Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 38.djvu/162

 forces in the three kingdoms (25 Feb.) and joint-commander of the navy (2 March). On 16 March parliament was dissolved, but not till it had annulled the engagement to be faithful to a commonwealth previously required from all persons in office.

Hitherto Monck had lulled the suspicions of the republicans by public and private protestations of his fidelity to the republic. 'As for a Commonwealth,' he wrote to Heselrige on 13 Feb., 'believe me, Sir, for I speak it in the presence of God, it is the desire of my soul, and shall (the Lord assisting) be witnessed by the actions of my life, that these nations be so settled in a free state, without a king, single person, or House of Peers, that they may be governed by their representatives in parliament successively' (Clarendon State Papers, iii. 678). In his speeches and manifestoes he was equally vehement (, p. 63 ;, p. 711). Hitherto the republicans had hoped that 'Monck could not be such a devil to betray a trust so freely reposed in him' (, ii. 816). Now convinced that the restoration of the Stuarts was imminent, Heselrige and others offered the supreme power to Monck, and Bordeaux, the French ambassador, assured him of the support of Mazarin, if he chose to accept the offer (BAKER, pp. 715, 717 ;, Richard Cromwell, ii. 293). But Monck refused to listen to these suggestions, and ordered Bordeaux not to interfere in matters of government.

More serious was the danger of a military revolt. Monck had prepared to deal with it by removing Fleetwood's troops from London, quartering the regiments in small sections, and replacing inflexible republicans by colonels whom he could trust. On 15 March a meeting of officers demanded that he should send to the parliament to re-enact the engagement against a monarchy, but he told them 'that he brought them not out of Scotland for his nor the parliament's council; that for his part he should obey the parliament, and expected they should do the same' (Clarendon State Papers, iii. 696 ;, p. 716). He then ordered them to their regiments and forbade them to assemble again, and finally obtained from the whole army an engagement to submit to whatsoever the Lord should bring forth from the consultations of the coming parliament (9 April;, p. 719). So effectual were these measures, that when Lambert escaped from the Tower, he was only joined by seven or eight troops of horse and a few cashiered officers, and his recapture put an end to the insurrection (22 April).

Before this time Monck had entered into direct communication with Charles II. The precise date at which he resolved to restore the king has been much disputed. Speaking of Nicholas Monck's visit to his brother in July 1659, Clarendon says : 'At that time there is no question the general had not the least thought or purpose to contribute to the king's restoration, the hope whereof he believed to be desperate ; and the disposition that did grow in him afterwards did arise from those accidents which fell out, and even obliged him to undertake that which proved so much to his profit and glory. . . ' 'It was the king's great happiness that he never had it in his power to serve him till it fell to be in his power, and, indeed, till he had nothing else in his power to do' (Rebellion, xvi. 100, 115). On the other hand, Price represents Monck as first conceiving the idea of a restoration in July 1659, and covertly avowing his intention before he entered England (, ed. Maseres, pp. 721, 746). As early as November 1659 Monck told Clarges that he intended to readmit the 'secluded members,' and every politician knew that this meant the restoration of the monarchy (, p. 688). His conduct when he declared against the army in October 1659, the foresight with which he provided for every possibility, and the decision with which he acted, all render it difficult to suppose that he had no clear conception of his ultimate object.

Much of Monck's success was due to his judicious selection of his instruments. In dealing with the republicans he had made Gumble his mouthpiece, Sharpe was his agent with the presbyterians, and Clarges with the officers. To negotiate with royalists a new personage was required, and for that purpose he had made choice of his relative William Morice [q. v.], one of the secluded members, whom he summoned from Devonshire and made governor of Plymouth (, Rebellion, xvi. 162 ;, p. 712). Through Morice he arranged an interview with Sir John Grenville (19 March), and at last received from his hands the letter the king had sent him in the previous summer. 'My heart,' he told Grenville, 'was ever faithful to the king, but I was never able to do him service till the present time.' He refused to give Grenville a letter for the king, but made him commit his instructions to memory, and despatched him at once to Brussels. Monck's recommendations were that the king should remove at once to Breda, and thence offer a general pardon and indemnity, guarantee all sales of land effected by the late authorities, and promise religious toleration. In the Declaration of Breda (4 April) the king practically