The History of England from the First Invasion by the Romans to the Accession of King George the Fifth Part 57

his march; and, at York, spent five days in consultation with Fairfax; but to the advice of that n.o.bleman, that he should remain there, a.s.sume the command of their united forces, and proclaim the king, he replied that, in the present temper of his officers, it would prove a dangerous, a pernicious, experiment. On the arrival of what he had long expected, an invitation to Westminster, he resumed his march, and Fairfax, having received the thanks of the parliament, disbanded[b] his insurrectionary force.[1]

At York, the general had caned[c] an officer who charged him with the design of restoring the kingly government; at Nottingham, he prevented with difficulty the officers from signing an engagement to obey the parliament in all things "except the bringing in of Charles Stuart;" and at Leicester, he was compelled to suffer[d] a letter to be written in his name to the pet.i.tioners from Devons.h.i.+re, stating his opinion that the monarchy could not be re-established, representing the danger of recalling the members excluded in 1648, and inculcating the duty of obedience to the parliament as it was then const.i.tuted.[2] Here he was met by two of the most active members, Scot and Robinson, who had been commissioned to accompany him during his journey, under the pretence of doing him honour, but, in reality, to sound his disposition, and to act as spies on his conduct.

He received them with respect as the representatives of the sovereign authority; and so flattered were they by his attentions, so duped by his wariness, that they could not see through the veil which he spread over his intentions.

[Footnote 1: Price, 749-753. Skinner, 196, 200, 205. Journals, Jan. 6.]

[Footnote 2: Ibid. 754. Kennet's Register, 32.]

[Sidenote a: A.D. 1660. Jan. 12.]

[Sidenote b: A.D. 1660. Jan. 16.]

[Sidenote c: A.D. 1660. Jan. 19.]

[Sidenote d: A.D. 1660. Jan. 23.]

As he advanced, he received at every stage addresses from boroughs, cities, and counties, praying him to restore the excluded members, and to procure a free and a full parliament. With much affectation of humility, Monk referred the deputies to the two delegates of the supreme power, who haughtily rebuked them for their officiousness, while the friends of Monk laboured to keep alive their hopes by remote hints and obscure predictions.[1]

To lull the jealousy of the parliament, Monk had taken with him from York no more than five thousand men, a force considerably inferior to that which was quartered in London and Westminster. But from St. Alban's he wrote[a]

to the speaker, requesting that five of the regiments in the capital might be removed before his arrival, alleging the danger of quarrels and seduction, if his troops were allowed to mix with those who had been so recently engaged in rebellion. The order was instantly made; but the men refused[b] to obey. Why, they asked, were they to leave their quarters for the accommodation of strangers? Why were they to be sent from the capital, while their pay was several weeks in arrear? The royalists laboured to inflame the mutineers, and Lambert was on the watch, prepared to place himself at their head; but the distribution of a sum of money appeased their murmurs; they consented to march; and the next morning[c] the general entered at the head of his army, and proceeded to the quarters a.s.signed to him at Whitehall.[2]

Soon after his arrival, he was invited to attend and

[Footnote 1: Price, 754. Merc. Polit. No. 604. Philips, 595. Journals, Jan.

16.]

[Footnote 2: Price, 755, 757, 758. Jour. Jan. 30. Skinner, 219-221.

Philips, 594, 595, 596. Clar. Pap. iii. 666, 668. Pepys, i. 19, 21.]

[Sidenote a: A.D. 1660. Jan. 28.]

[Sidenote b: A.D. 1660. Feb. 2.]

[Sidenote c: A.D. 1660. Feb. 3.]

receive the thanks of the house. A chair had been placed for him within the bar: he stood uncovered behind it; and, in reply[a] to the speaker, extenuated his own services, related the answers which he had given to the addresses, warned the parliament against a multiplicity of oaths and engagements, prayed them not to give any share of power to the Cavaliers or fanatics, and recommended to their care the settlement of Ireland and the administration of justice in Scotland. If there was much in this speech to please, there was also much that gave offence. Scot observed that the servant had already learned to give directions to his masters.[1]

As a member of the council of state, he was summoned to abjure the house of Stuart, according to the late order of parliament. He demurred. Seven of the counsellors, he observed, had not yet abjured, and he wished to know their reasons, for the satisfaction of his own conscience. Experience had shown that such oaths were violated as easily as they were taken, and to him it appeared an offence against Providence to swear never to acquiesce in that which Providence might possibly ordain. He had given the strongest proofs of his devotion to parliament: if these were not sufficient, let them try him again; he was ready to give more.[2]

[Footnote 1: Journals, Feb. 6. New Parl. Hist. iii. 1575. Philips, 597.

Price, 759. The Lord-general Monk, his Speech. Printed by J. Mac.o.c.k, 1660.]

[Footnote 2: Gumble, 228. Price, 759, 760. Philips, 595. About this time, a parcel of letters to the king, written by different persons in different ciphers, and intrusted to the care of a Mr. Leonard, was intercepted by Lockhart at Dunkirk, and sent by him to the council. When the writers were first told that the letters had been deciphered, they laughed at the information as of a thing impracticable; but were soon undeceived by the decipherer, who sent to them by the son of the bishop of Ely copies of their letters in cipher, with a correct interlineary explanation of each. They were astonished and alarmed; and, to save themselves from the consequences of the discovery, purchased of him two of the original letters at the price of three hundred pounds.--Compare Barwick's Life, 171, and App. 402, 412, 415, 422, with the correspondence on the subject in the Clarendon Papers, iii. 668, 681, 696, 700, 715. After this, all letters of importance were conveyed through the hands of Mrs. Mary Knatchbull, the abbess of the English convent in Gand.]

[Sidenote a: A.D. 1660. Feb. 6.]

The sincerity of this declaration was soon put to the test. The loyal party in the city, especially among the moderate Presbyterians, had long been on the increase. At the last elections the common council had been filled with members of a new character; and the declaration which they issued demanded "a full and free parliament, according to the ancient and fundamental laws of the land." Of the a.s.sembly sitting in Westminster, as it contained no representative from the city, no notice was taken; the taxes which it had imposed were not paid; and the common council, as if it had been an independent authority, received and answered addresses from the neighbouring counties. This contumacy, in the opinion of the parliamentary leaders, called for prompt and exemplary punishment; and it was artfully suggested that, by making Monk the minister of their vengeance, they would open a wide breach between him and their opponents. Two hours after midnight he received[a] an order to march into the city, to arrest eleven of the princ.i.p.al citizens, to remove the posts and chains which had lately been fixed in the streets, and to destroy the portcullises and the gates.

After a moment's hesitation, he resolved to obey, rather than hazard the loss of his commission. The citizens received him with groans and hisses; the soldiers murmured; the officers tendered their resignations. He merely replied that his orders left nothing to his discretion; but the reply was made with a sternness of

[Sidenote a: A.D. 1660. Feb. 9.]

tone, and a gloominess of countenance, which showed, and probably was intended to show, that he acted with reluctance and with self-reproach.[1]

As soon as the posts and chains were removed, Monk suggested, in a letter to the speaker, that enough had been done to subdue the refractory spirit of the citizens. But the parliamentary leaders were not satisfied: they voted that he should execute his former orders; and the demolition of the gates and portcullises was effected. The soldiers loudly proclaimed their discontent: the general, mortified and ashamed, though he had been instructed to quarter them in the city, led them back to Whitehall.[2]

There, on the review of these proceedings, he thought that he discovered proofs of a design, first to commit him with the citizens, and then to discard him entirely. For the house, while he was so ungraciously employed, had received, with a show of favour, a pet.i.tion from the celebrated Praise-G.o.d Barebone, praying that no man might sit in parliament, or hold any public office, who refused to abjure the pretensions of Charles Stuart, or of any other single person. Now this was the very case of the general, and his suspicions were confirmed by the reasoning of his confidential advisers. With their aid, a letter to the speaker was prepared[a] the same evening, and approved the next morning by the council of officers. In it the latter were made to complain that they had been rendered the instruments of personal resentment against the citizens, and to require that by the following Friday every vacancy in the house should be filled up, preparatory to its

[Footnote 1: Journ. Feb. 9. Price, 761. Ludlow, ii. 336. Clar. Pap. iii.

674, 691. Gumble, 236. Skinner, 231-237.]

[Footnote 2: Journ. Feb. 9. Philips, 599.]

[Sidenote a: A.D. 1660. Feb. 10.]

subsequent dissolution and the calling of a new parliament. Without waiting for an answer, Monk marched back into Finsbury Fields: at his request, a common council (that body had recently been dissolved by a vote of the parliament) was summoned; and the citizens heard from the mouth of the general that he, who yesterday had come among them as an enemy by the orders of others, was come that day as a friend by his own choice; and that his object was to unite his fortune with theirs, and by their a.s.sistance to obtain a full and free parliament for the nation. This speech was received with the loudest acclamations. The bells were tolled; the soldiers were feasted; bonfires were lighted; and among the frolics of the night was "the roasting of the rump," a practical joke which long lived in the traditions of the city. Scot and Robinson, who had been sent to lead back the general to Whitehall, slunk away in secrecy, that they might escape the indignation of the populace.[1]

At Westminster, the parliamentary leaders affected a calmness and intrepidity which they did not feel. Of the insult offered to their authority they took no notice; but, as an admonition to Monk, they brought in a bill[a] to appoint his rival, Fleetwood, commander-in-chief in England and Scotland. The intervention of the Sunday allowed more sober counsels to prevail.

[Footnote 1: Price, 765-768. Clar. Pap. iii. 681, 692, 714. Ludlow, 337.

Gumble, 249. Skinner, 237-243. Old Parl. Hist. xxii. 94. Pepys, i. 24, 25. "At Strand-bridge I could at one time tell thirty-one fires; in King-street, seven or eight, and all along burning, and roasting, and drinking for rumps; there being rumps tied upon sticks, and carried up and down. The butchers at the May-pole in the Strand rang a peal with their knives, when they were going to sacrifice their rump. On Ludgate-hill there was one turning of the spit that had a rump tied to it, and another basting of it. Indeed it was past imagination."--Ibid. 28.]

[Sidenote a: A.D. 1660. Feb. 11.]

They solicited the general to return to Whitehall; they completed the bill for the qualifications of candidates and electors; and, on the day fixed by the letter of the officers, ordered[a] writs to be issued for the filling up of the vacancies in the representation. This measure had been forced upon them; yet they had the ingenuity to make it subservient to their own interest, by inserting a provision in the act, that no man should choose or be chosen, who had not already bound himself to support a republican form of government. But immediately the members excluded in 1648 brought forward their claim to sit, and Monk a.s.sumed the appearance of the most perfect indifference between the parties. At his invitation, nine of the leaders on each side argued the question before him and his officers; and the result was, that the latter expressed their willingness to support the secluded members, on condition that they should pledge themselves to settle the government of the army, to raise money to pay the arrears, to issue writs for a new parliament to sit on the 20th of April, and to dissolve themselves before that period. The general returned[b] to Whitehall; the secluded members attended his summons; and, after a long speech, declaratory of his persuasion that a republican form of government and a moderate presbyterian kirk were necessary to secure and perpetuate the tranquillity of the nation, he advised them to go and resume their seats.

Accompanied by a great number of officers, they walked to the house; the guard, under the command of Sir Anthony Ashley Cooper, opened to let them pa.s.s; and no opposition was made by the speaker or the members.[1]

Hazlerig, however, and the

[Footnote 1: Journals, Feb. 11, 13, 15, 17, 21. Price, 768-773. Ludlow, ii.

345, 351, 353. Skinner, 256-264. Clar. Pap. 663, 682, 688. Gumble, 260, 263. Philips, 600. The number of secluded members then living was one hundred and ninety-four, of members sitting or allowed to sit by the orders of the house, eighty-nine.--"A Declaration of the True State of the Matter of Fact," 57.]

[Sideline a: A.D. 1660. Feb. 17.]

[Sideline b: A.D. 1660. Feb. 21.]

more devoted of his adherents, rose and withdrew--a fortunate secession for the royalists; otherwise, with the addition of those among the restored members who adhered to a commonwealth, the republicans might on many questions have still commanded a majority.[1]

To the Cavaliers, the conduct of Monk on this occasion proved a source of the most distressing perplexity. On the one hand, by introducing the secluded members he had greatly advanced the cause of royalty. For though Holles, Pierpoint, Popham, and their friends still professed the doctrines which they had maintained during the treaty in the Isle of Wight, though they manifested the same hatred of popery and prelacy, though they still inculcated the necessity of limiting the prerogative in the choice of the officers of state and in the command of the army, yet they were royalists by principle, and had, several of them, made the most solemn promises to the exiled king of labouring strenuously for his restoration. On the other hand, that Monk at the very time when he gave the law without control, should declare so loudly in favour of a republican government and a presbyterian kirk, could not fail to alarm both Charles and his abettors.[2] Neither was this the only instance: to all, Cavaliers or republicans, who approached him to discover his intentions, he uniformly professed the same sentiments, occasionally confirming his professions with oaths and imprecations. To explain this inconsistency between

[Footnote 1: Hutchinson, 362.]

[Footnote 2: Clar. Hist. iii. 720, 721, 723, 724; Papers, ii. 698.]

the tendency of his actions and the purport of his language, we are told by those whom he admitted to his private counsels, that it was forced upon him by the necessity of his situation; that, without it, he must have forfeited the confidence of the army, which believed its safety and interest to be intimately linked with the existence of the commonwealth. According to Ludlow, the best soldier and statesman in the opposite party, Monk had in view an additional object, to deceive the suspicions and divert the vigilance of his adversaries; and so successfully had he imposed on the credulity of many (Hazlerig himself was of the number), that, in defiance of every warning, they blindly trusted to his sincerity, till their eyes were opened by the introduction of the secluded members.[1]

In parliament the Presbyterian party now ruled without opposition. They annulled[a] all votes relative to their own expulsion from the house in 1648; they selected a new council of state, in which the most influential members were royalists; they appointed Monk commander-in-chief of the forces in the three kingdoms, and joint commander of the fleet with Admiral Montague; they granted him the sum of twenty thousand pounds in lieu of the palace at Hampton Court, settled on him by the republican party; they discharged[b] from confinement, and freed from the penalty of sequestration, Sir George Booth and his a.s.sociates, a great number of Cavaliers, and the Scottish lords taken after the battle at Worcester; they restored the common council, borrowed sixty thousand pounds for the immediate pay of the army,

[Footnote 1: Price, 773. Ludlow, 349, 355. Clar. Pap. iii. 678, 697, 703, 711.]

[Sidenote a: A.D. 1660. Feb. 21.]

[Sidenote b: A.D. 1660. March.]

declared the Presbyterian confession of faith to be that of the church of England, ordered copies of the solemn league and covenant to be hung up in all churches, offered rewards for the apprehension of Catholic priests, urged the execution of the laws against Catholic recusants, and fixed the 15th of March for their own dissolution, the 25th of April for the meeting of a new parliament.[1]

Here, however, a serious difficulty arose. The House of Commons (according to the doctrine of the secluded members, it could be nothing more) was but a single branch of the legislature. By what right could it pretend to summon a parliament? Ought not the House of Lords, the peers who had been excluded in 1649, to concur? Or rather, to proceed according to law, ought not the king either to appoint a commission to hold a parliament, as was usually done in Ireland, or to name a guardian invested with such power, as was the practice formerly, when our monarchs occasionally resided in France? But, on this point, Monk was inflexible. He placed guards at the door of the House of Lords to prevent the entrance of the peers; and he refused to listen to any expedient which might imply an acknowledgment of the royal authority. To the arguments urged by others, he replied,[a] that the parliament according to law determined by the death of Charles I.; that the present house could justify its sitting on no other ground but that of necessity, which did not apply to the House of Lords; and that it was in vain to expect the submission of the army to a parliament called by royal authority. The military had, with reluctance, consented to the restoration of