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King Charles' Children.

The king had risen early.[Footnote 1]

[Footnote 1: The day of the death of Charles I. is celebrated on the 30th of January, because England had not yet adopted the Gregorian Calendar. The 30th of January, 1648, corresponds with the 9th of February, 1649.]

[Transcriber's note: From Wikipedia article "Gregorian calendar"; "In common usage, 1 January was regarded as New Year's Day and celebrated as such, but from the 12th century until 1751 the legal year in England began on 25 March (Lady Day). So, for example, the Parliamentary record lists the execution of Charles I. on 30 January as occurring in 1648 (as the year did not end until 24 March), although later histories adjust the start of the year to 1 January and record the execution as occurring in 1649.]

"I have a great work to do," he said to Herbert, and he began his toilet. The hands of the faithful servant trembled in arranging his hair. "Take, I pray you, the same pains as usual," said the king; "although my head is not to remain long upon my shoulders, I would be as trim to-day as a bridegroom. Let me have a shirt on more than ordinary," he added, "the season is so sharp as probably may make me shake, which some observers will imagine proceeds from fear." The bishop had arrived and opened the Gospel. He began the 27th chapter of St. Matthew, the narrative of the passion of Our Lord. The king asked him, "if he had made choice of that chapter, being so applicable to his present condition?" "It is the proper lesson for the day," said the bishop, touched by the coincidence. The king was at prayers; it was ten o'clock. A light knock was heard at the door: it was Colonel Hacker. He said in a low tone of voice, and almost tremblingly, "It is time to go to Whitehall; your Majesty will have there some further time to rest." "I will come presently," said Charles, and, after a moment's meditation, he descended with the bishop, traversing the Park between the two lines of soldiers drawn up along his passage, with a serene aspect, a bright countenance, a firm step, walking even faster than the troop and marvelling at their slowness. Arriving at Whitehall, he refused the services of the Independent ministers who desired to pray with him. "No," said Charles; "they have too often prayed against me and without any reason to pray with me during my agony. If they wish to pray for me, I shall be grateful to them."

He received the communion from the hands of the bishop, and, rising again, with alacrity, "Now," he said, "let those rogues come. I have forgiven them from the bottom of my heart. I am ready for all that is about to befall me." He would eat nothing; Juxon insisted. "Your Majesty has fasted for a long time. It is cold, perhaps upon the scaffold, some weakness …" "You are right," said the king. He ate a piece of bread and drank a glass of wine. It was one o'clock; Hacker knocked at the door. Juxon and Herbert fell upon their knees; it was the king who raised them. He traversed the banqueting-hall; behind the line of soldiers, a crowd of men and women, pale, motionless, praying for the king as he passed. The soldiers did not use him roughly. At the extremity of the hall, an opening made on the day previous led to the scaffold, level with it and hung with black. Two men stood near the axe, each in a sailor's attire and masked. The king arrived, with head erect, endeavoring to catch the eye of the people, to speak to them; but the troops alone covered the spot. None could approach, and it was to Juxon and the colonel of the guard, Tomlinson, that Charles addressed the little speech which he had prepared. It was calm and grave even to coldness, while maintaining that he had always been in the right in his conduct as king. While he spoke, some one touched the axe. He turned abruptly around: "Do not hurt the axe that it may hurt me," he said. His speech was ended; the most profound silence reigned in the open space. The king himself arranged his hair under a silken cap; then, turning towards the bishop, "I have a good cause and a gracious God on my side." "Yes, Sire, there is but one stage more; this stage is turbulent and troublesome. It is a short one, but you may consider it will soon carry you a very great way. It will carry you from earth to heaven." The king replied, "I go from a corruptible to an incorruptible crown, where no disturbance can be, no disturbance in the world." He had taken off his collar of St. George and consigned it to the bishop, saying to him, "Remember." Then he looked at the block. "Be careful that it is set fast," he said to the executioner. "It is fast, Sire." "I will offer up a short prayer, and when I put my hands out this way (stretching them out), then." He collected his thoughts, said a few words in a low tone of voice, raised his eyes to heaven and knelt down, placing his head upon the block. The executioner touched his hair to rearrange it under his cap. The king thought he was about to strike. "Stay for the sign," he said. "Yes I will, and until it please your Majesty." A moment after the king stretched out his hands, and his head fell at the first blow. "This is the head of a traitor," exclaimed the executioner, showing it to the people; but a prolonged shudder alone answered him, and the cavalry, advancing slowly through the crowd, had great difficulty in dispersing the people, who had rushed to the foot of the scaffold to steep their handkerchiefs in the blood of the martyred king.

The coffin remained exposed for seven days at Whitehall. Cromwell caused it to be opened, and, taking the head in his hands, as though to assure himself that it was really separated from the trunk, "It appeared sound," he said, "and well made for a long life."

On the 8th of February, a few faithful servants accompanied the remains of their master to the tomb. It was at Windsor, in St. George's Chapel, where the body of Henry VIII. reposed, that Charles I. was to be buried. The sky was cloudless; but suddenly, as the coffin crossed the courtyard of the castle, a heavy fall of snow took place, and the pall of black velvet was completely covered with it. The servants of the king saw therein the heavenly sign of the innocence of their unhappy master. Juxon prepared to officiate according to the rites of the Anglican Church. Hacker opposed this. "The liturgy decreed by Parliament is obligatory for the king as for all," he said. Juxon submitted, and the coffin was lowered into the vault without any religious ceremony. Those who were present prayed in their hearts.

Chapter XXVI.

The Commonwealth And Cromwell (1649-1653).

King Charles I. had not yet been lowered into his tomb, when, on the 7th of February, the House of Commons, reduced by successive purifications to a hundred members, voted an Act reading thus: "It has been proved by experience, and this House declares, that the office of king is in this country useless, and dangerous to the liberty, security, and good of the people; henceforth to be abolished." The House of Lords had been suppressed on the day previous. A Council of State was entrusted with executive power. It was composed of forty-one members, amongst whom were the three leaders of the army—Fairfax, Cromwell, and Skippon—with five former peers. Nearly all the others belonged to the House of Commons.

A disagreement sprang up at the outset. The new councillors were asked to sign a declaration approving what had been done regarding the trial of the king and the abolition of the monarchy as well as in the House of Lords. Twenty-two members of the council refused to sign. They promised to serve faithfully the government of the House of Commons, the only power remaining, but without expounding their views upon acts which they disapproved in different degrees. Cromwell perceived that the regicides could not govern alone. He came to an agreement with Sir Henry Vane, the most sincere, the most able, and the most visionary of the republican statesmen. Sir Henry had refused to take part in the trial of the king, but he consented to sit in the council of state, provided that the past should not be referred to. The presidency was conferred upon Bradshaw. He took, as Latin secretary, one of his cousins who had recently maintained, in an eloquent pamphlet, that it was right to summon to trial "a tyrant or a bad king, as well as to depose him and put him to death after having duly convicted him." This was the poet Milton.

The Republic was founded and its government was being organized, but the country submitted without accepting it. Nearly four months elapsed before it could be proclaimed in the City of London. It had been found necessary to change the Lord Mayor, and the aldermen absented themselves upon the day of the solemn publication. "What was being done was against my conscience and my oaths," said Sir Thomas Sumes, when summoned to answer for his absence at the bar of the House. "My heart was not in this work," said Richard Chambers. Great difficulty was experienced in finding aldermen to replace them. Everywhere the same ill-feeling was manifested. Two years after the establishment of the Commonwealth, Parliament was compelled to entrust to the parishes the task of destroying all emblems recalling the monarchy. The clergy on all hands refused to take the oath of fidelity to the new power, and the government did not dare to give the name of the "Commonwealth of England" to a new frigate launched in the port of London in presence of the assembled council of state. "It was considered," wrote the Minister of France, M. de Croullé, to Cardinal Mazarin, "that if this ship were to perish, as all vessels are liable to do, it would be a bad omen."

The republican government, so shackled in its course, held in its hands some of the most eminent royalist leaders: the Duke of Hamilton, the Earls of Holland and Norwich, Lord Capel, Sir John Owen—valiant remnants of the last struggles of the civil war, who for several months had all been prisoners. Scarcely had the High Court, which condemned Charles I., completed its task when a fresh tribunal was formed, still under the presidency of Bradshaw, to try those who had fought for him until the last moment, and of whom the greater number were to follow him to the scaffold.

The Court began its sitting upon the 5th of February. The five accused men represented different shades of the royalist party. The Duke of Hamilton, a great nobleman and a politician of the court; Lord Holland, a frivolous and corrupt courtier; Lord Norwich, a true cavalier, complaisant, jovial, and devoted to the king; Sir John Owen, a worthy country gentleman, courageous and simple-minded; finally, Lord Capel, a model of all the firm and grave virtues, as independent as he was faithful. All five were condemned to death. The Duke of Hamilton immediately received not only an offer of his life, but of the return of his former office if he would make revelations upon the past. "If I had as many lives as I have hairs upon my head," said the duke, "I would sacrifice them all rather than ransom them by so shameful a bargain." When Sir John Owen heard his sentence pronounced, he made a low bow to the court. "It is a very great honor to a poor gentleman of Wales," he said, "to lose his head with such noble lords:" and he added with an oath, "I was afraid they would have hanged me."

Everything was tried in order to obtain from Parliament the pardon of the condemned. The appeal of the Duke of Hamilton and Lord Holland was rejected; Lord Norwich and Sir John Owen were pardoned; the latter, at the instigation of Hutchinson, who observed to Ireton, "I am going to speak for this poor gentleman, who is alone and without friends." There remained Lord Capel, the object of passionate solicitude and the most active proceedings on the part of his family. His appeal was discussed before Parliament. Cromwell rose, dwelling more especially upon the virtues of Lord Capel. "My affection for the public interest, however, weighs down my private friendship," he said. "I cannot but tell you that you have now to decide whether you will preserve the most bitter and implacable enemy you have. I know Lord Capel very well; he will be the last man in England who will abandon the royal cause; he has great courage, ability, and generosity; as long as he shall live, whatever may be his position, he will be a thorn in your side; for the well-being of the commonwealth I feel compelled to vote against his petition." It was rejected.

The death of Lord Capel justified the picture which his enemies had drawn of his life. The Duke of Hamilton and Lord Holland suffered the penalty simply and worthily, before him; he appeared alone upon the scaffold, having said farewell to his wife and children with words of consolation and encouragement. "Is your chaplain there, sir?" asked the officer in command. "No," replied he, "I have taken leave of him." Seeing several of his servants, who were weeping, "Restrain yourselves," he said. Then, removing his hat, he addressed the people, frankly and simply, as a royalist and a Christian. He had promised his chaplain, Dr. Morley, to take the blame himself for his vote against Strafford. "I confess," he said, "for the glory of God, and to the shame of my own weakness, that it was indeed an unworthy act of cowardice not to resist the torrent which bore us along in this affair." People and soldiers, friends and strangers, all beheld him die, the object of admiration and respect.

The republican leaders perceived that this admiration and respect were not favorable to them. They desisted from this system of execution. The royalists remaining in their hands were banished, and their property was confiscated. Others merely remained in prison; no more clamor was desired; the proceedings of the High Court which had condemned Lord Capel were not published, the rigors of the past were silenced, blood ceased to flow. Parliament could not, however, suppress a book which had recently appeared, and the success of which continued to increase. The Eikon Basiliké (or royal image) revealed to England under a pious form the reflections and opinions of the king during the course of his trials. The book professed to be the personal work of Charles, but it had been written by Dr. Gauden, subsequently Bishop of Worcester, under the restoration. The king had probably corrected it during his sojourn in the Isle of Wight. It was in effect, the royal image, a loftiness that was both natural and strained, a constant mingling of blind princely pride and sincere Christian humility, a real piety amidst false dealing, and the expression of an invincible devotion to his faith, his honor, and his rank. Herein was matter to move royalist hearts. Notwithstanding the efforts of Parliament, forty-eight thousand copies were circulated in England during the year. All Europe devoured the book, which was translated into all languages. The attachment to the memory of the king became the object of passionate worship. Milton was commissioned to reply in the name of Parliament, but the apology of the Iconoclast, prolix and cold, notwithstanding its violence, did not destroy the effect of Eikon Basiliké. To his friends and to many people in Europe, Charles remained a martyr, and his enemies the executioners of a saint.

The annoyances and embarrassments caused to Parliament by the remnant of the royalist party, were not the gravest that it had to fight against. Barely installed, the republican government found itself in presence of an ardent, democratic, and mystical opposition. A man had been found, endowed with an indomitable courage and devotion, who constituted himself not the chief—no one was chief at that time—but the interpreter and defender of all the malcontents. This was John Lilburne, already accustomed to playing this part under the monarchy.

Having become masters, the republican leaders felt the danger of the habits of agitation which they had but recently favored in the army, and they forbade the soldiers to join in any gathering contrary to discipline. A pamphlet by Lilburne appeared attacking those prohibitions: the New Chains of England Discovered incited the soldiers to disobedience. Five of them brought to Fairfax a violent petition; they were degraded. The libels of Lilburne succeeded each other, personally attacking the generals. "Speak to Cromwell of whatsoever it may be," he exclaimed, "he will place his hand upon his heart, he will raise his eyes to heaven, he will take God to witness, he will weep, he will groan, he will repent himself, and so doing, he will strike you under the first rib." Such violence could not be tolerated. The House voted that the pamphlet of Lilburne was full of false, calumnious, and seditious accusations. He was placed in the Tower with three of his principal fellow-laborers. Two new libels from the indomitable agitator appeared while he was in prison.

The doctrines which he preached with so much zeal began to bear their fruits. A band of rough men already overran the county of Surrey, digging and sowing here and there, first on the commons and waste lands, but talking of throwing down the fences of the neighboring parks. They invited the people of the vicinity to join them, promising clothes and victuals to those who should come and aid them. Fairfax sent two squadrons against them; the chiefs were arrested; one of them, Everard, was an old soldier. "We are of the race of the Israelites," they said; "the liberties of the people were lost under William the Conqueror; we are nearing the time of deliverance; I have seen a vision which said to me: 'Go and till the ground to feed those who are hungry, and clothe those who are naked;' we do not desire to attack property, but a time will come when all men will willingly give their possessions to put them into the common lot. That time is near."

ed Lilburne and his friends saw the danger. They added to their constitution an article formally declaring that "possessions would not be divided, nor all things put into the common lot;" but the "Delvers," as the disciples of Everard styled themselves, or the "levellers," as they were generally called, had excited the public imagination, and that title was soon applied to all the little anarchical associations, civil or military, which decided to found the republic under an absolutely democratic form, and who offered an ardent opposition to the actual government of England; from words men soon came to blows.

Every day popular deputations besieged the gates of Westminster, demanding the restoration to liberty of Lilburne and his associates. "Return to your platters," was the answer of Parliament to a band of women. "We no longer have any platters," they said, "nor meat to put upon them." Amidst this fermentation, eight regiments, cavalry and infantry, were chosen for service in Ireland. The soldiers complained; they were unwilling to leave England without having their arrears of pay settled, and without having enforced their political views. A little paper was circulated in the ranks, advising them not to depart. A squadron of the cavalry of Whalley, who had received orders to quit London, took possession of the standard and refused to obey. Fairfax and Cromwell hastened to the scene; they quelled the insurrection; fifteen of the most mutinous were arrested, and five condemned to death by a court-martial, notwithstanding the representations of Lilburne, who maintained that no Englishman could, in time of peace, lose his life upon the decree of a council of war. But Cromwell could caress and strike at the same time; four of the condemned men were pardoned; the fifth, Robert Lockyer, was shot in St. Paul's Churchyard. He was young, brave, and pious, a fanatical sectarian, beloved by his comrades. Solemn obsequies were performed in his honor; a hundred troopers rode in front; the sword of the deceased man and branches of rosemary dyed with blood rested upon the coffin; a crowd of sympathetic spectators awaited the body at the cemetery. Such sights were both an affront and a warning to the government.

Insurrection broke out in several regiments; fermentation was in progress all around. A corps of insurgent soldiers, placing at their head Captain Thompson, overran Oxfordshire. The generals marched upon them, after having in the first place assured themselves of the fidelity of the troops whom they had under their control; they attacked the rebels at Burford. Already discouraged by the blow which they had suffered from a first detachment sent against them, they defended themselves for some time in the town, from the housetops and in the streets. Then a great number surrendered. The others contrived to escape; the court-martial decided that the rebels should be decimated. The condemned men were assembled together upon the leads of the church, whence they saw their comrades brought out one by one to the square and shot in the face of the army. Three had already suffered their fate without retracting anything that they had done, and themselves giving the signal for the firing. Cornet Dean came fourth: he was a worthy soldier whom the generals knew; he manifested penitence; Fairfax pardoned him. Cromwell entered the church, caused the remainder of the condemned men to descend, rebuked them, admonished them, reproached them for the peril which they had caused to the cause of God and the country. These rude and haughty soldiers shed tears, and, when they were restored to their regiments and sent to Ireland, they marched with a good will.

The republican generals had been both prudent and firm, bold and moderate. Parliament and the city of London congratulated them upon their success with a degree of gratitude which revealed their fears; but the danger was only lulled; fresh insurrections might break out; they were indeed breaking out every day, and the "levellers," through hatred of Cromwell and his friends, became reconciled with the cavaliers. "I would rather live seven years under the government of old King Charles, although they may have cut off his head as a tyrant, than one year under their present tyranny," said Lilburne, in his prison; "and I tell you that if they persist in this tyranny, they will create sufficient friends for Prince Charles, not only to proclaim his name, but further, to bring him back to the throne of his father."

Parliament was agitated by this new danger. The trial of Lilburne, so long deferred, at length began. He appeared before the jury upon the 24th of October, 1649; he was as skillful in defending himself as in attacking his opponents. At the moment when the jurymen were about to retire to deliberate, the accused suddenly turned towards them. "Gentlemen of the jury," he said, "you are my sole judges, the keepers of my life, at whose hands the Lord will require my blood. And therefore desire you to know your power and consider your duty, both to God, to me, to your own selves, and to your country, and the gracious assisting Spirit and presence of the Lord God Omnipotent, the Governor of heaven and earth, and all things therein contained, go along with you, give counsel and direct you to do that which is just and for His glory." Lilburne was acquitted, and the acclamations of the people greeted this decision, accompanied with such outbursts of joy that no voice could be heard in the Hall for more than half an hour.

Parliament felt keenly this blow, and redoubled its rigors against the press. At the same time residence in London was forbidden the Cavaliers, the Catholics, and suspected persons. The old Presbyterian leaders, Sir William Waller, Major-General Brown and a few others, hitherto detained at Windsor, were sent to different towns of England. The Commonwealth exercised a tyranny which royalty had never known, or practiced, but it did not contrive to establish itself. Cromwell continued to become greater in its midst, and without encountering any active resistance. The republican authorities alone, and surrounded by irreconcilable enemies, in vain caused the pamphlets entitled the Character of King Cromwell to be seized at Coventry. The civil war was still further to increase the power of the rival whom they dreaded while they served him.

While England was organizing the Commonwealth, Scotland and Ireland, in the main royalist, notwithstanding the party dissensions which agitated them, had proclaimed the Prince of Wales king, and delegates had set out to implore the new monarch to repair to his kingdom. Charles II. was at the Hague, surrounded by the best counsellors of the king his father, who had prevented him from establishing himself in France, the policy and religion of which country inspired great distrust. They persisted, in concurrence with the Scotch commissioners, in urging the king to sever his connection with Montrose, and to accept the harsh conditions which the Presbyterians offered him. Montrose was at the Hague, speaking eloquently of the victories which might yet be expected in Scotland. The Marquis of Ormond urged Charles to proceed to Ireland, whither the chief of the rebels, Owen Rae O'Neill, summoned him. The king hesitated, recoiled; he endeavored to draw up a manifesto which should satisfy both the royalists of England, Scotland, and Ireland; then, abandoning this impossible undertaking, he at length quitted the Hague, and, under pretext of proceeding to France to say farewell to the queen his mother, he deferred his departure, more perplexed in his designs than eager to support by his presence the efforts which his faithful subjects were about to make in his behalf.

Parliament had not delayed so long in adopting its course. The proclamation of King Charles II. in Ireland rendered necessary the expedition which was to reconquer that kingdom for Protestant domination and snatch it from the disorder which had so long reigned there. There was moreover an ardent desire to occupy the army, and remove Cromwell to a distance on an honorable pretext. A hundred and twenty thousand pounds sterling per month was voted for the maintenance of the army. Cromwell was nominated general, while to Fairfax was given, to console him for his inaction, the vain title of generalissimo of all the forces of Parliament.

The army corps intended for Ireland was ready, well equipped, well clothed, well paid. Skillful precautions and prudent manœuvres were at work to alienate from the royal party on the one hand the moderate, and on the other the most fervent Catholics, who were flattered with the hope of freedom in their worship. Meanwhile, Cromwell did not depart. "It is scarcely to be reconciled with common sense," wrote M. de Croullé to Mazarin, "that Cromwell, who, according to the belief of many, carries his thoughts far beyond where the most intemperate ambition can lead him, should determine to abandon this kingdom to the mercy of the cabals which might be formed in his absence, and which his presence can prevent from being even undertaken."

If Cromwell thus had a difficulty in tearing himself away from England, where he must leave behind him rivals and declared or secret enemies, the successes of Ormond, in Ireland, soon presented themselves, compelling him to take his course. Londonderry and Dublin remained in the possession of Parliament; further, the latter city was besieged before the end of July, when the advanced guard of the Parliamentary general landed in Ireland. On the 2d of August the governor of Dublin, Michael Jones, made a successful sortie. Notwithstanding all the efforts of Ormond, the royal army, shamefully routed, found itself compelled to raise the siege. Cromwell himself landed in the port of Dublin on the 15th of August.

Scarcely had he reached Ireland when he saw that all consideration towards the moderate party and the Catholics was difficult: passions were too violent and excited. English against Irish, Protestants against Catholics, republicans against royalists, it was necessary to allow full scope to be given to hatred and vengeance in order to be assured of victory. Cromwell was anxious to conquer at all costs. It was under these dark auspices that the campaign began, on the 31st of August, with the siege of Drogheda, a town considerable among all those of the province of Leinster. The garrison was numerous, composed in great part of English, and they made a vigorous resistance. It was necessary to make the assault twice, and to carry the towers one by one. "I do not think," wrote Cromwell, after the victory, "that, of the whole number of the defendants, thirty have escaped with their lives. Truly I believe that it will tend to prevent the effusion of blood for the future, which are the satisfactory grounds to such actions which otherwise cannot but work remorse and regret."

The massacre of Drogheda did not suffice to arrest the bloodshed. Wexford defended itself in the same manner and suffered the same fate. In the parts in which success was more easy, it was yet sullied by great cruelties. Meanwhile the strictest discipline reigned in the army; the country districts were quiet, and the soldiers were careful to pay for everything they took. Cromwell had secretly recommenced his intrigues, at times causing the projects of his enemies to miscarry through their own dissensions, by means of the skillful agents whom he introduced among them. This man, who boasted of having slain all the friars of Drogheda, made useful service of the ecclesiastics as secret emissaries. His seductive efforts reached even the Marquis of Ormond, for whom he manifested great esteem, often saying, "What has Lord Ormond to do with Charles Stuart, and what favors has he received from him?" At the same time, and by an act of shrewd foresight, he authorized recruiting in Ireland for the service of foreign powers. In a few months this little Catholic kingdom, which had with great difficulty furnished an army of eight to ten thousand men for the service of the king, sent to France and Spain more than fifty thousand soldiers, fierce enemies of Protestantism and Parliament. The republican chiefs, in London, began to find that the absence of Cromwell and his new glory dangerously enhanced his greatness; they urged him to return to London, placing a part of Whitehall and of St. James's Palace at his disposal. Cromwell was profuse in his acknowledgments, but he delayed returning to England as he had delayed leaving it. Fresh events were preparing which were about to furnish him with an opportunity for displaying both his skill and genius.

Charles II. had left Ormond to fight for him in Ireland. At the first news of his defeat before Dublin, he had for a moment desired to throw himself in the midst of the struggle. It was represented to him that the moment was ill-chosen; that it was not well to go there to take part in a defeat. "Then I must go there to die," he nobly replied, "for it is shameful for me to live elsewhere." Recovering from this courageous impulse, he lived elsewhere, leaving his friends to die in Ireland. The same fate was soon to overtake in Scotland the most brilliant and devoted of his adherents.

The Parliament of Scotland had invited Charles to resume the negotiations previously entered upon at the Hague. The conditions of the Presbyterians were as harsh as ever, but Ireland was almost lost. Ormond no longer had any hope save in the diversion of a war between England and Scotland. The friends of the king urged him to lend ear to the proposals of the Scots; fresh conferences were held at Breda. While Montrose, still independent and ardently opposed to the Presbyterians, was seeking soldiers and money in Germany, Charles II. wrote on the 19th of September, 1649: "I entreat you to go on vigorously with your wonted courage and care, in the prosecution of those trusts committed to you, and not be startled with any reports you may hear, as if I were otherwise inclined to the Presbyterians than when I left you. I assure you, I am upon the same principles I was and depend as much as ever upon your undertakings and endeavors for my service."

Montrose was, in effect, preparing an important enterprise. He had recruited, with great pains, a certain number of soldiers; but his first division perished at sea; the second landed in the Orkney Islands, awaiting their general. It was there, at the beginning of March, 1650, that Montrose landed in his turn, accompanied only by a few Scottish noblemen and five hundred soldiers. He rallied the troops who had preceded him, and full of confidence in the promises which he had received and the popular risings upon which he counted, he disembarked at the northernmost extremity of Scotland, displaying with the royal banner a standard bearing an image of the decapitated head of Charles I., with these words: "Judge, and revenge my cause, O Lord."

Montrose advanced across the counties of Caithness and Sutherland; but the reinforcements which he expected did not arrive, the chiefs whose support he hoped for placed themselves, on the contrary, on the side of Parliament. An army corps sent by the government of Edinburgh, under the orders of Colonel Strachan, marched against him. Ill-guarded and destitute of information regarding the movements of the enemy, Montrose was attacked unawares on the 16th of April, near Corbiesdale, in the county of Ross. The soldiers whom he had brought from Germany fought valiantly; but the recruits from the Orkney Islands disbanded. At the moment when Montrose was vainly endeavoring to rally them, his horse was killed under him. His friend Lord Frendraught gave him his own. The rout was complete. The marquis threw away his uniform and decorations; he donned the clothing of a peasant and plunged into the country, seeking everywhere a shelter. He wandered about in this manner for a fortnight among the mountains, now well received by his partisans, now repulsed with terror. At length he was delivered up to his enemies on the 3rd of May, by Neil Macleod, formerly one of his friends, for four hundred bolls of meal. On the 17th of May, after moving from halting-place to halting-place, he was transferred to Leith, near Edinburgh. The last act of the tragedy was at hand.

On the same day, the Parliament, assembled in Edinburgh, voted that "James Graham, bareheaded and bound by a rope to a cart, should be brought by the executioner to the bar, there to receive his sentence, and that he should be carried to Edinburgh, and there be hanged on a gibbet; then to be taken down, his quarters to be nailed to the different gates of the city." The hatred of the enemies of Montrose took pleasure in such a sight, and persons who were indifferent were more terrified than revolted.

The noble partisan, the bold and brilliant captain, pale and wearied by the severities of his captivity, was accordingly conducted upon a sorry horse from Leith to Edinburgh. Being received by the magistrates and the executioner, preceded by thirty-two of his officers bound together two by two, Montrose entered the city in a cart. The vast crowd was hostile, and had come with the object of insulting the prisoner. His courage and gravity imposed silence upon their ill-will. As the procession passed before the house of the Earl of Moray, the cart stopped for a moment, and behind a half-opened window the Marquis of Argyle was seen feasting his eyes upon the humiliation of his enemy.

On arriving at the prison, Montrose was asked whether he had anything to say before receiving his sentence. He refused to reply; he did not know whether the king had concluded any arrangement with Parliament. The treaty was signed, and Charles II. was upon the point of proceeding to Scotland. This was made known to Montrose, who appeared somewhat moved, while persisting in his silence, notwithstanding the solicitations of the commissioners. Two days afterwards, at the bar of Parliament, where he appeared magnificently attired, defending himself from the cruelties which had been imputed to him during the war, he heard his sentence kneeling. "I kneel to render honor to the king my master, in whose name you sit," he said, "and not to Parliament." The execution was fixed for the morrow.

The soldiers and citizens were under arms; some attempt in favor of the condemned man was feared. "What!" said Montrose, "do these good people, who were so greatly in fear of me when I was alive, still fear me when I am about to die? Let them beware! When I am dead I shall haunt their consciences, and be far more formidable than when alive." He refused the services of the Presbyterian ministers, and spent the entire night alone in prayer save when he was composing verses of a beautiful and noble kind notwithstanding their subtlety. "I wish," he said, "I had limbs enough to be dispersed into all the cities of Christendom, there to remain as testimonies in favor of the cause for which I suffer." Proud and calm, he thus marched to the scaffold; the executioner wept on placing the rope round his neck. A sorrowful murmur arose among the crowd. Argyle himself was agitated and sad, as though smitten with some regret or with a presentiment of his own fate.

The commissioners of Parliament had not deceived Montrose when they told him that they had negotiated with the king, and that he was about to come back among them. At the moment when the news of the defeat of Montrose arrived at Breda, Charles II., hitherto hesitating, decided to accept the Covenant and to promise to govern in all civil matters according to the advice of Parliament, in all religious matters according to the advice of the Presbyterian Church. To give to his promises the sanction of a brilliant falsehood, he wrote to Parliament that, having forbidden Montrose to undertake his expedition, he could not regret the defeat of a man who had disobeyed him.

He doubtless accepted in the same spirit the execution of his loyal servant, whose life, it was said, he wanted to save; no trace has remained of this disgraceful compact. Montrose died on the 21st of May. On the 2nd of June, Charles II. embarked for Scotland with a fleet which his brother-in-law, the Prince of Orange, placed at his service. Three weeks later, he set foot in his kingdom, after having signed the Covenant aboard his vessel, and taking farewell of nearly all the gentlemen who accompanied him. The King of Scotland had delivered himself up, bound hand and foot, to Parliament and the Presbyterians.

At the same moment Cromwell was at last returning victorious from Ireland. He landed at Bristol. An immense crowd thronged his passage, rending the air with their acclamations. "What a crowd come to see your lordship's triumph!" said one of those present to Cromwell. "If it were to see me hanged, how many more there would be," abruptly replied the general.

The repose of Cromwell was not to be of long duration. Parliament had conferred on the Council of State every power necessary to repress the invasion which was expected on the part of the Scotch. The council decided that the invasion should be forestalled by invading Scotland. Fairfax had been nominated Generalissimo; but when he learnt that the initiative of hostilities was about to be taken, he resigned his command. In vain did many remonstrate with him, Cromwell foremost. "The lieutenant-general," said Ludlow, "acted his part so to the life that I really thought that he was in earnest; this obliged me to go to him, as he was issuing forth from the Council Chamber, to beg him not to push scruples and modesty to a refusal which would be hurtful to the service of the nation; but the sequel showed that this was in no wise his intention." Fairfax resigned all his offices. Cromwell was nominated captain-general, and on the 22d of July, 1650, he crossed the Tweed at the head of about fifteen thousand men. On setting foot upon Scottish soil he turned towards his troops: "As a Christian and a soldier I exhort you to be wary and worthy, for sure enough we have work before us. But have we not had God's blessing hitherto? Let us go on faithfully, and hope for the like still."

If he had been well acquainted with what was taking place in the councils of Scotland, Cromwell would, without doubt, have had confidence in his success. The Presbyterian Scots surrounded with royal honors the monarch whom they had recalled; but he was treated as a prisoner who is distrusted, and whom it is desired to separate from the business in hand. The king did not attend at the council, and when he wished to consult Argyle upon some affair of importance, the latter respectfully avoided the confidence. On the other hand, the theologians overwhelmed with their exhortations the young prince, who was devoting himself, but in vain, to becoming a hypocrite. Distrust remained unshaken. When Cromwell had crossed the border, the king was brought to the camp, near Leith. In a few days alarm was taken at the influence which he might exert over the troops, and he was conducted to Perth, further away than ever from the scene of operations.

This was not sufficient for the fanatics; they asked Charles to sign an expiatory declaration, in which he should expressly acknowledge the wrongs of the king his father, the idolatry of the queen his mother, and his own sin in the treaty which he had concluded with the Irish rebels. It was at the same time demanded that, in favor of free Parliaments and the Presbyterian rule in the Church, in England as well as in Scotland, he should renew all the protestations and engagements against Papacy which had already been wrung from him.

On the first impulse Charles refused. "I could not look my mother in the face if I were to sign such a document," he said. But the symptoms of disorganization increased among the royalist party. The king knew that outside of Scotland there was neither party, nor army, nor kingdom for him. He signed the expiatory declaration, and the fanatical preachers assured their audiences that, "the wrath of heaven being now appeased, an easy victory would be gained over a general blasphemer and an army of sectaries."

The sectaries and their general were meanwhile advancing into Scotland, but in circumstances so difficult that they were more occupied with escaping from their own perils than with taking advantage of the weakness and divisions among their enemies. Everywhere before them, as they marched, they encountered a desert; men and flocks had disappeared in accordance with the orders of Lesley and the passionate exhortations of the Presbyterian ministers. Without any other resource in the country itself, Cromwell could only feed his troops by means of provisions coming to him by sea from England, which compelled him to continually proceed along the coast. Lesley remained behind in his intrenchments, between Edinburgh and Leith. Bad weather engendered a host of diseases in the English army. "They hope," wrote Cromwell to Bradshaw, on the 30th of July, "that we shall famish for want of provisions, which is very likely to be if we are not timely and fully supplied."

The situation had become so urgent that Cromwell resolved to fall back upon Dunbar, in order to wait there for convoys and reinforcements. From there it was possible, if the supplies were too long delayed, to regain the English border. Upon the way, Lesley, having at length issued forth from his camp, constantly harassed the English. Scarcely had they arrived at Dunbar, when they found their retreat cut off by a considerable detachment occupying the defile of Copperspath, "so narrow," said Cromwell himself, "that ten men to hinder are better than forty to make their way." Lesley yielded to the solicitations and anger of the fanatics. He had hitherto carefully avoided battle, being satisfied with driving before him every day the famous Ironsides and their invincible general, without endeavoring to measure his strength with them. But the ministers were eager to enjoy the glory of victory, and called upon the general not to suffer the enemy to escape whom God had delivered into their hands. "They had disposed of us," said Cromwell, "and of their business by sufficient revenge and wrath towards our persons, and had swallowed up the poor interest of England, believing that their army and their king would have marched to London without any interruption." Lesley resisted no longer. "To-morrow, at seven o'clock in the morning," he said, on the 2d of September, to his officers, "the English army will be ours, dead or alive."

At this moment Cromwell was leaving a prayer-meeting, and he mounted on horseback, with Lambert, his major-general. Surveying with his telescope the positions of the Scottish army, he was struck by the movement which was taking place among the enemy. Lesley was preparing to throw himself across his passage with all his troops. Cromwell was only anxious to fight. "The Lord delivers them into our hands; they come!" he exclaimed, and he proposed to his officers to forestall the Scots and marched towards them. Monk vigorously supported the opinion of the general, and solicited the command of the infantry of the advanced guard. The English spent the night in preparing for the struggle.