A Student's History of England Volume II Part 12

3. =Cromwell in Ireland. 1649-1650.=--To Cromwell such a situation was intolerable. His Puritan zeal led him to regard with loathing Ormond's league with the Catholics, and he was too thorough an Englishman not to resolve that, if there was to be a struggle, England must conquer Ireland, and not Ireland England. On August 15 he landed at Dublin. On September 11 he stormed Drogheda, where he put 2,000 men to the sword, a slaughter which was in strict accordance with the laws of war of that day, which left garrisons refusing, as that of Drogheda had done, to surrender an indefensible post, when summoned to do so, to the mercy or cruelty of the enemy.

Cromwell had a half-suspicion that some farther excuse was needed.

"I am persuaded," he wrote, "that this is a righteous judgment of G.o.d upon those barbarous wretches who have imbrued their hands in so much innocent blood; and 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." At Wexford, where the garrison continued to defend itself after the walls had been scaled, there was another slaughter. Town after town surrendered. In the spring of =1650= Cromwell left Ireland. The conquest was prosecuted by his successors, Ireton and Ludlow, with savage effectiveness; and when at last, in =1652=, the war came to an end, a great part of three out of the four provinces of Ireland was confiscated for the benefit of the conquering race.

The Catholic landowners and other persons who had borne arms against the Parliament were driven into the wilds of Connaught, to find there what sustenance they could.

4. =Montrose and Charles II. in Scotland. 1650.=--In =1650= Cromwell's services were needed in Scotland. In the spring, Montrose reappeared in the Highlands, but was betrayed, carried to Edinburgh, and executed as a traitor. On June 24 Charles II. landed in Scotland, and, on his engaging to be a Presbyterian king, found the whole nation ready to support him. Fairfax declined to lead the English army against Charles, on the plea that the Scots had a right to choose their own form of government. Cromwell had no such scruples, knowing that, if Charles were once established in Scotland, the next thing would be that the Scots would try to impose their form of government on England. Cromwell, being appointed General in the room of Fairfax, marched into Scotland, and attempted to take Edinburgh; but he was out-manoeuvred by David Leslie (see p.

549), who was now the Scottish commander, and, to save his men from starvation, had to retreat to Dunbar.

5. =Dunbar and Worcester. 1650-1651.=--Cromwell's position at Dunbar was forlorn enough. The Scots seized the pa.s.sage by which alone he could retreat to England by land, whilst the ma.s.s of their host was posted inaccessibly on the top of a long hill in front of him. If he sailed home, his flight would probably be the signal for a rising of all the Cavaliers and Presbyterians in England. The Scots, however, relieved him of his difficulties. They were weary of waiting, and, on the evening of September 2, they descended the hill. Early on the morning of the 3rd, Cromwell, crying "Let G.o.d arise; let His enemies be scattered," charged into their right wing before the whole army had time to draw up in line of battle, and dashed them into utter ruin. Edinburgh surrendered to him, but there was still a large Scottish army on foot, and, in August =1651=, its leaders, taking Charles with them, pushed on into England, where they hoped to raise an insurrection before Cromwell could overtake them. On they marched, with Cromwell following hard upon their heels. Fear kept those who sympathised with Charles from rising, and, at Worcester, on September 3--the anniversary of the battle of Dunbar--Cromwell absolutely destroyed the Scottish army. Those who were not slain were taken prisoners, and many of the prisoners sent as slaves to Barbadoes. "The dimensions of this mercy," wrote Cromwell, "are above my thoughts. It is, for aught I know, a crowning mercy." He spoke truly. Never again was he called on to draw sword in England.

Charles succeeded in making his escape to France, on one occasion concealing himself amidst the thick leaf.a.ge of an oak, whilst his pursuers rode unwittingly below.

[Ill.u.s.tration: A coach of the middle of the seventeenth century: from an engraving by John Dunstall.]

6. =The Navigation Act. 1651.=--Ever since the days of James I.

there had existed a commercial rivalry between England and the Dutch Republic, and disputes relating to trade constantly arose. Latterly these disputes had been growing more acute. Early in =1648= Spain came to terms with the Dutch by acknowledging their independence, and, later in the same year, the Thirty Years' War in Germany was brought to an end by the Peace of Westphalia, though war between France and Spain still continued. Henceforth religion was no longer made the pretext for war on the Continent; and States contended with one another because they wished either to annex territory, or to settle some trade dispute in their own favour. In =1650= the Stadholder, William II.--the son-in-law of Charles I.--died, and the office which he held was abolished, the government of the Dutch Republic falling completely under the control of the merchants of the Province of Holland, in which were situated the great commercial ports of Amsterdam and Rotterdam. The Dutch had got into their hands the carrying trade of Europe. In =1651= the English Parliament pa.s.sed the Navigation Act, to put an end to this state of things.

English vessels alone were to be allowed to import goods into England, except in the case of vessels belonging to the country in which the goods which they carried were produced.

7. =The Dutch War. 1652-1653.=--War with the Dutch soon followed.

Vane, the leading man in the Committee of the Council of State which managed the navy, had put the fleet into excellent condition. Its command was given to Blake, who had been noted as a soldier by the defence of Taunton (see p. 547) in the Civil War, but who never went to sea till =1649=, when he was over fifty. Yet Blake soon found himself at home on board ship, and won the confidence of officers and men. Battle after battle was fought between the English and Dutch fleets. The st.u.r.dy antagonists were well matched, though the English ships were larger and more powerfully armed. In November =1652=, Tromp (the Dutch Admiral) got the better of Blake, but in February =1653= there was another battle, in which Blake got the upper hand; but it was no crushing victory, like Dunbar and Worcester. In the summer of =1653= the English gained two more victories, but though they attempted to blockade the Dutch ports, they were obliged to give up the attempt.

8. =Unpopularity of the Parliament. 1652-1653.=--At home, the truncated Parliament was becoming increasingly unpopular. Ever since the end of the first Civil War, Parliament had supplied itself with money by forcing Royalists to compound--that is to say, to pay down a sum of money, without which they were not allowed to enjoy their estates; and these compositions, as they were called, were still exacted from men who had joined in the second Civil War, or had favoured the invasion by Charles II. The system, harsh in itself, was not fairly carried out. Members of Parliament took bribes, and let the briber off more easily than they did others who neglected to give them money. Those who were not Royalists had grievances of their own. Many of the members used their power in their own interest, disregarding justice, and promoting their sons and nephews in the public service.

9. =Vane's Reform Bill. 1653.=--For a long time Cromwell and the officers had been urging Parliament to dissolve itself and to provide for the election of a new Parliament, which would be more truly representative. Vane had, indeed, brought in a Reform Bill, providing for a redistribution of seats, depriving small hamlets of the franchise, and conferring it upon populous towns and counties; but the discussion dragged on, and the army was growing impatient.

Yet, impatient as the army was, officers and politicians alike recognised that a freely-elected Parliament would probably overthrow the Commonwealth and recall the king. Cromwell suggested that a committee of officers and politicians should be formed to consult on securities to be taken against such a catastrophe. The securities which pleased the members of Parliament were, that all members then sitting should continue to sit in the next Parliament, without fresh election, and should be formed into a committee having power to reject any new member whom they considered it desirable to exclude.

10. =Dissolution of the Long Parliament by Cromwell.

1653.=--Cromwell, who disliked this plan, was a.s.sured, on April 19, by one of the leading members of Parliament that nothing would be done in a hurry. On the next day, April 20, he heard that the House was pa.s.sing its bill in the form which he disliked. Going to the House, when the last vote on the bill was about to be taken he rose to speak. Parliament, he said, had done well in its care for the public good, but it had been stained with 'injustice, delays of justice, self-interest.' Being interrupted by a member, he blazed up into anger. "Come, come!" he cried; "we have had enough of this. I will put an end to this. It is not fit you should sit here any longer." He called in his soldiers, and bade them clear the House, following the members with words of obloquy as they pa.s.sed out.

"What shall we do with this bauble?" he asked, taking up the mace.

"Take it away." "It is you," he said to such of the members as still lingered, "that have forced me to do this. I have sought the Lord night and day, that He would rather slay me than put me upon the doing of this work."

[Ill.u.s.tration: Oliver Cromwell: from the painting by Samuel Cooper at Sidney Suss.e.x College, Cambridge.]

11. =The so-called Barebone's Parliament. 1653.=--Cromwell and the officers shrank from summoning an elected Parliament. They gathered an a.s.sembly of their own nominees, to which men gave, in derision, the t.i.tle of the Barebone's Parliament, because a certain Praise-G.o.d Barebone sat in it. In a speech at its opening, on July 4, Cromwell told them that England ought to be governed by G.o.dly men, and that they had been selected to govern it because they were G.o.dly.

Unfortunately, many of these G.o.dly men were crotchety and unpractical. A large number of them wanted to abolish the Court of Chancery without providing a subst.i.tute, and a majority resolved to abolish t.i.thes without providing any other means for the support of the clergy. At the same time, enthusiasts outside Parliament--the Fifth Monarchy men, as they were called--declared that the time had arrived for the reign of the saints, and that they were themselves the saints. All who had anything to lose were terrified, and turned to Cromwell for support, as it was known that no man in England had stronger common sense, or was less likely to be carried away by such dreamers. In the Parliament itself there was a strong minority which thought it desirable that, if t.i.thes were abolished, support should be provided for the clergy in some other way. These men, on December 11, got up early in the morning, and, before their opponents knew what they were about, declared Parliament to be dissolved, and placed supreme authority in the hands of Cromwell.

12. =The Protectorate, and the Instrument of Government. 1653.=--On December 16 a const.i.tutional doc.u.ment, known as _The Instrument of Government_, was drawn up by Cromwell's military supporters, and accepted by himself. Cromwell was to be styled Lord Protector, a t.i.tle equivalent to that of Regent, of which the last instance had been that of the Protector Somerset (see p. 412). The Protector was to enter, to some extent, upon the duties which had formerly devolved on the king. There was to be a Parliament consisting of a single House, which was to meet once in three years, from which all who had taken the king's part were excluded, as they also were from voting at elections. The const.i.tuencies were to be almost identical with the reformed ones established by Vane's Reform Bill (see p.

566). The Protector was to appoint the executive officials, and to have a fixed revenue sufficient to pay the army and navy and the ordinary expenses of Government; but if he wanted more for extraordinary purposes he could only obtain it by means of a Parliamentary grant. New laws were to be made by Parliament alone, the Protector having no veto upon them, though he was to have an opportunity of criticising them, if he wished to urge Parliament to change its purpose. The main lines of the const.i.tution were, however, laid down in the Instrument itself, and Parliament had no power given it to make laws contrary to the Instrument. In the executive government the Protector was restrained, not by Parliament, but by a Council of State, the members of which he could not dismiss as the king had dismissed his Privy Councillors. The first members were nominated in the Instrument, and were appointed for life; but when vacancies occurred, Parliament was to give in six names, of which the Council was to select two, leaving to the Protector only the final choice of one out of two. Without the consent of this entirely independent Council, the Protector could take no step of importance.

13. =Character of the Instrument of Government.=--The Instrument of Government allowed less Parliamentary control than had been given to the Long Parliament after the pa.s.sing of the Triennial Act and the Tonnage and Poundage Act (see pp. 530, 531): as, though Parliament could now pa.s.s laws without any check corresponding to the necessity of submitting them to the royal a.s.sent, it could not pa.s.s laws on the const.i.tutional points which the Instrument of Government professed to have settled for ever. Neither--except when there was an extraordinary demand for money--could it stop the supplies, so as to bring the executive under its power. It was, rather, the intention of the framers of the Instrument to prevent that Parliamentary absolutism which had proved so hurtful in the later years of the Long Parliament. On the other hand, they gave to the Council of State a real control over the Protector; and it is this which shows that they were intent on averting absolutism in the Protector, as well as absolutism in Parliament, though the means taken by them to effect their end was different from anything adopted by the nation in later years.

14. =Oliver's Government. 1653-1654.=--Before meeting Parliament, Oliver had some months in which he could show the quality of the new Government. On April 5, =1654=, he brought the war with the Dutch to a close, and subsequently concluded treaties with other European powers. On July 10 he had Dom Pantaleon Sa, the brother of the Portuguese amba.s.sador, beheaded for a murder. He had more than enough domestic difficulties to contend with. The Fifth-Monarchy men, and other religious enthusiasts, attacked him for treachery to republicanism, whilst Charles II. incited his followers to rise in insurrection against the usurper. Some republicans were imprisoned, and the royalists Gerard and Vowel, who tried to a.s.sa.s.sinate Oliver, were executed. In the meanwhile, the Protector and Council moved forward in the path of conservative reform. The Instrument allowed them to issue ordinances, which would be valid till Parliament could examine them; and, amongst others which he sent forth, was one to reform the Court of Chancery, and another to establish a Commission of Triers, to reject all ministers presented to livings, if it considered them to be unfit, and another Commission of Ejectors, to turn out those who, being in possession, were deemed unworthy.

Oliver would have nothing to say to the Voluntary system. t.i.thes were to be retained, and religious worship was to be established; but there was to be no inquiry whether the ministers were Presbyterians, Independents, or anything else, provided they were Puritans. There was to be complete toleration of other Puritan congregations not belonging to the established churches; whilst the Episcopalians, though not legally tolerated, were as yet frequently allowed to meet privately without notice being taken of them. Other ordinances decreed a complete Union with Scotland and Ireland, both countries being ordered to return members to the Parliament at Westminster. As far as the real Irish were concerned, the Union was entirely illusory, as all Roman Catholics were excluded from the franchise.

15. =The First Protectorate Parliament. 1654-1655.=--On September 3, =1654=, the First Protectorate Parliament met. Its first act was to question the authority of private persons to frame a const.i.tution for the State, on which Oliver required the members of Parliament to sign a paper acknowledging the government as established in a single person and in Parliament, and turned out of the House those who refused to sign it. The House, thus diminished, drew up a new const.i.tution, altering the balance in favour of Parliament, and expressly declaring that the const.i.tution was liable to revision whenever the Protector and Parliament agreed to change it. It is probable that Oliver would have consented to this change, but a dispute arose upon the control of the army. Oliver wished that it should permanently remain under the Protector, and that Parliament should be unable to withdraw the sums of money fixed for its maintenance. Parliament, on the other hand, insisted on voting the money only for five years, thus claiming to determine, at the end of that time, whether the army should be disbanded or not. The only real solution of the difficulty lay in a frank acknowledgment that the nation must be allowed to have its way for evil or for good.

Oliver, however, suspected--doubtless with truth--that, if the nation were freely consulted, it would sweep away not only the Protectorate, but Puritanism itself. Practically, therefore, the question at issue was whether the Government should be controlled by Parliament or by the army. On January 22, finding that the House was not likely to give way, he dissolved Parliament.

16. =The Major-Generals. 1655.=--The Instrument of Government authorised the Protector to levy sufficient taxes without consent of Parliament to enable him to meet the expenditure in quiet times, and after the dissolution Oliver availed himself of this authorisation.

Many people, however, refused to pay, on the ground that the Instrument, unless recognised by Parliament, was not binding; and, as some of the judges agreed with them, Oliver could only enforce payment by turning out those judges who opposed him, and putting others in their places. Moreover, the Government was embarra.s.sed by attempts to overthrow it. There were preparations for resistance by the republicans in the army--suppressed, indeed, by the arrest and imprisonment of the leaders--and there was an actual Royalist outburst, with wide ramifications, which showed itself openly in the South of England, where a Royalist gentleman named Penruddock rode into Salisbury at the head of 200 men, and seized the judges who had come down for the a.s.sizes. In the face of such danger, Oliver abandoned all pretence of const.i.tutional government. He divided England into eleven military districts, over each of which he set a Major-General, with arbitrary powers for maintaining order, and, by a mere stroke of the pen, ordered a payment of 10 per cent. on the incomes of Royalists. Military rule developed itself more strongly than before. On November 27 Oliver, in his fear of the Royalists, ordered the suppression of the private worship of those who clung to the Book of Common Prayer; perceiving rightly that the most dangerous opponents of his system were to be found amongst sincere Episcopalians. He also made use of the Major-Generals to suppress vice and immorality by shutting up alehouses and imprisoning persons whose lives were disorderly.

17. =Oliver's Foreign Policy. 1654-1655.=--Partly, perhaps, because he hoped to divert attention from his difficulties at home, partly because he wished his country to be great in war as well as in peace, Oliver had for some time been engaging in naval enterprise.

In the early part of his career he had been friendly to Spain, because France intrigued with the Presbyterians and the king. France and Spain were still at war, and when Cromwell became Protector he offered his alliance to Spain, on condition that Spain would help him to reconquer Calais, and would place Dunkirk in his hands as a pledge for the surrender of Calais after it had been taken. He also asked that commerce between England and her own West Indian colonies should be free from Spanish attacks, and for more open liberty of religion for the English in the Spanish dominions than had been offered by Spain in its treaty with Charles I. The Spanish amba.s.sador replied that to ask these two things was to ask his master's two eyes, and plainly refused to admit an English garrison into Dunkirk. Upon this, Cromwell sent out, in the end of =1654=, two fleets, one--under Blake--to go to the Mediterranean, to get reparation from the pirates of Tunis and Algiers for wrongs done to English commerce; and the other--under Penn and Venables--to seize a Spanish island in the West Indies. Blake was successful, but Penn and Venables failed in an attempt on San Domingo, though they took possession of Jamaica, which at that time was not thought to be of much value.

18. =The French Alliance. 1655.=--As Oliver could not get what he wanted from Spain, he agreed to a treaty with France to end what had been virtually a maritime war, in which trading-ships had been seized on both sides. Freedom of religion was to be accorded to Englishmen in France. Before any treaty had been signed, news arrived that the Duke of Savoy had sent his soldiers to compel his Vaudois subjects to renounce their religion, which was now similar to that of the Protestants, though they had revolted from the Papacy long before Luther's Reformation. These soldiers committed terrible outrages amongst the peaceful mountaineers. Those who escaped the sword were carried off as prisoners, or fled to the snowy mountains, where they perished of cold and hunger. Milton's voice was raised to plead for them. "Avenge," he wrote--

"O Lord, thy slaughtered saints, whose bones Lie scattered on the Alpine mountains cold-- Even men who kept thy truth, so pure of old, When all our fathers worshipped stocks and stones."

Cromwell at once told Mazarin that, if he cared for peace with England, this persecution must stop. Mazarin put pressure on the Duke of Savoy, and liberty of worship was secured to the Vaudois.

Then, on October 24, =1655=, Oliver concluded the treaty with France.

19. =Oliver's Second Parliament, and the Humble Pet.i.tion and Advice.

1656.=--War with Spain was a necessary consequence of the seizure of Jamaica, and, in =1656=, Oliver called a second Parliament, to give him money. Yet it was certain that any freely-elected Parliament would try to grasp authority for itself. When Parliament met, on September 17, Cromwell began by excluding about a hundred members who were likely to oppose him. After this, his relations with the House were smoother than they had been in =1654=--especially as news arrived that Stainer, with some of Blake's ships, had captured part of the Spanish treasure-fleet on its way from America; and, soon, thirty-eight waggons laden with Spanish silver, rolled through the London streets. Parliament voted the money needed, and Oliver, in return, withdrew the Major-Generals. Then there was discovered a plot to murder the Protector, and Parliament, anxious for security, drew up amendments to the Const.i.tution, known as _The Humble Pet.i.tion and Advice_. Members of the Council of State were to be approved by Parliament, and the power of excluding members from the House of Commons was to be renounced by the Protector. There was also to be a second House named in the first instance by the Protector, who was given power to exclude members subsequently named by himself or his successors from taking their seats. The object of this curious provision was to secure a house which might be trusted for all time to throw out measures opposed to Puritanism, even when they were supported by the House of Commons. Oliver was asked to take the t.i.tle of king, with the right of naming his own successor.

He refused the kingship, as the army disliked it, and also, perhaps, because he felt that there would be an incongruity in its a.s.sumption by himself. The rest of the terms he accepted, and, on June 26, =1657=, before the end of the session, he was installed as Lord Protector with greater solemnity than before. It was already known that, on April 20, Blake had destroyed a great Spanish fleet at Santa Cruz, in Teneriffe. On his way back, on August 7, he died at sea, and was brought home to be buried in Westminster Abbey.

20. =The Dissolution of the Second Protectorate Parliament.

1658.=--On January 20, =1658=, Parliament met for its second session. The House of Commons had to take back the hundred excluded members who were enemies of Oliver, and to lose a large number of Oliver's warmest supporters, who were removed to the other House.

The Commons had no longer an Oliverian majority, and, without attacking the Protector himself, they now attacked the second House, which gave itself the airs of the ancient House of Lords. On February 4, in a speech of mingled sadness and irritation, Oliver dissolved his second Parliament. "The Lord," he said, "judge between me and you."

21. =Victory Abroad and Failure at Home. 1657-1658.=--Abroad, Oliver's policy was crowned with success. In =1657=, a treaty of alliance was made with France, and 6,000 English troops, co-operating with the French army, captured Mard.y.k.e. On June 4, =1658=, they defeated the Spanish army in a great battle on the Dunes, and on the 14th Dunkirk surrendered, and was placed in the hands of the English. It has often been doubted whether these successes were worth gaining. France was growing in strength, whilst Spain was declining, and it would not be long before France would become as formidable to England as Spain had been in the days of Elizabeth. Cromwell, however, was not the man to base his policy on the probabilities of the future. At home and abroad he faced the present, and, since the day on which the king had mounted the scaffold, the difficulties at home had been overwhelming. Though his efforts to restore const.i.tutional order had been stupendous, and his political aims had been n.o.ble, yet he was attempting that which he, at least, could never do. Men will submit to the clearly expressed will of the nation to which they belong, or to a government ruling in virtue of inst.i.tutions which they and their ancestors have been in the habit of obeying, but they will not long submit to a successful soldier, even though, like Oliver, he be a statesman as well.

22. =Oliver's Death. 1658.=--Oliver was growing weary of his unending, hopeless struggle. On August 6, =1658=, he lost his favourite daughter, and soon afterwards he sickened. There were times when old doubts stole over his mind: "It is a fearful thing,"

he repeated, "to fall into the hands of the living G.o.d." Such fears did not retain their hold on his brave spirit for long: "I am a conqueror," he cried, "and more than a conqueror, through Christ that strengtheneth me." On August 30 a mighty storm pa.s.sed over England. The devil, said the Cavaliers, was fetching home the soul of the usurper. Oliver's own soul found utterance in one last prayer of faith: "Lord," he murmured, "though I am a miserable and wretched creature, I am in covenant with Thee through grace; and I may, I will come to Thee, for Thy people. Thou hast made me, though very unworthy, a mean instrument to do them some good, and Thee service; and many of them have set too high a value upon me, though others wish, and would be glad of, my death.... Pardon such as desire to trample upon the dust of a poor worm, for they are Thy people too; and pardon the folly of this short prayer, even for Jesus Christ's sake, and give us a good night, if it be Thy pleasure. Amen." For three days more Oliver lingered on. On September 3, the anniversary of Dunbar and Worcester, he pa.s.sed away to the rest which he had never known on earth.

23. =Richard Cromwell. 1658-1659.=--On his deathbed Oliver named, or was said to have named, his eldest son Richard as his successor. The nation preferred Richard to his father, because he was not a soldier, and was very little of a Puritan. On January 27, =1659=, a new Parliament met, chosen by the old, unreformed const.i.tuencies, as they had existed in the time of Charles I.; and not by those reformed ones appointed by the Instrument of Government, though Royalists were still excluded both from voting at the elections and from sitting in Parliament. In this Parliament a majority supported Richard, hoping that he would consult the wishes of the army less than his father had done. For that very reason the officers of the army turned against him, and asked not only that Fleetwood, Oliver's son-in-law, should be their commander, but that he should be entirely independent of the authority of the Protector. Richard nominated Fleetwood, but insisted upon his acting under the Protector as his Lieutenant-General. Parliament upheld the control of the civil power over the army. On April 22 the soldiers forced Richard to dissolve Parliament. On May 25 Richard abdicated and the Protectorate came to an end.

24. =The Long Parliament Restored. 1659.=--Already on May 7, at the invitation of the soldiers, forty-two members of the so-called Rump--the portion of the Long Parliament which had continued sitting till it was ejected by Cromwell in =1653= (see p. 566)--had installed themselves at Westminster. No hereditary king was ever more tenacious of his rights than they. They told the officers 'that the Parliament expected faithfulness and obedience to the Parliament and Commonwealth,' and, declaring all Oliver's acts to have been illegal, resolved that all who had collected taxes for him must repay the money. The officers, many of whom had, as Major-Generals, gathered taxes by authority from Oliver, were naturally indignant.

"I know not," said Lambert--one of the most distinguished of Oliver's officers--"why they should not be at our mercy as well as we at theirs." Before anything could be done, news arrived that Sir George Booth had risen in Cheshire for Charles II. Lambert marched against him, and defeated him at Winnington Bridge. When he returned, the officers made high demands of Parliament, and, when these were rejected, they sent troops, on October 13, to keep the members out of the House. "Do you not know me?" said the Speaker, Lenthall. "If you had been with us at Winnington Bridge," said a soldier, "we should have known you."

25. =Military Government. 1659.=--The soldiers had come to despise civilians merely because they were civilians. They tried to govern directly, without any civilian authority whatever. The attempt proved an utter failure. It was discovered that taxes were paid less readily than when there had been a civilian Government to exact them. The soldiers quarrelled amongst themselves, and the officers, finding themselves helpless, restored the Rump a second time. On December 26 it resumed its sittings at Westminster.

26. =Monk and the Rump. 1660.=--George Monk, who commanded the forces in Scotland, had little inclination to meddle with politics; but he was a thorough soldier, and being a cool, resolute man, was determined to bear this anarchy no longer. On January 1, =1660=, he crossed the Border with his army, and on January 11 was joined by Fairfax at York, who brought with him all the weight of his unstained name and his high military reputation. On February 3 Monk entered London, evidently wishing to feel his way. On February 6 the City of London, which had no members sitting in the Rump, declared that it would pay no taxes without representation. Monk was ordered by the Rump to suppress the resistance of the City. On the 10th he reached Guildhall. Keeping his ears open, he soon convinced himself that the Rump was detested by all parties, and, on the morning of the 16th, declared for a free Parliament.

27. =End of the Long Parliament. 1660.=--It was easy to coerce the Rump, without the appearance of using violence. On February 26, under pressure from Monk, it called in the Presbyterian members shut out by Pride's Purge (see p. 557). After they had taken their seats, a dissolution, to be followed by new elections, was voted. At last, on March 16, the Long Parliament came, by its own act, to its unhonoured end. The destinies of England were to be placed in the hands of the new Parliament, which was to be freely elected. The Restoration was a foregone conclusion. The predominant wish of Englishmen was to escape from the rule of soldiers, and, as every recent form of civil government had been discredited, it was natural to turn back to that which had flourished for centuries, and which had fallen rather through the personal demerits of the last king than through any inherent vices of the system.

28. =The Declaration of Breda. 1660.=--On April 4 Charles signed a declaration, known as the Declaration of Breda. He offered a general pardon to all except those specially exempted by Parliament, and promised to secure confiscated estates to their new owners in whatever way Parliament should approve. He also offered to consent to a bill for satisfying the arrears of the soldiers, and to another bill for the establishment of 'a liberty for tender consciences.' By the Declaration of Breda, Charles had carefully thrown upon Parliament the burden of proposing the actual terms on which the settlement was to be effected, and at the same time had shaken himself free from his father's policy of claiming to act independently of Parliament. The new Parliament, composed of the two Houses of Lords and Commons, was known as the Convention Parliament, because, though conforming in every other respect to the old rules of the Const.i.tution, the House of Commons was chosen without the king's writs. It met on April 25. The Declaration of Breda reached it on May 1. After unanimously welcoming the Declaration, Parliament resolved that, 'according to the ancient and fundamental laws of this kingdom, the Government is, and ought to be, by King, Lords, and Commons.' The Puritan Revolution had come to an end.

_Books recommended for further study of Part VI._

RANKE, L. History of England (English Translation). Vol. i. p.

386--vol. iii. p. 308.

HALLAM, H. Const.i.tutional History of England. Chaps. VI.-X.

GARDINER, S. R. History of England from 1603-1642.

--------- History of the Great Civil War.

Ma.s.sON. Life of Milton, and History of his Time. Vols. i.-v.

FORSTER, J. Life of Sir John Eliot.