had refused to the Parliament the concession of that old militia
point for twenty years, and had refused to Scotland the recognition
of its Solemn League and Covenant, Scotland got a handsome sum for
its army and its help, and the King into the bargain. He was
taken, by certain Parliamentary commissioners appointed to receive
him, to one of his own houses, called Holmby House, near Althorpe,
in Northamptonshire.
While the Civil War was still in progress, John Pym died, and was
buried with great honour in Westminster Abbey – not with greater
honour than he deserved, for the liberties of Englishmen owe a
mighty debt to Pym and Hampden. The war was but newly over when
the Earl of Essex died, of an illness brought on by his having
overheated himself in a stag hunt in Windsor Forest. He, too, was
buried in Westminster Abbey, with great state. I wish it were not
necessary to add that Archbishop Laud died upon the scaffold when
the war was not yet done. His trial lasted in all nearly a year,
and, it being doubtful even then whether the charges brought
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against him amounted to treason, the odious old contrivance of the
worst kings was resorted to, and a bill of attainder was brought in
against him. He was a violently prejudiced and mischievous person;
had had strong ear-cropping and nose-splitting propensities, as you
know; and had done a world of harm. But he died peaceably, and
like a brave old man.
FOURTH PART
WHEN the Parliament had got the King into their hands, they became
very anxious to get rid of their army, in which Oliver Cromwell had
begun to acquire great power; not only because of his courage and
high abilities, but because he professed to be very sincere in the
Scottish sort of Puritan religion that was then exceedingly popular
among the soldiers. They were as much opposed to the Bishops as to
the Pope himself; and the very privates, drummers, and trumpeters,
had such an inconvenient habit of starting up and preaching longwinded
discourses, that I would not have belonged to that army on
any account.
So, the Parliament, being far from sure but that the army might
begin to preach and fight against them now it had nothing else to
do, proposed to disband the greater part of it, to send another
part to serve in Ireland against the rebels, and to keep only a
small force in England. But, the army would not consent to be
broken up, except upon its own conditions; and, when the Parliament
showed an intention of compelling it, it acted for itself in an
unexpected manner. A certain cornet, of the name of JOICE, arrived
at Holmby House one night, attended by four hundred horsemen, went
into the King’s room with his hat in one hand and a pistol in the
other, and told the King that he had come to take him away. The
King was willing enough to go, and only stipulated that he should
be publicly required to do so next morning. Next morning,
accordingly, he appeared on the top of the steps of the house, and
asked Comet Joice before his men and the guard set there by the
Parliament, what authority he had for taking him away? To this
Cornet Joice replied, ‘The authority of the army.’ ‘Have you a
written commission?’ said the King. Joice, pointing to his four
hundred men on horseback, replied, ‘That is my commission.’
‘Well,’ said the King, smiling, as if he were pleased, ‘I never
before read such a commission; but it is written in fair and
legible characters. This is a company of as handsome proper
gentlemen as I have seen a long while.’ He was asked where he
would like to live, and he said at Newmarket. So, to Newmarket he
and Cornet Joice and the four hundred horsemen rode; the King
remarking, in the same smiling way, that he could ride as far at a
spell as Cornet Joice, or any man there.
The King quite believed, I think, that the army were his friends.
He said as much to Fairfax when that general, Oliver Cromwell, and