Page:The Children of the New Forest - 1847 - Marryat.djvu/202

 believe me when I say it, I really feel for one who so nobly rescued my only child."

"I thank you, Sir, for your advice, which I feel to be good, and for your good opinion, which I value."

"And which I feel that you deserve; and you shall have, young as you are, my confidence, which I know you will not abuse. I did know this man who now lies dead before us, and I did also know that he was concealed in this cottage; Major Ratcliffe was one of my earliest and dearest friends, and until this unhappy civil war, there never was any difference between us, and even afterwards only in politics, and the cause we each espoused. I knew, before I came down here as Intendant, where his place of concealment was, and have been most anxious for his safety."

"Excuse me, Mr. Heatherstone, but each day I find more to make me like you than I did the day before: at first I felt most inimical; now I only wonder how you can be leagued with the party you now are."

"Edward Armitage, I will now answer for myself and thousands more. You are too young a man to have known the cause of the insurrection, or rather opposition to the unfortunate King Charles. He attempted to make himself absolute, and to wrest the liberties from the people of England: that his warmest adherents will admit. When I joined the party which opposed him, I little thought that matters would have been carried so far as they have been; I always considered it lawful to take up arms in defence of our liberties, but at the same time I equally felt that the person of the King was sacred."

"I have heard so, Sir."

"Yes, and in truth; for never did any people strive more zealously to prevent the murder of the King—for murder it was—than my relative Ashley Cooper and myself. So much so, indeed, as to have incurred not only the suspicion but the ill will of Cromwell, who, I fear, is now making rapid advances towards