1641 'STONE-DEAD HATH NO FELLOW? 341 the Earl shook his head. "Stone-dead," he bluntly answered, "hath no fellow." He argued that, even if Strafford were fined or imprisoned, the King would not only restore his estate and release all fines, but would likewise give him his liberty, as soon as he had a mind to make use of him, which would be as soon as the Parliament should be ended. Essex did but express an opinion which was very widely entertained. It was not so much a question whether Strafford had been a traitor as whether April 24. Charles could be trusted.1 The clamour of the House of Commons was backed by a growing excitepetition. ment in the City. On the 24th, 20,000 Londoners signed a petition calling for the execution of Strafford and the redress of grievances, as the only means of escape from the existing depression of trade,2 The Londoners' The Commons answer the arguments of Strafford's counsel. During the first stages of this negotiation a compromise was come to between the Houses. The Commons agreed to reply to the legal arguments of Strafford's counsel, if they were understood to be directed to the question whether the Bill of Attainder ought to pass, and not to the question what judgment ought to be given on the impeachment. In spite of opposition from Bristol and Savile the compromise was accepted by the Lords, and on the 27th the Attainder Bill was read in their House a second time. The 29th was fixed for hearing the legal arguments of the Commons.3 April 27. Second reading of the Attainder Bill by the Lords. Nevertheless, an impression seems to have prevailed that, though the Lords were unwilling to quarrel with the other House on a point of form, they had made up their minds not to send Strafford to the scaffold. It was evidently Charles's wisest course to rely on the Lords, and to allow himself to appear before the world, if he must interfere at all on Strafford's 1 Clarendon, iii. 164. Dates and events are as usual mixed up here so as to create a thoroughly false impression, but I feel inclined to accept the separate anecdotes as substantially true. They are just the things which would remain in the author's mind when all sense of relation was lost. 2 Rushworth, iv. 233. 3 Brief Journal, March 1-May 3, S. P. Dom. cccclxxx. 9. L. J. iv. 227. behalf, as the guardian of constitutional right. Charles could not make up his mind to risk all that must be risked by the steady pursuance of this line of conduct. To the Queen his attempts to respect the law must have seemed to be sheer infatuation. Her head was full of projects. No enterprise seemed too daring, no combination too extensive, for her selfwilled inexperience. If we knew all we should probably be able to tell of Charles as carried away by her flashing eloquence, The Queen's agreeing to everything that she proposed, and professprojects. ing himself to be ready to carry out her projects, till calm consideration, out of her sight, once more commended to his mind some other plan which would at least keep him within the letter of the law. Such at least is the most probable explanation of the inconsistent action of the King during these agitated days. April 19. Arrival of Prince William. The Court of Henrietta Maria had few secrets. Rumour was busy with speculations as to the price paid by the Prince of Orange for a royal alliance. On the 19th Prince William arrived to claim his bride. The Court gossips at once fixed on the sum of 1,200,000 ducats as that which he had brought over to relieve the wants of his future father-in-law. One of the Scottish Commissioners asserted distinctly that the sum was 200,000l. Whether sends money the tale was true or not, there is little doubt that Charles to the army. Charles was at this time sending money to York to conciliate the troops, and that he was encouraged by the reports which reached him to expect the help of the Northern army in the event of a breach with Parliament. He talked of going down in person to take the command. It was believed that he intended first to attack the Scots, and then to turn his arms against those who resisted his authority in England.' Almost April 23, May 3 sent his money The King, says Giustinian, in his despatch of a dissegni di conciliarsi l'affetto loro, et renderle pronte a quelle impressioni che il tempo et la occasione le conciliassero d' intraprendere maggiormente opportune.' In a later despatch of April 30 the ambassador adds that the soldiers were well disposed to the King: 'e pare che prosegua nei disegni avisati di voler tentare di nuovo con la forzà di por freno all'ardire May 10 1641 CHARLES AND THE ARMY. 343 at the same time he was doing his best to conciliate these very Scots, and was assuring them of his intention to come to Scotland in person to preside over the next sitting of Parliament.1 Plan for a violent dis solution of Other plans there were of still more extensive reach. Charles and the Queen were to take refuge at Hampton Court, whence they would find the way open to Portsmouth. There they would find Goring, and they still fancied Parliament. Goring to be true. An armed force was to be sent to seize the Tower, and the Northern army was to march on London. The Irish army, together with any troops which Frederick Henry might be disposed to lend, was to be summoned to Portsmouth, unless indeed it could be more profitably employed elsewhere. In the midst of the clash of arms, Parliament was to be dissolved, and Charles would be indeed a king once more.2 Such fantasies as these could hardly be reduced to practical de' Scozzesi, non meno che a quella de' più seditiosi d'Inghilterra ancora.' Ven. Transcripts. A contemporary letter embodied in the Brief and Perfect Relation (p. 83) mentions a rumour that the Dutchmen have offered money to the King for a new service of war.' One of the Scottish Commissioners to xxv. No. 155. April 27, Wodrow MSS. 2 'Quando si agitava la causa del V. Rè d'Irlanda e di volerlo in qualunque maniera salvarlo dalla morte, si determinò da quelle M. Mtà l'andata all' Amtoncurt, et in questo mentre mandar gente a sorprendere la Torre di Londra, rompere il Parlamento, et havendosi di gia acquistata buona parte dell' esercito regio ritirarsi le persone Reali a Posmur, porto di mare forse il più forte che sia in quei Regni. Così credevasi di liberare il V. Rè, e dar leggi à quelli che le volevano distruggere, sperando di poter ciò più commodamente effettuare mediante gl'aiuti di Hibernia e d'Olanda, se non per altra parte, almeno per il medesimo porto. Ma mentre le loro M. Mtà stavano apparechiate per eseguire le cose predette, sopragiunse corriero con avviso che il Governatore di Posmur, benche havesse giurato fedeltà al Rè, haveva dato in mano al Parlamento la piazza. Al che s'aggiunse parimente che il Capitano della Torre rifutò di consegnar le chiavi di essa a S. Mtà, et il popolo trovavasi preparato per andar a Vitale, a passarene anche ad Amtoncurt, se fosse fatto besogno.' Rossetti Jan. 30 to Barberini, Feb. 9' 1642, R. O. Transcripts. The refusal of the Lieutenant was on May 2, which brings the formation of the scheme to the end of April. shape. Something, too, was certain to ooze out. April 28. Plan for Strafford's escape known. On the 28th it was known that for some weeks a vessel, chartered by Strafford's secretary, Slingsby, had been lying in the Thames, and that the master, being questioned about his destination, had answered gruffly, that it was nothing to him on what service he was employed so long as he had victuals and pay. The suspicions which the Commons were thus led to entertain could not but be heightened by a speech addressed to them by the King on the afternoon of the very day on which they had received information of the preparations for Strafford's flight. In involved phraagain refuses seology, Charles gave them to understand that he meant to keep the Irish army together till the English and Scottish forces in the north were disbanded.2 Strange as it may seem, Charles appears to have expected gratitude for the announcement. The King, wrote D'Ewes, "stayed a pretty while looking about, but there was The King to disband the Irish army. Dissatisfaction of the Commons. not one man gave him the least hum or colour of plaudit to his speech, which made him, after some time of expectation, depart suddenly. Many were much grieved at this speech, because they saw no sudden hope of dissolving the said Irish, popish army. April 29. St. John's argument. "3 On the following day, in the midst of the investigations into the plans for Strafford's escape, and with the King's refusal to disband the Irish army fresh in their minds, the Lords were called on, to listen to St. John's argument on the legality of the Bill of Attainder. When he spoke, St. John had doubtless heard something at least of the rumours which were afloat, something perhaps of Charles's expectation from the Dutch marriage, or of the plan for bringing the army from the North, and he had certainly listened to the King's unsatisfactory speech of the preceding afternoon. Under the influence of this he broke away from the long chain of statute and precedent, upon which it was his business to L. J. iv. 229. 1 D'Ewes's Diary, Harl. MSS. clxiii. 110. See also the story of the three women listening through the keyhole. An Exact Collection, 235. 2- C. 7. ii. 131. D'Ewes's Diary, Harl. MSS. clxiii. fol. 113. 1641 ST. JOHN'S ARGUMENT. 345 rely. "We give law," he said, "to hares and deer, because they be beasts of chase; it was never accounted either cruelty or foul play to knock foxes and wolves on the head as they can be found, because they be beasts of prey. The warrener sets traps for polecats and other vermin for the preservation of the warren." Strafford's maxims were thus turned against himself. The Commons, too, claimed, in a moment of supreme danger to be loose and absolved from all rules of govern ment. Charles's urgent appeal to the Lords. There can be little doubt that by this time the Attainder Bill was gaining ground in the House of Lords.2 The growing belief that plots, the extent of which it was impossible to know, were entertained at Court, would do more to convert the Lords than all St. John's eloquence. On the 30th, too, when the report of the King's speech of the 28th was read by the speaker, the Commons again testified their dissatisfaction. "There followed," according to D'Ewes, a long silence in respect it gave so little hope of disbanding the Irish army, and yet that the King pressed us to disband the other two armies, and told us that we were masters of the same." "3 No wonder that Bristol and Savile, the two 66 4 1 Rushworth, Strafford's Trial, 703. We are told that several times in the course of this speech Strafford raised his hands to protest. In Ranke's account this grows into a special protest against this part of the speech. 2 Writing of the King's speech of May 1, Giustinian says that it was made sospettando il Rè che l'odio di molti Parlamentarii con le gelosie 'di rendere mal sodisfatto il popolo persuadino ad abbraciarlo,' i.e., the Bill of Attainder. A letter which reports news from another letter written on the 29th or 30th is more explicit. The writer says that the Bill of Attainder had been read twice in the Upper House, and the passing is yet doubtful, Thirty Lords are for it, but many of the fifty lords are come about, and therefore it is generally conceived the Earl will lose his head. Other letters say that Mr. St. John did make such an excellent argument as satisfied the opposites.'-King to Calthorpe, May 1, Tanner MSS. lxvi. fol. 72. 3 D'Ewes's Diary, Harl. MSS. clxiii. fol. 120. * These names are given in the letter of Father Philips (Rushworth, iv. 257). Clarendon gives Saye's name instead of Savile's. It is not likely |