Page:Cassell's Illustrated History of England vol 3.djvu/253

] The parliamentarians lost five hundred men in the battle, the king three times that number and many officers; but the greatest loss of all was that of the amiable and conscientious lord Falkland, a man on the royalist side as much respected as Hampden was on the parliament side. He had gone with the parliament till he thought they had obtained all that they were justly entitled to, and pressed too hard on the king, when he felt it his duty to support the crown, and had accepted office as secretary of state. He was a man of a most cheerful, cordial, courteous disposition; but from the moment that the war broke out, all his cheerfulness fled. He seemed to feel in himself all the wounds and miseries of his bleeding country. He was constantly an advocate of peace, and was often observed sitting in a state of abstraction, uttering aloud and as unconsciously the words, "Peace! peace!" As the war went on his melancholy increased; he neglected his dress, and became short and hasty in his temper. He declared that "the very agony of the war, and the view of the calamities and desolation which the kingdom did and must endure, took his sleep from him, and would break his heart." Whitelock says that "on the morning of the fight he called for a clean shirt, and being asked the reason of it, answered that if he were slain in the battle, they would not find his body in foul linen. Being dissuaded by his friends against going into the fight, as having no call to it, being no military officer, he said he was weary of the times, and foresaw much misery to his country, and did believe he should be out of it ere night, and could not be persuaded to the contrary, but would enter into the battle, and was there slain." His death was deeply lamented by all parties. Besides him fell the earls of Sunderland and Carnarvon.

When the king's affairs were in the ascendant by the successes in the west, the taking of Bristol, and the defeat of Waller at Roundaway Down, near Devizes, the earls of Bedford, Northumberland, Holland, and Clare deserted the parliament cause. Northumberland, being cautious, retired to Petworth, to see how the other lords who meant to go over to the king should be received. Bedford, Clare, and Holland offered their services to the king, and went to Walingford, where they were suffered to wait a great while, much to their chagrin. They then went to Oxford, whilst Charles was in the west, and were ordered to await his return. The queen and the courtiers, meanwhile, treated them not as valuable and influential allies, whose good reception would certainly bring over many more, but, with consummate folly, as renegades, who had forfeited all respect by taking part with the king's enemies. They followed the king to Gloucester, where they were coolly enough received, and afterwards fought on his side at Newbury; but nothing winning them that estimation which good policy would have granted them at once, as the king's prospects turned, they made their peace with parliament, and went back to London, where, however, they found they had sunk greatly in public opinion, and were not permitted to take their seats in the house of peers or hold office. Their flight had lowered the public estimation of the lords, and their reception at Oxford had seriously injured the king's cause. Whilst the king and queen retained their impolitic resentments, there was no hope of winning over friends from the ranks of their opponents. It was clear that neither time nor trouble had really taught them anything. At the same time we learn from Clarendon that there existed great discord and division in the camp and court at Oxford. Every one was jealous of the slightest promotion or favour shown to another; and the cavaliers, he says, had grown disorderly, and devoted to the plundering of the people, just as the parliamentary army was growing orderly, zealous, and efficient. Insomuch that one side seemed to fight for monarchy with weapons of confusion, and the other to destroy the king and government with all the principles and regularity of monarchy.

This was seen in nothing more than in the management with regard to Scotland. To both parties it was of the highest consequence to have the alliance of the Scots. Charles, on his last visit, had flattered the people, conceded to the notions of the covenanters, and conferred honours on their leaders. But Montrose, who knew the covenanters well, assured the king that he would never get them to fight on his side. They were too much united in interest and opinion with the puritan parliament not to adhere to them. He proposed, therefore, to raise another power in Scotland—that of the nobility and the Highlanders, who should at least divide the country, evade a hazard in an army of covenanters leaving the country, and thus at least save the king from the imminent danger of an invasion in that quarter, the first result of which would be to lose him his ascendancy in the northern counties of England. When the queen landed and came to York, Montrose waited on her, and did all in his power to awaken a sense of danger in Scotland, and offered to raise ten thousand men there, and paralyse the designs of the covenanters. But when these representations were made to Charles, the marquis of Hamilton, now made duke, strongly opposed the advice of Montrose, declared that it was monstrous to set Scots against Scots, and that he would undertake to keep them quiet. He prevailed, and Montrose, disappointed, retired again to Scotland to watch the progress of events. Hamilton went to Scotland, with authority from the king to take the lead in all movements of the royalists.

As was foreseen, the English parliament made overtures to the Scots for assistance, and the Scots were by no means loth, provided they could make advantageous terms. It determined to send a commission to Edinburgh to treat, and the Scots on their part resolved to call a parliament to receive their offers. The time fixed for the reassembling of the Scottish parliament was not yet arrived by a full year, and it was one of the circumstances which the duke of Hamilton had most particularly pledged himself to the king to prevent assembling; yet on the 22nd of June, notwithstanding his remonstrance, it came together, and on the 20th of July the commissioners from the English parliament arrived, and were received by both parliament and general assembly with exultation, and their letters from the parliament of England were read with shouts of triumph—by many, with tears of joy. Their arrival was regarded as a national victory.

The conduct of Hamilton was now suspicious. If he was honest he had misled the king, for he found he had no power to resist the popular feeling in Scotland; but the