end were productive of domestic happiness and security, the laws became more precise, the monarch's privileges better ascertained, and the subjects duty better delineated; all became more peaceable, as if a previous fermentation in the constitution was necessary for its subsequent refinement.

CHAP.

CHAP. XXXIII.

THE COMMONWEALTH.

CROMWELL, who had secretly

solicited and contrived the king's A. D. death, now began to feel wishes to which 1648. he had been hitherto a stranger.. His prospects widened as he rose, his first principles of liberty were all lost in the unbounded stretch of power that lay before him. When the peers met on the day appointed in their adjournment, they entered upon business, and sent down some votes to the commons, of which the latter deigned not to take the least notice. In a few days after the commons voted, that the house of lords was useless and dangerous, and therefore was to be abolished. They voted it high treason to acknowledge Charles Stuart, son of the late king, as successor to the throne. A great seal was made, on one side of which were engraven the arms of England and Ireland, with this inscription; " The great seal of "England." On the reverse was represented the house of commons sitting, with this motto: "the first year of freedom, by God's blessing res"tored, 1648." The forms of all public business were changed from the king's name, to that of the keepers of the liberties of England.

"On

The next day they proceeded to try those gallant men, whose attachment to their late sovereign had been the most remarkable. The duke of Hamilton and lord Capel were condemned and executed, the earl of Holland lost his life by a like sentence, the earl of Norwich and Sir John Owen were condemned, but afterwards pardoned by the

commons.

K 2

The

The Scotch, who had in the beginning shewn themselves so averse to the royal family, and having, by a long train of successes,totally suppressed all insurrections in its favour, now first began to relent from their various persecutions. Their loyalty began to return; and the insolence of the independents with their victories, served to inflame them still more. The execution of their favourite duke Hamilton also, who was put to death not only contrary to the laws of war, but to nations, was no small vexation; they, therefore, determined to acknowledge prince Charles for their king, But their love of liberty was still predominant, and seemed to combat with ther manifold resentments. At the same time that they resolved upon raising him to the throne, they abridged his power with every limitation which they had attempted to impose on their late sovereign.

Charles, after the death of his father, having passed some time at Paris, and finding no likeli hood of assistance from that quarter, was glad to accept of any conditions. He possessed neither the virtues nor the constancy of his father; and being attached to no religion as yet, he agreed to all their proposals, being satisfied with even the formalities of royalty. It is remarkable, that while the Scotch were thus inviting their king over, they were, nevertheless, cruelly punishing those who had adhered to his cause. Among others, the earl of Montrose, one of the bravest, politest, and most finished characters of that age, was taken prisoner, as he endeavoured to raise the highlanders in the royal cause; and being brought to Edinburgh was hanged on a gibbet thirty feet high,, then quartered, and his limbs stuck up in the principal towns of the kingdom. Yet notwithstanding all this severity to his followers, Charles ventured into Scotland, and had the mortification to enter

the

the gate of Edinburgh, where the limbs of that faithful adherent were still exposed.

Being now entirely at the mercy of the gloomy and austere zealots, who had been the cause of his father's misfortunes, he soon found that he had only exchanged exile for imprisonment. He was surrounded, and incessantly importuned by the fanatical clergy, who obtruded their religious instructions, and obliged him to listen to long sermons, in which they seldom failed to stigmatize the late king as a tyrant, to accuse his mother of idolatry, and himself of an untoward disposition. Six sermons a day were his usual allowance; and though they laboured to out-go each other in absurdity, yet he was denied the small consolation of laughter. In short, the clergy having brought royalty under their feet, were resolved to keep it still subservient, and to trample upon it with all the contumely of successful upstarts. Charles for a while bore all their insolence with hypocritical tranquillity, and even pretended to be highly edified by their instructions. He once, indeed, attempted to escape from among them; but being brought back, he owned the greatness of his error, he testified repentance for what he had done, and looked about for another opportunity of escaping.

In the mean time, Cromwell, who had been` appointed to the command of the army in Ireland, prosecuted the war in that kingdom with his usual success. He had to combat against the royalists, commanded by the duke of Ormond, and the native Irish, led on by O'Neill. But such ill connected and barbarous troops could give very little opposition to Cromwell's more numerous forces, conducted by such a general, and emboldened by long success. He soon over ran the whole country; and after some time, all the towns revolted in his favour, and opened their gates at his approach.

But

But in these conquests, as in all the rest of his actions, there appeared a brutal ferocity, that could tarnish the most heroic valour. In order to intimidate the natives from defending their towns, he, with a barbarous policy, put every garrison that made any resistance to the sword. He entered the town of Drogheda by storm, and indiscriminately butchered men, women, and children, so that only one escaped the dreadful carnage to give an account of the massacre. He was now in the train of speedily reducing the whole kingdon to subjection, when he was called over by the parlia- ment to defend his own country against the Scotch, who having espoused the royal cause, had raised a considerable army to support it.

After Cromwell's return to England, upon taking his seat, he received the thanks of the house, by the mouth of the speaker, for the services he had done the commonwealth in Ireland. They then proceeded to deliberate upon choosing a general for conducting the war in Scotland, which Fairfax refusing upon principle, as he had ali along declined opposing the presbyterians, the command necessarily devolved upon Cromwell. Fairfax, from that time forward declined meddling in public affairs; but sending his commission of generalissimo to the house, he retired to spend the remainder of his life in peace and privacy. Cromwell, eager to pursue the path of ambition that . now lay before him, and being declared captaingeneral of the forces, boldly set forward for Scotland at the head of an army of sixteen thousand

men.

The Scotch, in the mean time, who had invited over their wretched king to be a prisoner, not a ruler among them, prepared to meet the invasion, They had given the command of their army to general Lesly a good officer, who formed a proper plan for their defence. This prudent com

mander'