Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 35.djvu/367

Rh (, ii. 45–485, passim). In February 1644 he was a member of the committee of both kingdoms, and according to Mackenzie (Memoirs, p. 9) was president; but there is no trace in their records of the appointment of a president. On 20 Nov. he was named one of the Scottish commissioners to take the propositions of peace to Charles at Uxbridge. Here he endeavoured, with Loudoun, in the spring of 1645, to induce Charles to accept presbyterianism (, Great Civil War, ii. 66). He returned home in May, ‘much missed’ (, ii. 241, 279, 505). In February 1646 Lauderdale was again in London as commissioner, and was spokesman to the common council for his colleagues, where he expressed their resolve to uphold the covenant (ib. p. 352). He was in communication with the king, as well as corresponding officially with Scotland, and advised Charles not to close with the offers of the independents (, Lives of the Hamiltons, p. 288). In October he argued vehemently in the committee of both kingdoms against the proposed vote of the two houses to dispose of the king's person without reference to Scotland (, ii. 403). He returned to Scotland before the end of the year (Hamilton Papers, Camden Soc., p. 140). His conduct regarding the surrender of the king to the English by the Scots, January 1647, is obscure. Burnet describes him (Hamiltons, p. 312) as working in the king's interest. It was afterwards definitely stated, though actual proof was wanting, that in letters both to Scotland and England he had advised the surrender (, p. 49; Lauderdale Papers, Camden Soc., i. 125, 128). But Burnet's statement that in this year he turned decisively to the king's interest seems borne out. In April he was sent to London to urge upon the English parliament a settlement with Charles without further conditions, and to obtain permission for Hamilton and Charles Seton, second earl of Dunfermline, to serve in the royal bedchamber, but the mission was fruitless (, Hamiltons, p. 314). He protested against the Holmby House abduction, and demanded liberty for the king to come to London (ib. p. 315). In June it was rumoured that he was entrusted with a letter from Charles to the Prince of Wales to urge him to come to Scotland with an army (, Great Civil War, iii. 120; Clarke Papers, Camden Soc., i. 136), and on 19 June and 22 July important interviews took place between him and the king. At the second meeting they talked over a plan for bringing the Scottish army into England, and Charles offered to write a letter to Edinburgh to this purpose (, iii. 125, 164). At this time also Lauderdale was combining with the eleven members whose exclusion from parliament had been demanded by the army. On 30 July he went to Woburn to see Charles, evidently to get the letter for Edinburgh. But the soldiers got wind of the affair, broke into his lodgings, forced him to rise and dress, and turned him away, though he begged for time to say his prayers (, Hamiltons, p. 319). At Hampton Court he surprised Charles by joining in the presentation of the parliamentary propositions on 7 Sept. (, iii. p. 190). He had previously received not only an offer from Captain Batten to bring the twenty-two ships under his command to declare for the Scots, but Cromwell's assurance that he was ready to comply with their wishes if they would refrain from sending an army to help the king. On 22 Oct., with John Campbell, first earl of Loudoun [q. v.], and the Duke of Hamilton's brother, William Hamilton, earl of Lanark, he visited Charles at Hampton Court, and left with the king a declaration that Scotland would help him, after privately assuring him that the covenant would not be pressed. Burnet states further that he came to the king, while hunting at Hampton Court, with fifty armed men, prepared to rescue him, but that the king refused to accept their aid (ib. p. 230). When Charles was hesitating whether to try to escape to Scotland or to go to London, Lauderdale urged him not to do the first unless prepared to give full satisfaction on the point of religion, nor the latter, since London was in the power of the army; but to go to Berwick, whence he could make his own terms (, Hamiltons, p. 324). On 9 Nov., just before the king's flight to the Isle of Wight, he warned him that without fresh concessions on the point of presbyterianism the Scots would not help. On 8 Dec. he told the king that he was about to be made close prisoner (ib. p. 330). From Carisbrooke, whither he went as one of the commissioners, he returned (26 Dec.) with the famous ‘Engagement,’ and with a further and most important document signed by Charles agreeing to the employment of Scottish nobility in England, and promising the frequent residence of the king and the Prince of Wales in Scotland (, Own Time, i. 64, Clarendon Press edit.; Lauderdale Papers, i. 2). He, with the other commissioners, protested against the vote of non-addresses, 17 Jan. 1648, and the rest of the month was spent in London establishing a good understanding with the king's friends; the English leaders, such as Marmaduke Langdale [q. v.], being instructed by Charles to take their orders from Lanark or Lauder-