The cavaliers hastened at the summons. The king found himself in a few days at the head of a body of three thousand men. They were preparing to join Montrose, and only awaited their instructions, when it was learned that David Lesley, at the head of the Scotch cavalry, was approaching Doncaster. The Royalists took alarm. Many retired, and when the news of the recent and brilliant successes of Montrose reached the king, he had no longer sufficient forces to attempt the venture. He was urged not to expose his person. He re-entered Oxford, on the 29th of August, not knowing what to do with the few troops which he had left.
The victories of Montrose, however, revived the dejected monarch. Edinburgh and Glasgow were in the hands of the conqueror. He had set free all the Royalists whom the Scotch Parliament had kept in prison, and timid men hastened to place themselves under his standard. The Scotch had recalled David Lesley with his cavalry. They needed all their strength to protect their country.
The king wished to take advantage of the enfeeblement of the Scotch army. He advanced towards Hereford; but the besiegers did not await him, and fell back towards the north. He was urged to pursue them, but refused to do so, being already wearied by this effort so little in accord with his tastes and habits. Prince Rupert held Bristol, which town Fairfax was besieging. He promised to resist for four months. The king did not trouble himself about the matter and repaired to take rest at Ragland, at the residence of Lord Worcester, with whom he had constant conferences. Scarcely had he arrived when he learnt that Bristol was occupied by Fairfax. Prince Rupert had surrendered the town at the first assault, almost without resistance, when as yet nothing had failed him—neither provisions nor soldiers. Charles was dismayed. It was his ruin in the west and the most bitter disappointment of the hopes he had placed in his nephew. His courtiers, especially Lord Digby, who detested Rupert, envenomed his anger. He wrote to the prince an offensive letter, which concluded with these words: "My conclusion is to desire you to seek your subsistence, until it shall please God to determine of my conditions, somewhere beyond seas; to which end I send you herewith a pass, and I pray God to make you sensible of your present position and give you means to recover what you have lost, for I shall have no greater joy in a victory than a just occasion without blushing to assure you of my being your loving uncle and most faithful friend,—C. R."
Prince Rupert had taken refuge in Oxford. He did not depart, despite the injunctions of the king. He asserted that he had been calumniated, and asked to make an explanation to his uncle; but Lord Digby had taken care to prevent the interview. Charles resumed the road to the north. He wished to relieve Chester, which was again besieged, and was now the only port in which the assistance expected from Ireland could arrive. He was in sight of the town with five thousand men, Welsh foot-soldiers or cavaliers of the north, when he was attacked in the rear by a Parliamentary corps, commanded by Major-General Poyntz. A detachment coming from the little army which was investing Chester, attacked the advance guard at the same time. The king, pressed between two fires, after a desperate resistance, saw his best officers fall around him, and was compelled to return to Wales, abandon Chester to its fate and once more separated as though by an insurmountable barrier from that camp of Montrose which constituted his only hope.
The army of Montrose no longer existed. For ten days already, the marquis had, like the king, been seeking a shelter while endeavoring to collect his soldiers. On the 30th of September he had been beaten at Philip-Haugh by David Lesley. His forces had dissolved at the first blow. Brilliant and rash, in the base he excited envy, while in the timid he inspired no sense of security. A reverse sufficed to dissipate all his successes, and on the morrow of his defeat the conqueror of Scotland was only an audacious outlaw.
This last blow overwhelmed the king. He no longer knew where to rest his hopes. Urged by Lord Digby, he retired to Newark, while the courtier, determined to avoid an interview with Prince Rupert, who had set out to rejoin the king, placed himself at the head of fifteen hundred horse, which Charles still possessed. Under the pretext of taking succor to Montrose, he started for the north.
The explanations of Prince Rupert did not satisfy the king, notwithstanding the favorable declaration of the council of war. The insolence of the cavaliers who accompanied his nephew hurt his dignity. A quarrel began. "Begone, begone!" exclaimed Charles angrily, "and do not appear again before me." Agitated in their turn, Rupert, his brother Maurice, and their partisans quitted Newark in the middle of the night. The king was no longer safe there. Lord Digby had been defeated at Sherborne, in his march towards the north. There were now on the king's side neither soldiers nor generals. Charles assembled together four or five hundred cavaliers, the remnants of several regiments, and, on the 3d of November, at eleven o'clock at night, he left the town, taking the road to Oxford. He re-entered the city after a forced march, thinking himself saved, for he had once more found his council and his court, and could indulge his habits and find some repose.
The relief was not of long duration. The royalist towns were falling one by one into the power of Fairfax and Cromwell. Fifteen had surrendered or had been taken by assault within five months. Scarcely had Charles returned to Oxford, when he wrote to the Prince of Wales to hold himself in readiness to proceed to the Continent. At the same time he made overtures of peace to Parliament, demanding a safe-conduct for four negotiators.
Never had Parliament been less inclined towards peace. The hundred and thirty new members, who had replaced in the House of Commons those who had followed the king, had increased the power and daring of the Independents, though all did not belong to their party. The severities towards the Royalists were redoubled. The war everywhere became harsher, sometimes cruel. Fairfax alone still preserved the fine humanity which distinguished nearly all the leaders at the opening of the war. Misunderstandings broke out even between the Scots and the Houses. The former complained that their army was not paid; the latter, that an army of allies plundered and devastated, like a hostile body, the counties which it occupied. The strongest fermentation, the deepest hostility, the bitterest and most decisive measures on all hands, left little chance for peace to arrest or even suspend the rapid course of events.
The overtures of the king were rejected, and a safe-conduct was refused to the negotiators. Charles persisted, but without success, and as he proposed to repair to Westminster to negotiate in person with Parliament, his enemies solemnly declared that they at length possessed proof of the falsity of his words. The king had concluded a treaty of alliance with the Catholic Irishmen still in revolt. Ten thousand of these barbarians, under the orders of the Earl of Glamorgan, were soon to land at Chester. They had obtained, as the price of their assistance, the complete abolition of the penal laws against the Catholics, and the freedom of their worship. Ireland, in fact, was delivered up to the Papacy. For two months the Committee of the two kingdoms had known of the conspiracy and reserved the publication of it for an important occasion. The day had at length arrived.
The king was struck down by this discovery. For two years he had personally conducted this negotiation with the Earl of Glamorgan, the eldest son of the Marquis of Worcester. Brave, generous, thoughtless, passionately devoted to his master in danger, and to his oppressed religion, Glamorgan had plotted in every form, proceeding incessantly from England to Ireland, often entrusted with secret missions unknown to the Marquis of Ormond, lieutenant of the king in Ireland, and alone knowing to what point the concessions of the king might reach. The treaty had been concluded since the 20th of August preceding, and Parliament did not know all that Charles had promised in its name.
When it was learned in Dublin that the plot was known in London, Ormond easily saw what a blow the affairs of the king had sustained even among his own party. He immediately caused Glamorgan to be arrested as having exceeded his powers. The earl kept his counsel, and did not produce the secret documents signed "Charles," which he held in his hands. He even said that the king was not bound to ratify what he had thought himself able to promise for him. On his part, Charles hastened to disown the affair in the proclamation which he addressed to the Houses, as well as in his official letters to the Council of Dublin. Glamorgan, he said, had no other mission than to recruit soldiers and to second the efforts of the Lord Lieutenant. Neither Parliament nor the people believed this. Glamorgan, being soon released, recommenced his attempts to assemble an Irish army to proceed to England. In reply, the command of Cromwell, already several times renewed, was again prolonged, and the king found himself compelled to resume hostilities as though he had been in a position to sustain them.
The last remnants of the royalist armies still fought, but without ardor and without hope. When the Prince of Wales found himself abandoned by his generals, Goring and Grenville, he implored Sir Ralph, now Lord Hopton, to resume command of the troops in the west. "Your Highness," replied the brave soldier, "I cannot obey you without resigning myself to the sacrifice of my honor, for with the troops which you have entrusted to me how can I preserve it? Their friends alone fear them; their enemies despise them; they are only terrible on the day of pillage; and only determined when they are resolved to fly. However, since your Highness has judged it well to summon me, I am ready to follow you at the risk of losing my honor;" and he resumed the command of seven or eight thousand men who detested him, and to whom his discipline was odious. On the 16th of February he was defeated by Fairfax at Torrington, upon the borders of Cornwall. All the troops that had remained with him were dispersed. Fairfax pursued him, while the Prince of Wales, driven into a corner at the Land's End, in Cornwall, embarked for the Scilly Isles, being unwilling to leave English soil. Fairfax offered honorable conditions. Hopton, free from all anxiety as to the safety of the prince, desired to attempt once more to fight with the small corps which he had re-formed with great difficulty; but the soldiers called upon him to capitulate. "Bargain, then," said Hopton, "but not for me." He embarked with Lord Chapel to join the Prince of Wales. The king now possessed in the south-west only insignificant garrisons, scattered in a few towns.
Sir Jacob Astley was defeated at Stow, in Gloucestershire, as he was advancing with three thousand men to join the king, who had issued forth with fifteen hundred horse from Oxford to meet him. The rout was complete. The aged Astley resisted for a long while, then fell into the hands of the enemy. The soldiers, touched by his white hairs and his courage, brought him a drum. He sat down; then addressing the Parliamentary officers, he said, "Gentlemen, you may now sit down and play, for you have done all your work, if you fall not out among yourselves." The king had no longer any hope save in the dissensions which he might foment among his enemies. He had for a long while been maintaining secret relations with the Independents, especially with Vane. He wrote himself to the latter after Astley's disaster, "Be assured that everything shall come to pass according to my promise. By all that is dearest to a man, I implore you to hasten your good offices, for otherwise it will be too late, and I shall perish before gathering the fruit. Trust to me. I will fully reward your services. I have said all. If in four days I should not have an answer I shall be compelled to find some other expedient. May God direct you! I have done my duty." He at the same time addressed a message to the Houses, offering to disband his troops, to open all his towns, and to take up his residence again at Whitehall.
Great was the emotion at Westminster; all knew that if the king were at Whitehall he would no longer be the object of the disturbances if the city should break out, and all were equally determined not to fall into his power. All the necessary precautions were adopted to prevent Charles from appearing unexpectedly in the capital. Violent measures were taken against those who should negotiate secretly or who should maintain any relations with him. Vane left the letter of the king unanswered.
Meanwhile Fairfax advanced, and Oxford was about to be invested. The king made an offer to Colonel Rainsborough, who had already arrived before the town, to surrender to him on condition that he should conduct him to Parliament at once. The colonel refused. Charles was about to fall as a prisoner of war into the hands of his enemies. One resource only remained to him. For two months M. de Montreuil, the French ambassador, had been laboring to procure him an opportunity of taking refuge in the camp of the Scots. He thought himself secure of the personal safety of the king in the midst of an army which looked upon Charles as its legitimate sovereign. The queen, still in France, also kept up relations with the Scotch military leaders. She urged her husband to put trust in them. He still hesitated, but he issued forth from Oxford on the 27th of April, at midnight, followed only by his valet-de-chambre, Ashburnham, and a clergyman. Dr. Hudson, well versed in all the roads.
For a moment, when at Harrow-on-the-Hill, in sight of London, the king stopped. Should he take a bold step and suddenly appear in the midst of the city? It was too venturesome a stroke for his timid and sensitive dignity. He turned away, directing his course towards the north, still desiring to join Montrose. Hudson, who had gone forward to reconnoitre, came back to say that M. de Montreuil still answered for the Scots. The king at length made up his mind, though from weariness rather than from choice. On the morning of the 5th of May he arrived at Kelham, the headquarters of the Scotch commander.
The Earl of Leven and his officers at first affected surprise, but they received the king with great respect. They however hastened to apprise the Parliaments of Edinburgh and London, and, in the evening, when the king wished to give the watchword to the sentinels placed at his door, "Pardon me, Sire," Leven said, "I am the oldest soldier here; your Majesty will permit me to undertake that duty."
It was soon known in London that the king had quitted Oxford, but nothing indicated the direction of his flight. On the 6th of May it was at length learned that he had confided his person to the Scotch, who had raised their camp and were marching in great haste towards the border. They only stopped at Newcastle. From there the king could negotiate with the Presbyterians of the two kingdoms.
This was what all the Independents dreaded. For a year past everything had prospered with them. They were masters of the army, and all daring spirits, the energetic and ambitious had placed themselves under their banner. Their influence continued to increase on all hands. They were ruined if at the moment of reaching the summit of power, the king should ally himself with the Presbyterians against them.
They adopted every means to ward off the blow, without scrupling to offend the Scotch, whom they desired to separate from the Presbyterian party in England. The Commons voted that the Scotch army was no longer necessary; that a hundred thousand pounds would be paid to it in advance on account of their claims, and that it should be induced to return to Scotland. Insults were lavished upon those allies, of whom it was now desired to be rid at all costs.
The Scotch and their illustrious guest facilitated the task of their enemies. They were not angry, but they hesitated, they felt their way carefully, they were afraid to take sides. The king still endeavored to deceive his rebellious subjects. "I do not despair," he wrote to Lord Digby before his departure from Oxford, "of inducing the Presbyterians or the Independents to join with me to exterminate each other, and then I shall become once more king in reality." On their side, the Presbyterians, passionately attached to the Covenant, would not hear of any arrangement which did not secure the triumph of their Church. While promising the king to negotiate for peace, they gave further tokens of fidelity towards their brothers, the English, and caused the execution of the most illustrious companions of Montrose, who had been prisoners of war since the battle of Philip-Haugh. The Marquis of Ormond published a letter of the king, asserting that he only repaired to the camp of the Scotch upon their promise, in case of need, to support him and his just rights. The Scotch immediately caused this almost exact interpretation of their words to be belied. The cavaliers could no longer have access to their master, and the clergy were invited to instruct the monarch in the true doctrine of Christ.
Charles did not resist, but even bore with the theological discussions; though the learned preacher, Henderson, who had undertaken his conversion, was not able to congratulate himself upon having shaken the king's fidelity to the Anglican Church. Charles was expecting proposals from the House, to whom he caused to be surrendered all the towns which still held out for him. But he hoped for aid from Ireland, and he wrote to Glamorgan, who was still the sole depositary of his secret designs, "If you can procure a large sum of money for me, pledging my kingdoms as a guarantee, I shall be delighted, and as soon as I shall have recovered the possession, I will amply pay this debt. Tell the nuncio that if I find some means of placing myself in his hands and yours, I will certainly not neglect it, for all the others despise me as I fully see."
At length the proposals of Parliament arrived: they were more humiliating and harsh than those which the king had hitherto rejected. He was asked to adopt the Covenant, to abolish the Church of England, to consign to the Houses for twenty years the command of the army, the militia, and the navy; to allow to be excluded from the armistice seventy-one of his most faithful friends, while all those who had taken arms for him were to be removed from all public functions at the good pleasure of Parliament. On all sides he was urged to accept this disgraceful peace. The queen sent messenger after messenger to him. M. de Bellièvre, the French ambassador, proceeded to Newcastle to advise him to accept it in the name of his court. Several towns in Scotland sent amicable petitions to him. The city of London wished to do likewise: a formal prohibition only prevented it. Threats were coupled with entreaties. The general assembly of the Scotch Church demanded, if the king should refuse the Covenant, that he should be forbidden to remain on Scottish soil, and the Chancellor of Scotland, Lord Lowsden, made him understand that, deprived of his hereditary kingdom, he might very probably find himself deposed in England.
All was powerless against the pride of the king, his religious scruples and also some secret hope which credulous or intriguing friends still kept alive. After having delayed his reply from day to day, he at length consigned to the commissioners on the 1st of August, a written message, in which, without absolutely rejecting the proposals, he again demanded that he should be received in London to negotiate in person with Parliament.
The Independents were unable to restrain their joy. "What is to become of us," said a Presbyterian, "now that the king has refused our proposals?" "What would have become of us if he had accepted them?" replied an Independent. The Scotch proposed to withdraw from England; but they required first the settlement of the arrears, and their claims were enormous. It was necessary to decide who should dispose of the person of the king. The parties commenced the struggle upon this point.
An understanding was arrived at, however, after bitter words and reciprocal recriminations. The arrears were fixed at four hundred thousand pounds sterling, and the House of Commons finally brought the Lords to accept the vote in the terms it had given out for five months past, "that to Parliament alone belonged the right of disposing of the king's person." The Scots resisted feebly, saying that Charles was their king as well as the sovereign of the English. Charles continued to demand to negotiate in person with Parliament.
The wish was as useless the fifth time as the first. The Houses had just signed the treaty which arranged for the withdrawal of the Scotch army, and how the price should be paid. The name of the king was not mentioned in all the clauses of this negotiation, but, on the 3d of December, 1646, at the moment when the convoy of wagons bearing twenty thousand pounds sterling to the Scotch, entered York, the Houses voted that the king should be conducted to Holmby Castle, in Northamptonshire. On the 12th of January, 1647, nine commissioners, three Lords, and six members of the Commons departed from London to take possession respectfully of their sovereign. The dignity of the king proudly resisted this terrible blow. "I am bought and sold," he said, when he learnt that the Parliament of Scotland officially consented to his being consigned into the hands of the English; but he quietly finished his game of chess, replying to the growing anxiety of his servants that he would make known his will to the commissioners when they should arrive. He awaited them without countenancing the confused projects of flight or insurrection which were being hatched around him. The people began to take pity on him. One Sunday, at Newcastle, the Scotch minister who preached before him having chosen his text from a version of the 52d Psalm, beginning,
Why dost thou, tyrant, boast thyself,
Thy wicked deeds to praise?
the king suddenly rose and began instead of this the 56th Psalm, commencing,
Have mercy on me, Lord, I pray,
For men would me devour!
The whole congregation joined with him. A last attempt of the Scotch in favor of the Covenant having miscarried, the Scotch army delivered both Newcastle and the king into the hands of the English. On the 9th of February, Charles left that town under the escort of a regiment of cavalry, everywhere followed by a numerous crowd which thronged on his way, not hostile, but respectful, and asking him to touch the sick persons afflicted with king's evil. The commissioners became uneasy at this gathering, but their prohibitions were ineffectual. When the king arrived at Holmby, where many gentlemen from the neighborhood had assembled, he congratulated himself upon the reception which he had received from his subjects.
Dissensions at Westminster broke out afresh. Assured of the person of the king, the Presbyterians, whose influence had once more become paramount in the House, in consequence of the terror which the Independents began to inspire among moderate men, carried a motion for disbanding the army, except the troops required by the war in Ireland and the service of the garrisons. Fairfax was to retain the command of the reduced forces, but no officer under his orders was to rise above the rank of colonel. All were obliged to conform to the Presbyterian form of government. A loan was voted to pay the arrears due the soldiers. Cromwell sat in the House, when this vote dealt a death-blow to the army he had been instrumental in forming, and among whom his authority continued to increase. He remained in London, and burst into protestations of devotion towards Parliament, but the numerous friends who followed his secret inspiration secretly entertained the natural discontent of the army. A petition, modest and friendly in tone, reached the Houses, signed only by fourteen officers. They promised to repair to Ireland at the first order, merely offering their humble advice upon the payment of the troops and the guarantees to which they were entitled. After this petition, which was somewhat ill-received, came another, more firm and precise, demanding the prompt settlement of the arrears, the pensions for the widows of the soldiers, and asserting the right of the troops to decline service in Ireland. The petition was read at the head of the regiments, and the officers who refused to sign were assailed with threats.
Parliament became incensed and commanded Fairfax to put an end to all these disorders. The facts were impudently denied. The House sent five commissioners to headquarters, to urge forward the disbandment. Two hundred officers came to meet them. "Who are to command us in Ireland?" asked Lambert, a brilliant soldier, ambitious and skilled in oratory. "Major-General Skippon and Major-General Massey." "They are brave soldiers, but we must have general officers whom we have so many times put to the proof." And all the officers exclaimed at once, "Yes, all, Fairfax and Cromwell." A few days afterwards, eight regiments of cavalry refused to repair to Ireland. "A treacherous snare," said the petition brought to the House, "to separate the soldiers from the officers whom they love, and to cover the ambition of a few men who have tasted sovereignty, and who in order to remain masters, degenerate into tyrants." The attack was personal. The soldiers who had brought the petitions were sent for. "Where was this letter taken into consideration?" the speaker asked them. "At a meeting of regiments." "Have your officers approved of it?" "Very few know it." "Have you not been cavaliers?" "We entered the service of Parliament before the battle of Edgehill, and we have never quitted it. We are only the agents of our regiments."
A great uproar arose in the House. Cromwell leant over Ludlow. "Those men," he said, "will have no rest until the army has put them outside by the ears." The instrument was being prepared for the execution. Two councils, one composed of the officers, the other of the representatives of the soldiers, fixed all the proceedings of the army. It was said that it had proposed to the king, if he would place himself at its head, to restore to him his just rights. The Presbyterian leaders took alarm; concessions were made to the soldiers. Cromwell, Ireton, Skippon, Fleetwood, all members of the Commons, were empowered to re-establish a good understanding between Parliament and the army. They repaired to headquarters, where their efforts, certainly not very sincere, brought about no result. The same demands continued to arrive from the army; immediate disbandment was ordered, and five Presbyterian commissioners set out to see to the execution of the decree. They found the army in a full state of insurrection. In the council of war which Fairfax convoked, all the officers, with the exception of six, voted that the resolutions of Parliament were not sufficient, and that the army could not separate without more substantial guarantees. Fairfax had become powerless; the power was passing into the hands of the soldiers and the leaders who possessed their confidence. The Presbyterians had now to struggle against a new enemy. If the army joined the king, they were ruined. Their leaders thought of becoming reconciled with the king.
[Image]
Fairfax Kissing The King's Hand.
While the Presbyterians were discussing and voting, Cromwell and his friends were acting. On the 4th of June, news arrived in London that on the preceding day the king had been taken away from Holmby by a detachment of seven hundred men, and that the army held him in its power.
It was a cornet named Joyce, of the regiment of the guards of Fairfax, who had performed the feat. Arriving secretly with his detachment of cavalry, he at first introduced himself alone into the castle, then he returned at midnight with his soldiers, demanding to speak with the king. Colonel Greaves and the commissioners of Parliament residing with his Majesty refused; they desired to close the iron portcullises, but the new comers dismounted and chatted with the garrison. Colonel Greaves's men declared that they would not be separated from the rest of the army. At midday Joyce was master of the castle. He retired after having stationed sentinels in various parts. In the evening he caused the king to be awakened in order to speak to him. "I will go with you, Mr. Joyce," said Charles, after a rather long conference, "if your soldiers confirm what you have promised."
On the morrow, at six o'clock in the morning, Joyce's troopers were grouped in battle-array in the courtyard. "Mr. Joyce," said the king, appearing upon the steps, "by what authority do you intend to take me from here?" "Sire, by the authority of the army, to prevent the designs of its enemies, who would once more plunge the kingdom in blood." "That is not a legal authority. I know no other in England but mine, and after mine that of Parliament. Have you a commission written by Sir Thomas Fairfax?" "I have the orders of the army, and the general is included in the army." "That is not a reply; where is your commission?" "There it is, Sire." "Where?" "There, behind me," and he pointed to his soldiers. "Never," said the king, smiling, "have I yet seen such a commission. It is written, I admit, in fair characters, legible without spelling; but know that, to take me away, you will have to use force, if you do not promise me that nothing will be required of me which may wound my conscience and honor." "It is not our manner," said Joyce, "to constrain the conscience of any one, still less that of our king." "Now, gentlemen, whither will you conduct me?" "To Oxford, Sire, if you please." "No, the air is not good." "To Cambridge?" "No, I prefer Newmarket; it is an air that has always suited me." "As you will, Sire." And they departed, notwithstanding a last protest from the commissioners of Parliament.
When the news of the capture of the king reached headquarters, it threw Fairfax into extreme agitation. "I do not like this," he said to Ireton; "who gave such orders?" "I ordered," said Ireton, "that the king should be secured in Holmby, but not that he should be made to depart thence." "It was quite necessary," said Cromwell, who had arrived from London, "otherwise the king would have been taken and brought back to Parliament." Charles received the staff of the army at Childersley, near Cambridge. The majority, Fairfax taking the initiative, kissed his hand with respect. Cromwell and Ireton held aloof. Fairfax protested to the king that he was a stranger to the project of his removal. "I do not believe you," said the king, "unless you hang Joyce." Joyce was sent for. "I have told the king," he said, "that I had no commission from the general. I acted by order of the army. Let it be assembled again; if three-fourths do not approve of the act, I consent to be hanged at the head of the regiment." Joyce was not hanged. "Sir," said the king to Fairfax on leaving him, "I have as good interest in the army as you." And continuing to complain of the violence which he had suffered, but satisfied in his heart at changing his prison and seeing discord break out among his enemies, he established himself at Newmarket under the care of Colonel Whalley.
Cromwell returned to London. He found the House of Commons a prey to the most violent agitation. Every one imputed to him the audacious stroke of seizing upon the king. He passionately resented the suspicions, taking God, the angels, and men to witness that, before that day, Joyce was as much a stranger to him as the light of the sun to the child in the womb of its mother. All these protestations did not convince the Presbyterians. Hollis and Grimstone sought everywhere for proofs against Cromwell, being determined to demand his arrest. Two officers came to see Grimstone. "Lately," they said to him, "at a meeting of officers it was discussed whether it would not be advisable to purge the army. 'I am sure of the army,' the lieutenant-general said; 'but there is another body which it is more urgent to purge, that is the House of Commons, and the army alone can do it.'" Grimstone took them to Westminster; they repeated their speech before the House. Cromwell rose, then fell upon his knees, bursting into tears, with a vehemence of speech, sobs, and gestures which overcame with emotion and surprise all present; praying the Lord to wreak upon his head all His vengeance if any man in all the kingdom was more faithful than he to the House. Then, rising, he spoke for two hours, being humble and audacious, prolix and impassioned, with so much success that, when he sat down, the paramount influence had passed over to his friends, and that, "if he had wished," Grimstone himself said, thirty years afterwards, "the House would have sent us to the Tower, the officers and myself, as calumniators." On that very evening Cromwell secretly quitted London, and, repairing to the army assembled at Triploe Heath, near Cambridge, he openly placed himself at the head of the Independents and soldiers.
A few days after his arrival the army was marching towards London, and consternation reigned in the Houses which had received the "humble remonstrance" of the soldiers. It was no longer a question of the exposition of their own grievances, it was the haughty expression of their demands regarding the general reform of the state. They demanded, besides, the expulsion of eleven members of the Commons, including Hollis, Stapleton, Maynard, the enemies, they said, of the army. They advanced, complaining as they went. They were already at St. Alban's, when the Common Council of the city wrote to Fairfax to demand that the army should remain forty miles from London. It was too late, the general replied; they wanted a month's pay. The Houses granted the pay, persisting that the army should go away. The troops continued their march.
Parliament meanwhile redoubled its concessions. All the reproaches which were addressed, all the requests which were made met with a friendly reception. Remedies were granted for the grievances complained of; the king was invited to reside at Richmond under the sole custody of Parliament. They did all they could to escape the necessity of mutilating their body, by expelling the eleven members designated by the army; but, on the 26th of June, the headquarters were at Uxbridge. The shops were closed, and people spoke openly of the obstinacy and selfishness of the eleven members. At length they offered to retire. Their devotion was accepted with such satisfaction that, on the very day of their retirement, the Commons voted that they approved of the army in everything, and would provide for its maintenance while commissioners should settle, in co-operation with others from the soldiers, the affairs of the kingdom. Fairfax consented to withdraw a few miles.
The king was informed that it was no longer desired that he should go to Richmond. "Since my Houses ask me to go to Richmond," he said, "if any one claim to prevent me therefrom it will have to be by force and by seizing the bridle of my horse; and if there be a man who dares attempt it, it will not be my fault if it be his last act." He was informed that the Houses themselves opposed his departure, and that they had yielded in everything to the army. He smiled disdainfully, happy at seeing his first adversaries thus humiliated, and he followed unresistingly the movements of the army. He was carefully guarded, but he enjoyed a liberty which the commissioners of Parliament had not allowed him till recently. He had chaplains, a certain number of his friends were admitted into his presence, he was even permitted to see his children, the Dukes of York and Gloucester, with the Princess Elizabeth, and he was enabled to keep them with him for two days. Some few of the leaders of the army, Cromwell and Ireton especially, asked each other whether the favor of the king, restored by their hands, would not be the best guarantee for their party, and for themselves the surest means of obtaining fortune and power.
The king resolutely forebore from any negotiation with the army, but he was not ignorant of the relations which, with the approval of the queen, his valet-de-chambre, Ashburnham, and the former royalist governor of Exeter, Sir John Berkeley, maintained with Cromwell. The manœuvres of the latter, among the army, were not without effect: the general council of officers was preparing proposals to remit to the king. Charles appeared cold and not very eager when Berkeley joyfully brought the project entrusted to him by Ireton. Never had anything so moderate been asked of a vanquished monarch. It was required that he should surrender for ten years the nominations to the great offices and the command of the soldiery. The political reforms were numerous, but he was not asked to abolish the Episcopal Church, or to ruin with fines the faithful servants who had fought for him, and the exceptions to the armistice numbered only seven. The king appeared so haughty that Berkeley was confounded. "If they really wished to conclude with me," he said, "they would propose things which I might accept." Then, abruptly breaking up the interview, he said, "You will soon see them only too happy themselves to accept conditions more equitable."
Berkeley retired, endeavoring to guess the secret of so much confidence, when he learned that a riot had broken out in the city. Westminster was besieged by bands of citizens and apprentices, loudly demanding the return of the king. A petition, consisting of a pledge to do everything in order that the king might return to London with honor and liberty, was instantly covered with a mass of signatures. Everywhere the officers of the army, but recently remodelled by the Independents, united themselves with the people. The Presbyterians, defeated both in military operations and in the Houses, felt themselves supported by the popular movement, and resumed the control of the trainbands of London, which had been taken from them. The House of Commons, finding its doors forced open by a furious mob, voted the return of the king. Parliament was besieged both by the people and the army.
The king and his confidants triumphed, for insurrection had broken out according to their wish and at their instigation. They were suspected among the army, and the haughtiness displayed by Ashburnham, who had arrived three days after his master, redoubled the ill-humor of the representatives of the soldiers, with whom he forbore negotiating. "I have always lived in good company," he said to Berkeley; "I can have nothing in common with those fellows. We must secure the officers, and, through them, we shall have the whole army." The officers themselves began to distrust the double-dealing which Charles was carrying on. "Sire," Ireton said to him, "do you claim to constitute yourself arbitrator between us and Parliament? It is we who wish to be the arbitrators between Parliament and you." They, however, officially presented their proposals to him. The king listened to them in silence, with an ironical smile, then he rejected them nearly all in few words, and as Ireton was beginning to support them with warmth, Charles abruptly interrupted him: "You cannot be without me (he said); you will fall to ruin if I do not sustain you." The officers looked in astonishment at Berkeley; the latter approached the king. "Sire," he said to him in a whisper, "your Majesty speaks as if you had some secret strength and power which I do not know of. Since your Majesty hath concealed it from me, I wish you had concealed it from these men too." The king endeavored to mitigate his words, but the majority of the officers had already adopted their course. It was said everywhere among the army, that there was no possibility of placing reliance on the king. Charles confidently awaited intelligence from London.
News was brought to headquarters by messengers of distinction. More than sixty members of the two Houses, with Lord Manchester and Speaker Lenthall at their head, arrived unexpectedly in the army, coming, they said, to seek the security and liberty which were denied to them by the fury of the populace. For a week Cromwell and his friends had been laboring, through the medium of Vane and St. John, to bring about this division among Parliament. They affected, however, to partake of the general surprise. Parliament, the real Parliament, with its legal chiefs and faithful members, was henceforth united with the army and under its protection. Joy shone on every countenance: the Lord was loudly praised.
Berkeley was not satisfied. He hastened to bring to the king news so fatal to the success of his negotiations; and urged him to write to the chiefs of the army a letter which should cause a better reception of their proposals to be hoped for. At this price, Cromwell and Ireton still answered for the inclinations of the army. But the king also had news from London. The members of Parliament remaining in the capital were more numerous than those who had quitted it. They had elected a new speaker; they had given orders to form new regiments; the city was full of ardor, and was preparing to defend itself. The king was formally invited to return to London. The vote proclaimed in the streets might reach him at any moment. "I will wait," said Charles to Berkeley. "There will be yet time to write that letter."
The king waited, then wrote; but it was too late. Every day more members of Parliament proceeded to join their colleagues at headquarters. Popular exasperation gave way to fear and uneasiness; compromises were spoken of. Cromwell caused the king to be pressed; he continued to hesitate still. Ashburnham and Berkeley arrived at length at headquarters, the bearers of the letter so often demanded. The submission of the city had preceded them, and the alliance of the king was no longer of any value to the conquerors. Two days afterwards, on the 6th of August, the army, bringing back the fugitive members in triumph, entered London without one single excess characterizing their march, and Fairfax took possession of the Tower, of which the Houses had nominated him governor. All the acts passed by Parliament in the absence of the members who had taken refuge in the army, were declared null in law, for the troops were encamped around Westminster. Everywhere the army triumphed. Parliament was now a docile and humbled instrument in its hands.
It was in the very midst of the army that fresh difficulties were about to arise. Intoxicated with their triumph, the obscure enthusiasts, fanatics of religion or liberty, thought that they had become masters, and aspired to alter not only the State, but society itself, and the face of the world. Possessed of a blind but pure ambition, intractable to any one who appeared to them weak or interested, they constituted in turn the strength and terror of the different parties who were all successively compelled to make use of and deceive them.
Cromwell had formerly found among them a few of his most useful agents, but they began to distrust him. The Lord had delivered into the hands of His servants all their enemies. Meanwhile, they continued to live upon good terms with the "delinquents," even with the greatest of all, who had been permitted to establish himself at Hampton Court, where he was served with idolatrous pomp. His most dangerous councillors were allowed to approach him, and the generals themselves saw them frequently. Rumors were in circulation at the meetings of the soldiers, and Lilburne, still indomitable even in the prison in which the Upper House had caused him to be incarcerated on account of his pamphlets, wrote to Cromwell, "If you despise my warnings as you have hitherto done, know that I will set forth against you all that I have of strength and influence, in order to produce changes in your fortune, which will be very little to your liking."