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 on the 26th. With this his successes came to an end. Disease and the consequences of financial disorder thinned his army, but there was always a want of initiative in Essex which prevented him from making the best of adverse circumstances. It must, however, be borne in mind that, though he was nominally commander-in-chief of all the parliamentary armies, he practically exercised no authority over other generals.

On 10 June Essex, having again advanced, occupied Thame. This tardy effort to attack Oxford was marked by the mortal wound received by Hampden on the 18th. On the 28th Essex tendered his resignation upon a sharp letter from Pym throwing blame upon him for the unsatisfactory result of his operations. His offer was, however, refused, and in the beginning of July Essex returned to Brickhill, where he learned of Waller's disaster at Roundway Down.

Essex and Waller each threw the blame of the misfortune on the other. The jealousy of Essex was increased when on 27 July Waller was enthusiastically received in the city, and when on the 29th the houses agreed to appoint the defeated general to the command of a separate army. The day before Essex had made demands for the increase of his own force and for the maintenance of his authority over all the other generals. To these demands the houses yielded, placing Waller once more nominally under his orders. It was when Essex was still sore at the bad treatment which he considered himself to have received that the peace party in the houses hoped to obtain his military assistance in supporting the proposals for an accommodation made by the House of Lords. Yet, annoyed as he was at what he considered to be the hard measure dealt out to him, he was loyal to his trust, and when on 3 Aug. Holland on behalf of the peace party and Pym on behalf of the war party applied to him, he declared in favour of Pym.

In August the siege of Gloucester by the king roused the anxiety of the parliamentary leaders. Essex, it was resolved, should be sent to relieve it, and his army should be recruited for the purpose. He accomplished his task successfully, entering by Gloucester on 8 Sept., the king having abandoned the siege on the 5th. On his way home he was outmarched by Charles, and on 20 Sept. he was obliged to fight at Newbury to force his way through the king's army. At the end of the day, though he had gained ground, the enemy was still in front of him, and his own troops were so badly supplied with provisions as to make him apprehensive of the worst. Fortunately for him the king had exhausted his ammunition, and on the following morning Essex was able to push on in the direction of London.

At the opening of the campaign of 1644, Essex, though firmly resolved to do his duty, was very sore at the feeling which had led the houses to entrust armies to Manchester and Waller which were virtually independent. On 8 April he addressed to the lords a remonstrance in which his wounded feelings made themselves felt in the midst of his protestations of devotion. Though much was done to supply his army, it was some time before he was able to stir. On 28 May he crossed the Thames at Sandford to assail Oxford on the east, while Waller assailed it from the south and west. Charles's escape into the open country on 3 June rendered these operations nugatory; and on 6 June, at a council of war held at Stow-on-the-Wold, Essex insisted on leaving Waller to follow the king, while he turned aside to relieve Lyme and to gain fresh ground in the west. In vain the houses ordered him to return. He was determined to take his own council, and after the relief of Lyme pushed on into Cornwall, induced, it is said, by the representations of Lord Robartes, who had property in those parts, but also, no doubt, influenced by his persuasion that to regain the western counties would be to deprive Charles of a large district in which considerable supplies of men and money could be levied.

Strategically, Essex's march into Cornwall was a blunder of the worst description. The king followed Essex up with an army numerically superior to his own, and the parliamentary general, cooped up at Lostwithiel, was too little of a tactician to make good on the battle-field the blunder of the campaign. On 1 Sept., after his cavalry had escaped, Essex, finding that the capitulation of his infantry was inevitable, made off in a small vessel for Plymouth, leaving Skippon to arrange the terms of surrender.

In the remainder of that year's fighting Essex took no part. He was too ill to be present at the second battle at Newbury. During the winter he was irritated by Cromwell's proceedings against Manchester, and it was at his house and in his presence that was held, probably on the night of 3 Dec., a conference between some of the Scots in London and some English members of the peace party in the House of Commons, in which a proposal was made to bring Cromwell to account as a stirrer-up of ill-will between the two nations. Upon the rejection of this proposal, Essex, as far as can be gathered, took a share in the opposition raised in the House of Lords to the measures for the reorganisation