providing they might be satisfied in other points."*

Whatever may have been the " strange methods" which Cromwell and his partisans employed, there is no doubt that their arts were attended with success. Lord Lauderdale, indeed, wrote from London very earnestly, with the view of undeceiving his Majesty, and of assuring him that he possessed the most perfect knowledge that the designs of those persons had no other object but the destruction of the monarchy and the ruin of the royal family. This, adds Dr Burnet, he continued "to represent, by many letters, both to the King and to those about him; yet his Majesty was much wrought upon to give credit to those offers of the sectaries, which made him the less apprehensive of hazard." But may not the conduct of Charles on this occasion, which has hitherto appeared so unaccountable, be in some measure explained by a reference to the plan which was adopted by his enemies to mislead him? Hudson was deservedly a favourite in the royal household, and possessed of no small influence in the King's most secret councils; whence we can easily understand, that if Cromwell deceived him, and could convert his zeal for the cause of his master into an instrument of fraud, the friends of the monarchy, during the treaty of Newcastle, must in vain have urged the strongest reasons for compliance with the demands of Parliament.

It belongs not to the biographer of Cromwell to state the terms of that unfortunate sti

* Burnet, p. 288.

pulation which provided for the delivery of Charles into the hands of the English commissioners. It is enough to mention, that the rejection of their propositions, and the firmness which he displayed in refusing to give his sanction to their religious model, had so much incensed the majority of the Presbyterians against the monarch, that the Independents had no immediate cause to apprehend a union of their interests. The struggle henceforth is, therefore, not between the power of the crown and that of the people, but between the two parties into which the popular leaders had formed themselves during the progress of the war. In this contest we shall behold Cromwell acting a distinguished part, treading under foot the very authority for which he had fought in the field; using as tools the ablest men of the age; and inducing the friends of liberty to strain their utmost exertions for the establishment of a military despotism, under which the law of the sword superseded for a time the exercise of every other code, in the administration of public affairs.

In taking a retrospect of the events which have marked the course of the four preceding years, it will be acknowledged that for the issue of the war, so favourable to their interests, the Parliament were greatly indebted to the courage and military talent of Oliver Cromwell. During the earlier campaigns, the victories gained by their arms were merely nominal, and were therefore usually followed by a depression of their affairs; nor was it until the captain of the Huntingdonshire cavalry rose to the rank of a field offi

cer that the soldiers of the commonwealth could meet on equal terms the high-spirited troops which followed the standard of the King. At Marston-Moor the reputation of Cromwell eclipsed that of every other commander who shared with him the dangers of a doubtful and very perilous engagement; while of the victory of Naseby, if Fairfax was entitled to the first place in the triumph, the true judge of professional merit will bestow the loudest encomium upon the achievements of his lieutenant-general.

But a condition of things much more decisive of his character, rose out of his own success. The King was thereby reduced sufficiently low to encourage the hope that the future government of the country might be established on a safe foundation, equally favourable to the just rights of the crown and to the liberties of the people. But such a compromise, which in all circumstances must be attended with great difficulty, was in this case opposed as well by the divided interests of the popular leaders, as by the feeling of superiority which swelled in the hearts of the military victors, who now thought themselves entitled to give the law to the beaten Royalists. There were, in fact, three parties who claimed the right of being heard in the final settlement of affairs; and it unfortunately happened, that on whatever principle the arrangement should take place, one of the three bodies must be sacrificed, to secure the union of the remaining two. A treaty between the King and the Presbyterians necessarily involved the political downfall of the Independents; while an agreement between the crown and the latter

class of religionists, must infallibly have led to the ecclesiastical discomfiture of their opponents, the adherents of the Covenant and of the Westminster Assembly. In short, it is more easy to describe the embarrassment in which the King, the Parliament, and the army, were placed by the conclusion of the war, than to suggest an expedient by which they might have accommodated their differences, and secured the peace of the nation. An honest patriotism would, no doubt, have accomplished much on both sides; but, unhappily for the reputation of the principal characters engaged in that momentous conflict, the evil spirit of private ambition, rivalry, and personal dislike, had universally mixed itself with the sullen temper engendered by a false religion, as well as with that desire for retribution and reprisal which a long course of hostilities could not fail to create in the national mind. We are now about to see in what manner Cromwell conducted himself amidst the dangers and perplexities of his new position; and to determine whether his tactics in parliament and in the council were not equal to those which he displayed in choosing his ground, and fixing the moment of attack, in the presence of an armed enemy.

CHAPTER V.

From the Arrival of the King at Holdenby-House, to the period of his Flight from Hampton Court.

THE Parliament had no sooner obtained possession of his Majesty's person, than they resolved to diminish the numbers of the army, and to remove from the exercise of a dangerous power the more ambitious of the general officers. At the period in question, the majority of the influential members in both Houses were of the Presbyterian persuasion, and consequently hostile to Cromwell and his Independents; for which reason, the latter resolved to employ the influence which they had acquired from their long service in the field, to prevent the accomplishment of a purpose so obviously calculated to endanger both their interests and their personal safety.

Their bold and sagacious leader divided his time between the camp and the House of Commons, concealing, with his usual dexterity, the plan by which he had determined to oppose the power of the one to the pretensions of the other. It was only from hints which he sometimes dropped in conversation, that his most intimate