hold thy right hand, saying unto thee, Fear not; I will help thee.'"
As he spoke he moved to the window and stood with his back against the dark curtains which hung before it. His clothes were dark too, his white band and his tanned but pale face, his brown hair and clasped hands were all picked out and shone upon by the candlelight; for the rest, his figure was in shadow. Ireton, gazing at him, was impressed by something about him which, hearty and homely as were his manners, seemed to always put him beyond his brother officers: the quality of greatness, Henry Ireton thought it was; but he wondered wherein lay greatness.
Cromwell did not speak again, and Ireton took his leave.
"I am going to Sir Thomas Fairfax," he said, "and if any messenger comes from Windsor to-night, I will send one over to you with the news."
After he had been alone a little while Cromwell went upstairs, still with a thoughtful face, with eyes downcast and a frowning brow.
The room he entered was rendered cheerful by the bright firelight and the glow of the candles in the wall sconces of polished brass, and it formed the setting to a fair and tender picture.
Cromwell's wife was seated at the spinet which occupied one corner of the room, and either side of her stood one of her younger daughters, singing. The lady and the children were all dressed in a brown colour, and the purity of their fair-complexioned faces and the delicacy of their soft and waving gold-brown hair was heightened by their collars and caps of white cambric enriched with exquisite needlework.
At the Lieutenant-General's entrance they paused, and Elisabeth Cromwell was about to rise, but he bade them continue and crossed to the fireplace, where he stood quietly, with his head hanging on his breast.
With a blush for the presence of their father at their simple performance, the two little girls began again; the fresh voices, sharply pure and sweetly tremulous, rose clearly and echoed clearly in the high-ceiled chamber, accompanied by the faint, half-muffled notes of the spinet.
"Ye Holy Angels bright,
Who wait at God's right hand,
Or through the realms of light
Fly at your Lord's command.
Assist our song,
Or else the theme
Too high doth seem
For mortal tongue."
The little singers had forgotten the embarrassment of an audience; their eyes sparkled, their little round mouths strained open in a rapture.
Elisabeth Cromwell, as her fingers touched the keys to the simple melody, looked across the spinet to her husband.
"Ye blessed souls at rest,
Who ran this earthly race,
And now from sin released,
Behold the Saviour's face.
His praises sound
As in His light
With sweet delight
Ye do abound."
The mother's head bent a little; she dropped her eyes. She was thinking of Robert and Oliver, and wondering if they were leaning from heaven to listen to this song—"blessed souls at rest." Ah, well!
"Ye saints, who toil below,
Adore your Heavenly King,
And onward as ye go
Some joyful anthem sing.
Take what He gives
And praise Him still
Through good and ill,
Who ever lives!"
The young voices gathered greater fervency on the next lines—
"My soul, bear thou thy part,
Triumph in God above,
And with a well-tuned heart
Sing thou the songs of love!
Let all thy days
Till life shall end,
Whate'er He send,
Be filled with praise!"
Frances and Mary Cromwell, having ended their hymn, came round from behind the spinet and curtsied to their father.
"A sweet song," he said, "and sweetly sung. Who wrote the words, Mary?"
"Mr. Richard Baxter, sir," she replied; "he taught them to the troop he was chaplain of at Kidderminster—and Henry copied them and brought them home to us."
"Learn Mr. Baxter's hymns," he smiled, "but not his tenets. He is lukewarm and unstable."
Mrs. Cromwell rose.
"And now they must to bed—I fear it is already over-late."
The Lieutenant-General stooped and kissed each of them on the fair, untroubled brow.
"A good night, my dears, my sweets. A good night, my little wenches."
He lingered over the farewell caress half wistfully, and as they left the room his tired eyes followed them.
Elisabeth Cromwell came to her husband's side and glanced up at him, then down at the fire.
"You are troubled to-night," she said, in a low voice.
"No," he answered, "no."
"About Richard's marriage settlements," she returned. "It is over a year since that affair was first opened."
"I know," he replied, "I know. But what can I do? I cannot settle on Dorothy Mayor moneys which I have not got for my own. There is Henry to think of, and the two little ones—and thou knowest, Bess, I am not rich."
She knew well enough from many economies of her own. He had strained his estates at the commencement of the first war, when he had raised and equipped, at his own expense, his troop in Cambridgeshire; his pay was in arrears and had lately been reduced; he had waited many ancient debts due to him from the Government; and he had returned the larger portion of the income arising from the grant of Lord Worchester's lands to the Parliament to be used in settling that unhappy country, Ireland. Therefore he was now more hampered and with less money to dispose of than when in private life, and all his frugal living and all his wife's good management would not permit him to afford Mr. Mayor what he demanded for his daughter; therefore Richard's match had hung a year, and seemed likely to hang longer.
"I would rather," said Richard's father abruptly, "that the lad was more like his brother Henry, and less eager to take a wife and live easily."
"All cannot be as thee," answered Elisabeth Cromwell half sadly, "wrapped in great affairs."
He turned.
"Why, Bess," he said, taking her hand, "that did sound as a reproach."
"Nay, my lord, my dear," she replied, in a subdued passion; "but thou art so much away."
"But thou art not alone," he said, eagerly bending over her.
"A woman is always alone, Oliver, when she is away from him she loves. I think a man doth not understand that—he hath so much else—thou—thou hast so much—and I am gone right into the background of thy life!"
He took both her hands now and laid them on his heart.
"Thou art dearer to me than any creature in the world," he said. "Let that content thee."
She sighed and smiled together. By her great love for him she could measure her great pain because of him—the separations, the anxieties, the apprehension, the knowledge that she was only a part of his life, that he had now many, many other things to think of more important than her, while she had nothing but him—always him. But he could not understand.
"Well, well," she said.
"Why art thou sad, Bess?" he asked tenderly. "Is it about Dick's marriage?"
She shook her head; her gentle face flushed with the thought that came to her.
"Oh, Oliver, I have been sorry about the King," she said simply.
"The King!" He dropped her hands.
Elisabeth Cromwell lifted her large, clear grey eyes.
"What is to be the fate of the King?" she asked, trembling.
"That hangs in the balance," he replied briefly. "Bring not these questions on to my own hearth, Bess."
Thus rebuked, she moved away, trembling more.
Her husband looked at her kindly.
"It is not for me or thee," he said gently, "to discuss the fate of the King, but for God in His good time to disclose it. Maybe He will harden His heart as He hardened the heart of Pharaoh, and maybe He will turn it to peace."
"These are terrible times," replied Elisabeth Cromwell rapidly. "I cannot but think of how terrible—being a woman I cannot but tremble—fearful things are said now about the King—about—bringing him to trial."
"Why not?" asked her husband sternly. "Hath he not been the author of two civil wars, and would he not have brought about a third save that God struck his forces at Preston Battle?"
"But he—he is the Governor of England," she answered timidly.
"Nay, no longer," returned Oliver Cromwell; "that high office hath he defiled. God hath overturned him—'He shall put down the mighty from their seats and exalt the humble and meek.' The King hath sinned against God, against his people, against the laws of England."
"Alack—it is beyond my understanding," sighed his wife; "but it seems to me he is the King!"
"Be not deceived by high-sounding words," replied the Lieutenant-General. "Charles Stewart is a man and must pay as men pay—for their sins and their follies."
As he spoke the servant entered with a note, which had just been brought, he said, by General Fairfax's man.
Cromwell gazed at the seal—Henry Ireton's arms pressed into wax scarcely cold—a full minute before he opened it, and the blood rushed to his face.
When he opened the letter his fingers shook.
It contained a few words from his son-in-law, the sand yet sticking to the ink.
The King had utterly refused to see Lord Denbigh, and utterly refused to have any dealings either with Parliament or army.
He defied them. Now, driven to the last extremity, he had flung aside all subterfuge and all evasion; he stood by his conscience, and no matter what the consequences, he refused terms which he regarded as a betrayal of God's laws in Church or State.
Oliver Cromwell crumpled up the letter with a gesture of, for him, unusual agitation.
"So it is over!" he muttered. He gazed at his wife with eyes that did not see her; drops of sweat stood out on his forehead and his lips quivered.
"What is over?" asked Elisabeth Cromwell, in terrified tones.
He drew himself together with an effort.
"The reign of Charles Stewart," he replied simply.
CHAPTER IX
BY WHAT AUTHORITY?
The Lords having rejected the ordinance for bringing the King to trial, the Commons, always under the influence of the army, declared themselves capable of enforcing their own act by their own law, "the People being, under God, the original of all just power."
Charles was hurried from Windsor to St. James's, and the day after his arrival in London put on his trial for having endeavoured to subvert his people's rights, for having levied war on them with the help of foreign troops, and with having, after once being spared, endeavoured by all wicked arts to again involve the kingdom in bloody confusion.
This was the end after so many years of strife, evasion, pacts made and broken, bloodshed and lives ruined. Charles was a prisoner on trial for his life, and in one of his splendid beds at Whitehall (now the headquarters of the army) Oliver Cromwell slept or lay awake and struggled with tumultuous thoughts.
Many who had been with him all along were against him now. Vane and Sidney protested hotly. Many members refused to sit among the judges who were to try Charles.
"The King," said Sidney, "can be tried by no court, and by such a court as this no man can be tried."
"I tell you," said Cromwell sombrely, "we will cut off his head with the crown upon it."
So passionate and vigorous and unalterable was his resolution now it was taken.
The fiercer spirits of the army were with him. "'Blood defileth the land,'" quoted Ludlow, "'and the land cannot be cleansed of the blood shed therein, but by the blood of him that shed it.'"
Cromwell, too, now believed that by God's express law the King was doomed.
It mattered not a whit to him that the tribunal which was to try Charles had neither legal nor moral right, since there was no law by which the King could be brought to trial, and the judges represented neither the Commons nor the people, but a section of the army; indeed, while others endeavoured to find excuses with which to cover up the obvious illegality of the proceeding, Cromwell disdained any such shifts. As he had been the man who had striven longest and most arduously to make some compromise with the King, he was now the man who was advancing most boldly and directly to the climax of the King's last phase.
He had decided there could be no peace while Charles lived, and he spared no effort to secure his death.
The time for temporizing was past, he believed, and he acted, as he never failed to act at a crisis, with swiftness, with firmness, with unhesitating decision.
Whitelocke, St. John, Wilde, and Rolle declined to be President of the Court which tried the King, but John Bradshaw accepted.
For a week the trial in the great Hall of Westminster (which the King had last entered when he came to demand the five members) continued, a long haughty protest on the part of Charles, a stern overruling of him on the part of the Court—the whole thing almost incredible in swiftness, fierceness, and enthusiastic passion overlaid with the stately forms of ancient ceremonial. On the fourth time of the sitting, the 29th January, being Saturday, the Court was held—as many believed—for the last time.
Lord Digby, who had been separated from his master when Charles was removed to Hurst Castle, and had been wandering about, more or less in disguise ever since, had managed to gain London, and on this morning of the 29th, a cold, wet, and grey day, he made his way to Westminster Hall, to witness the awful, unbelievable spectacle of the trial of his King.
The great gates of the Hall were opened to admit the general public, which soon swarmed in, and Digby found himself in the midst of a vast concourse of people, mostly of the baser sort, who pushed and gossiped and passed food and drink from one to another, so that the atmosphere was like the pit of a theatre for the smell of beer and oranges, as it had been at the trial of Lord Strafford.
Lord Digby caught scraps of conversation which pierced him to the heart—how, on the second day, the head had fallen off the King's cane and he had had to stoop for it himself—how he had paled at this, as if he took it for an ill-omen ... how curt Bradshaw had been with him, and how certain all were that there could only be one end—the axe....
Soon the Court entered, and a great "Ah-h," like an indrawn breath, rose from the crowd when they saw that Serjeant Bradshaw, the Lord President, was attired in a scarlet robe, instead of the black one which he had worn on the previous occasions. "His cap," whispered the man next Lord Digby, "is lined with steel, for fear one might make an attempt on him."
John Bradshaw, with a very unmoved dignity and stern calmness, took his seat in the midst of the Court, in a crimson velvet chair, having a desk with a crimson velvet cushion before him; either side of him, on the scarlet-hung benches, the fourscore members of the Court seated themselves, all with their hats on; sixteen gentlemen with partisans stood either side the Court; before a table, set at the feet of the President and covered with a rich Turkey carpet on which lay the sword, stood the Serjeant-at-Arms with the mace; the Clerk of the Court sat at this table also.
A company of guards was placed about the Hall to keep order, and everywhere, in the body of the Court and in the galleries, was a great expectant press of people.
After the Court had been sitting about ten minutes, the prisoner arrived in the charge of Colonel Tomlinson and a company of gentlemen with partisans.
As he entered some of the soldiers cried out, "Execution! Execution! Justice against the traitor at the Bar!"
The Serjeant-at-Arms met the King and conducted him to the Bar, where a crimson velvet chair was placed for him.
Charles looked sternly at the Court, up at the galleries and the multitude gathered in the body of the Hall; then he seated himself, without moving his hat.
He was dressed more richly than Lord Digby remembered him to have been for some time; his suit was black velvet and pale blue silk, with Flemish lace and silver knots; he carried a long cane in his hand and a pair of doeskin gloves. He was scarcely seated before he rose up again and moved about and looked down at the spectators with a smile of unutterable haughtiness. Lord Digby was near enough to remark that he looked in good health, vigorous, and composed.
Suddenly he glanced up at the Lord President, and though he must have remarked the scarlet robe, he did not change colour.
"I shall desire a word—to be heard a little," he said, "and hope I shall give no occasion of interruption."
"You may answer in your time," replied Bradshaw coldly. "Hear the Court first."
"If it please you, sir, I desire to be heard," said the King. "And I shall not give any occasion of interruption—and it is only in a word—a sudden judgment——"
"Sir," interrupted the Lord President, "you shall be heard in due time, but you are to hear the Court first——"
"Sir, I desire—it will be in answer to what I believe the Court will say—sir, a hasty judgment is not so soon recalled——"
"Sir," replied the Lord President sternly, "you shall be heard before the judgment be given, and in the meantime you may forbear."
Charles took his seat again, saying, "Well, sir, shall I be heard before judgment be given?"
The Lord President now proceeded to address the Court.
"Gentlemen, it is well known to most of you that the prisoner at the Bar hath been several times convened before the Court to make answer to a charge of treason——"
Here the King looked up and laughed in the face of the Court.
"—and other high crimes exhibited against him in the name of the People of England——"
A shrill woman's voice interrupted from one of the galleries—"Not half the People!" The King smiled, and there was some disturbance while the lady was silenced or removed.
Bradshaw continued: "To which charge being required to answer, he began to take on him to offer reasoning and debate unto the authority of the Court to try and judge him; but being overruled in that, and still required to make his answer, he was still pleased to continue contumacious, and to refuse to submit or answer.
"Thereupon the Court have considered of the charge; they have considered of the contumacy and of the notoriety of the fact charged upon the prisoner, and have agreed upon the sentence to be pronounced against this prisoner."
The Lord President paused a moment, and a low hum went through the Court. The King threw back his head with that expression of incredulous haughtiness still on his face.
"The prisoner doth desire to be heard," continued Bradshaw, "before the sentence be pronounced, and the Court hath resolved that they will hear him."
Charles rose; his scornful eyes flickered along the faces of his judges and rested for a second on the white countenance of Oliver Cromwell, who was looking at him intently.
The Lord President addressed the King—
"Yet, sir, this much I must tell you beforehand, which you have been minded of before, that if that you have to say be to offer any debate concerning jurisdiction, you are not to be heard in it—you have offered it formerly and you have indeed struck at the root, that is, the power and supreme authority of the Commons of England—but, sir, if you have anything to say in defence of yourself concerning the matter charged, the Court hath given me in command to let you know that they will hear you."
The King caught hold of the bar in front of him. He began to speak; at first his voice, though steady, was so low that only those near could hear him; he addressed himself to Bradshaw, but he faced all his judges, and his glance travelled from one to another.
At last Lord Digby, straining forward through the press, caught some words.
"... This many a day all things have been taken away from me, but that which I call more dear to me than my life, my honour, and my conscience—and if I had respect to my life more than the peace of the kingdom, the liberty of the subject, certainly I should have made a particular defence for myself, for by that at leastwise I might have deferred an ugly sentence, which I believe will pass on me."
He then asked to be heard in the Painted Chamber before the Lords and Commons before any sentence was given.
As he concluded he raised his voice and spoke with great nobleness and force.
"And if I cannot get this liberty I do here protest that so fair shows of liberty and peace are pure shows and not otherwise since you will not hear your King."
A hush followed his speech; Cromwell whispered to a neighbour; a faint sunlight penetrated the narrow Gothic window and touched to brilliancy John Bradshaw in his scarlet robes among his crimson cushions.
"Sir, you have spoken," he said.
"Yes, sir," replied the King, looking at him austerely.
The sunlight strengthened; the judge blazed in his unrelieved red; the prisoner was still in shadow; he stood with his hands on the bar; Lord Digby could see that he was biting his under-lip.
"What you have said," announced Bradshaw, "is a further declining of the jurisdiction of this Court, which was the thing wherein you were limited before——"
The King's voice cut his speech.
"Pray excuse me, sir, for my interruption, because you mistake me—it is not a declining of it; you do judge me before you hear me speak. I say I will not, I do not decline, though I cannot acknowledge the jurisdiction of this Court——"
A deep humming from the Court drowned the rest of his speech.
Bradshaw, stern, slightly flushed, and in a voice of terrible import, made reply—
"Sir, this is not altogether new that you have moved unto us—not altogether new to us, though it is the first time in person that you have offered it to the Court. Sir, you say you do not decline the jurisdiction of the Court."
"Not in this that I have said," answered Charles swiftly.
"I understand you well, sir," said the Lord President; "but, nevertheless, that which you have offered seems to be contrary to that saying of yours—for the Court are ready to give a sentence."
The very slightest quiver disturbed the King's face; he sought for his handkerchief, found it, and wiped his lips, looking down the while.
"It is not as you say," continued Bradshaw sternly, "that we will not hear our King—we have been ready to hear you, we have patiently waited your pleasure for three Courts together, to hear what you would say to the People's charges against you, to which you have not vouchsafed to give any answer at all."
As Lord Digby, pressed in the pushing crowd, listened to these words and gazed at the awful scene a sickness came over him; he saw that terrible red of judge and cushion, chair and bench float in a mist before his eyes, and through that scarlet blur the King's figure, stripped now of the inviolate sacredness of Majesty—merely a man, a desperate man in a sea of enemies, making a last stand for his life.
Bradshaw concluded his speech by saying that the Court would withdraw to the Court of Awards to consider of the King's request to be heard in the Painted Chamber, and so they moved out, leaving the red chair and the red benches bare.
Charles was also removed; as he passed the sword lying on the table covered with the Turkey carpet he said, "I do not fear that," and Oliver Cromwell and Thomas Harrison, hearing the words, looked at him over their shoulders as they went out.
Lord Digby struggled nearer the front and cried out, "God save your Majesty!" hoping the King would recognize his voice, but it was lost in cries of "Justice!" and "Execution!" which rose from the soldiers.
After half an hour the Court returned and the Serjeant-at-Arms brought back the prisoner. Charles now held in his hand a small bunch of herbs, and truly the atmosphere was stifling; he was still composed, but his face was now as white as the wall behind him; he seated himself and folded his arms.
Bradshaw addressed him; he was not to be allowed to go before the Lords and Commons in the Painted Chamber. "The judges are resolved to proceed to punishment and to judgment, and that is their unanimous resolution."
Some of the spectators groaned; the sense of impending doom, calamity, and horror spread from one to another. Charles rose; he was not a whit abashed or lowered in his pride, but there was a passion in his tones, a ringing challenge in his words, which were the indications of an inner despair.
"I know it is vain for me to dispute," he said. "I am no sceptic for to deny the power you have—I know that you have power enough! I confess, sir, I think it would have been for the kingdom's peace if you had shown the lawfulness of your power!" His haughty contempt showed for a moment unmasked, his look, his bearing, his voice, defied them utterly. "For this delay that I have desired, I confess it is a delay, but a delay very important to the peace of the kingdom, for it is not my person that I look on alone, it is the kingdom's welfare and the kingdom's peace—it is an old sentence that we should think long before we resolve of great matters—therefore, sir, I do say again, that I do put at your doors all the inconveniency of a hasty sentence. I confess I have been here this week, this day eight days ago was the day I came here first, but a little delay of a day or two further may give peace—whereas a hasty judgment may bring on that trouble and perpetual inconveniency to the kingdom that the child which is unborn may repent it." He paused a second, then raised his voice slightly. "Therefore again, out of the duty I owe to God, and to my country, I do desire that I may be heard by the Lords and Commons in the Painted Chamber, or any other chamber that you will appoint me."
The sixty-eight judges made no movement; Bradshaw, whose dignity and unfaltering composure were as remarkable as the dignity and composure of the prisoner, considering the extraordinary position in which he, a mere Cheshire gentleman, was now placed towards his sovereign, and what a responsibility he was taking on himself, what undying vengeance, what possibly horrible fate he was facing if the tide should one day turn, briefly replied that the Court had made their resolution and again asked Charles if he had anything to say for himself before sentence was delivered.
The King, facing him, replied—
"I say this, sir, that if you will hear me, if you will but give this delay, I doubt not but I shall give some satisfaction to you all here, and to my People, after that. And, therefore, I do require you, as you shall answer it at the dreadful Day of Judgment, that you will consider it once again."
It was what he had said since he had first been put on trial, a steady refusal to recognize this Court (as on all legal grounds he was justified in doing), a refusal to plead or argue the cause, a repetition of the haughty demand—"By what authority?" Before the Lords and Commons he might defend himself, not before this tribunal of his rebellious subjects. But as deeply rooted, as unyielding, as his refusal to recognize the Court was the Court's intention to judge and condemn him; they were there to make inquisition for blood, and not one of them faltered in their stern task.
In answer to the King's last speech Bradshaw said merely, "Sir, I have received direction from the Court."
The King sat down.
"Well, sir," he said, and looked about him with utter haughtiness.
"The Court will proceed to sentence," continued the Lord President, "if you have nothing more to say."
Lord Digby and many others held their breath: would the King, even now, disdain to answer to his charge?
He looked at Bradshaw and very faintly smiled.
"Sir," he said, "I have nothing more to say, but I shall desire that this may be entered—what I have said."
He knew as he spoke that his last hope had gone; he put the herbs to his nostrils and his thoughts flew to Paris and the woman waiting there.... The winter sun had faded; the crimson and scarlet glowed through a sombre shadow of river mist and afternoon fog, which began to encroach upon the Court and blot the eager faces and blur the coloured garments and dim the glitter of the great bare sword at which the King, turning in his chair, looked curiously.
"The Court, sir, hath something more to say to you," said Bradshaw, "which, although I know it will be very unacceptable, yet they are resolved to discharge their duty. Sir, you speak very well of a precious thing, which you call Peace, and it is much to be wished that God had put it into your heart that you had as effectually and really endeavoured and studied the peace of the kingdom, as now in words you do pretend—but, as you were told the other day, actions must expound intentions—yet your actions have been clean contrary."
In this strain the speech continued, delivered with clearness, with force and point, yet with a rapidity that strained the speed of the licensed penmen who were taking down the report of the trial.
Bradshaw spoke with learning, with eloquence, with weight and fire; yet what he said was but a repetition of the old grounds the Parliament had taken since the beginning of the war; the law was above the King. The King had defied the law and was therefore answerable.
He cited many precedents, quoted many authorities, but he could not disguise the illegality of the tribunal over which he presided, or cloak the fact that the King was being judged by means as outside the law as his had been when he had cast Sir John Eliot into the Tower or forced John Hampton to pay ship money.
The King had lost in the long struggle and was now paying the penalty as they on the scarlet benches would have paid if he had been the victor.
This fact Bradshaw might adorn with all dignity and eloquence—but it remained obvious and undeniable.
The Lord President spoke too long; the crowd became restless; and awful as the moment was, unprecedented as was the occasion, human weakness and human levity prevailed. Some yawned, some fought their way out for fresh supplies of food and drink, some went away to spread the news the King was doomed.
Some followed the speech eagerly enough and hummed their approbation, some shouted protests and were thrown out by the soldiers.
Charles, listening to an indictment such as no king had ever listened to before, in a situation in which no king had ever been before, sat perfectly still, holding the herbs to his nostrils.
To him this talk was mere waste of air; he was, as he had said, as good a lawyer as any in the kingdom, and he knew that the Court which Bradshaw so burningly justified had no shadow of legal right; he knew that he was the victim of force, and he knew that he was suffering, not so much for the offences which the Lord President laid to his charge, as because he had remained faithful to the Church of England and the Divine right of kings; he knew that if he had forsaken these two tenets even a few days ago when Lord Denbigh came to Windsor he might have been saved.
And he did not regret his firmness—even at this moment.
Once, when Bradshaw, appealing to history, said, "You are the hundred and ninth King of Scotland," he moved, and his look brightened as if he had been recalled from wandering thoughts to the present moment; and when the Lord President spoke of the violent end of his grandmother, Mary Stewart, he started a little and frowned.
For the rest he was motionless and silent, save only when Bradshaw arraigned him as, "Tyrant, traitor, murderer, and public enemy to the Commonwealth of England"; then he blushed and cried out, "Ha!"
The Lord President, spurred afresh by this cry of defiance, proceeded to prove these charges against the King, reinforcing them with texts of Scripture, and so upbraiding and fiercely condemning the King that at last Charles, amid a general murmur and buzz of the Court, sprang to his feet.
"I would only desire one word before you give sentence," he said, "and that is that you hear me concerning those great imputations that you have laid to my charge!"
"Sir," replied Bradshaw undauntedly, "you must give me leave to go on—for I am not far from your sentence and your time is now past——"
Again Charles interrupted.
"But I desire that you will hear me a few words only—for truly whatever sentence you will put upon me in respect of those heavy imputations that I see by your speech you have put upon me—sir, it is very true that——"
"Sir," said Bradshaw, with great sternness, "I would not willingly, especially at this time, interrupt you in anything you have to say, but, sir, you have not owned us as a Court—you look upon us as a sort of people met together—and we know what language we receive from your party."
"I know nothing of that!" exclaimed Charles contemptuously.
Bradshaw continued with the old bitter grievance: "You disavow us as a Court"—and on that theme spoke a little longer, the King the while facing him, leaning forward eagerly, with clenched hands and white face, frowning.
"We cannot be unmindful of what the Scripture tells us, for to acquit the guilty is of equal abomination as to condemn the innocent. We may not acquit the guilty. What sentence the law affirms to a traitor, tyrant, a murderer, and a public enemy to the country, that sentence you are now to hear read unto you, and that is the sentence of the Court."
There was a great movement in the Hall as of a wave advancing, then flung back. Oliver Cromwell put his hands before his face; the King did not move.
"Read the sentence," said Bradshaw. "Make an oyer and command silence while the sentence is read."
Which was done by the Clerk of the Court, and silence indeed fell—a silence which seemed to shudder.
The Clerk read over the charge from the parchment he held, and then proceeded—
"This charge being read unto him, he, the said Charles Stewart, was required to give his answer, but he refused to do so, and so expressed the several passages of his trial in refusing to answer. For all which Treasons and Crimes this Court doth adjudge that the said Charles Stewart, as a tyrant, traitor, murderer, and public enemy, shall be put to death by the severing of his head from his body."
Terrible sighs broke from the spectators; they swayed to and fro. The King, now the moment had come, looked incredulous.
"The sentence now read and published," said Bradshaw, "is the Act, Sentence, Judgment, and Resolution of the whole Court."
At this the sixty-eight judges stood up to show their assent.
"Will you hear me a word, sir?" cried Charles.
"Sir," returned Bradshaw, "you are not to be heard after the sentence."
"No, sir?"
"No, sir—by your favour, sir. Guard, withdraw your prisoner."
The partisans closed round Charles; incredulous, outraged, he continued to protest.
"I may speak after the sentence—by your favour, sir, I may speak after the sentence—ever——"
The guards caught hold of him none too civilly.
"I say, sir, I do," cried the unfortunate King—then sternly to the soldier who had seized his arm, "Hold!"—"by your favour the sentence, sir——"
They pushed and dragged him away. He raised his voice.
"I am not suffered for to speak! Expect what justice other people will have!"
So, still incredulous, protesting, he was forced away, and the Court rose and went into the Painted Chamber.
Lord Digby made his way out of the crowd; he found a dun mist over London and rows of Cromwell's Ironsides keeping guard outside the Hall.
As the King passed out with his guards on his way to Sir Robert Cotton's, one of these men called out, "God bless you, sir!" and his officer struck him on the face.
"It is a severe punishment for a little offence," said Charles. He was now quite calm.
The mist deepened, blotting out the surging crowd, some of whom wept and some of whom were silent, but none of whom openly rejoiced.