citizens resolved to bring back the champions or of honour could bind him, and that the only of liberty in triumph before the windows of way to make him harmless was to make him Whitehall. Vast preparations were made both powerless. by land and water for this great festival. The attack which the king had made on

The king had remained in his palace, hum- the five members was not merely irregular in bled, dismayed, and bewildered; “feeling,” manner. Even if the charges had been presays Clarendon, " the trouble and agony which ferred legally, if the grand jury of Middlesex usually attend generous and magnanimous had found a true bill, if the accused persons minds upon their having committed errors;" had been arrested under a proper warrant, and feeling, we should say, the despicable repent at a proper time and place, there would still ance which attends the bungling villain, who, have been in the proceeding enough of perfidy having attempted to commit a crime, finds that and injustice to vindicate the strongest meahe has only committed a folly. The populace sures which the Opposition could iake. To hooted and shouted all day before the gates of impeach Pym and Hampden was to impeach the royal residence. The wretched man could the House of Commons. It was notoriously not bear to see the triumph of those whom he on account of what they had done as memhad destined to the gallows and the quartering bers of that House that they were selected as block. On the day preceding that which was objects of vengeance; and in what they had fixed for their return, he fled, with a few at- done as members of that House, the majority tendants, from that palace, which he was never had concurred. Most of the charges brought to see again till he was led through it to the against them were common between them and scaffold.

the Parliament. They were accused, indeed, On the 11th of January, the Thames was and it may be with reason, of encouraging the covered with boats, and its shores with a Scotch army to invade England. In doing gazing multitude. Armed vessels decorated this, they had committed what was, in strici. with streamers were ranged in two lines from ness of law, a high offence; the same offence London Bridge to Westminster Hall. The which Devonshire and Shrewsbury committed members returned by water in a ship manned in 1688. But the king had promised pardon by sailors who had volunteered their services. and oblivion to those who had been the prin. The trainbands of the city, under the command cipals in the Scotch insurrection. Did it then of the sheriffs, marched along the Strand, at- consist with his honour to punish the accessatended by a vast crowd of spectators, to guard ries? He had bestowed marks of his favour the avenues to the House of Commons; and on the leading Covenanters. He had given thus, with shouts and loud discharges of ord the great seal of Scotland to Lord Loudon, the nance, the accused patriots were brought back chief of the rebels, a marquisate to the Earl by the people whom they had served, and for of Argyle, an earldom to Lesley, who had whom they had suffered. The restored mem- brought the Presbyterian army across the bers, as soon as they had entered the House, Tweed. On what principle was Hampden to expressed, in the warmest terms, their grati- be attainted for advising what Lesley was en. tude to the citizens of London. The sheriffs nobled for doing? In a court of law, of course, were warmly thanked by the speaker in the no Englishman could plead an amnesty grantname of the Commons; and orders were given ed to the Scots. But, though not an illegal, it that a guard, selected from the train bands of was surely an inconsistent and a most unkingly the city, should attend daily to watch over the course, after pardoning the heads of the resafety of the Parliament.

bellion in one kingdom, to hang, draw, and The excitement had not been confined to quarter their accomplices in another. London. When intelligence of the danger to The proceedings of the king against the which Hampden was exposed reached Buck- five members, or rather against that Paringhamshire, it excited the alarm and indigna- liament which had concurred in almost all tion of the people. Four thousand freeholders the acts of the five members, was the cause of that county, each of them wearing in his of the civil war. It was plain that either hat a copy of the protestation in favour of the Charles or the House of Commons must be privileges of Parliament, rode up to London stripped of all real power in the state. The to defend the person of their beloved repre- best course which the Commons could have sentative. They came in a body to assure taken would perhaps have been to depose the Parliament of their full resolution to defend king; as their ancestors had deposed Edward its privileges. Their petition was couched in the Second and Richard the Second, aná as the strongest terms. “In respect,” said they, their children afterwards deposed James. “ of that latter attempt upon the honourable Had they done this, had they placed on the House of Commons, we are now come to offer throne a prince whose characier and whose our service to that end, and resolved, in their situation would have been a pledge for his just defence, to live and die.”

good conduct, they might safely have left to A great struggle was clearly at hand. Hamp- that prince all the constitutional prerogatives den had returned to Westminster much changed. of the crown ; the command of the armies of His influence had hitherto been exerted raiher the state; the power of making peers; the to restrain than to moderate the zeal of his power of appointing ministers; a veto en bills party. But the treachery, the contempt of law, passed by the two Houses. Such a prince, the ihirst for blood, which the king liad now reigning by their choice, would have been shown, left no hope of a peaceable adjustment. under the necessity of acting in ccntorinity It was clear that Charles must be either a with their wishes. But the public inind was puppet or a tyrant, that no obligation of love not ripe for such a measure. There was no Duke of Lancaster, no Prince of Orange, no became—an instrument of despotism? Was great and eminent person, near in blood to it not possible that the soldiers might forget the throne, yet attached to the cause of the that they were also citizens, and might be ready people. Charles was then to remain king; to serve their general against their country ? and it was therefore necessary that he should Was it not vertain that, on the very first day be king only in name. A William the Third, on which Charles could venture to revoke his or a George the First, whose title to the crown concessions, and to punish his opponents, he was identical with the title of the people to would establish an arbitrary government, and their liberty, might safely be trusted with ex- exact a bloody revenge? tensive powers. But new freedom could not Our own times furnish a parallel case. Supexist in safety under the old tyrant. Since he pose that a revolution should take place in was not to be deprived of the name of king, Spain, that the Constitution of Cadiz should the only course which was left was to make be re-established, that the Cortes should meet him a mere trustee, nominally seised of pre- again, that the Spanish Prynnes and Burtons, rogatives, of which others had the use, a Grand who are now wandering in rags round LeiLama, a Roi Fainéant, a phantom resembling cester Square, should be restored 10 ther counthose Dagoberts and Childeberts who wore the try, Ferdinand the Seventh would, in that case, badges of royalty, while Ebroin and Charles of course, repeat all the oaths and promises Martel held the real sovereignty of the state. which he made in 1820, and broke in 1823.

The conditions which the Parliament pro- But would it not be madness in the Cortes, pounded were hard; but, we are sure, not even if they were to leave him the name of harder than those which even the Tories in king, to leave him more than the name ? the Convention of 1699 would have imposed Would not all Europe scoff at them, if they on James, if it had been resolved that James were to permit him to assemble a large army should continue to be king. The chief con- for an expedition to America, to model that army dition was, that the command of the militia at his pleasure, to put it under the command and the conduct of the war in Ireland should of officers chosen by himself? Should we not be left to the Parliament. On this point was say, that every member of the constitutional that great issue joined whereof the two parties party, who might concur in such a measure, put themselves on God and on the sword. would most richly deserve the fate which he

We think, not only that the Commons were would probably meet—the fate of Riego and justified in demanding for themselves the of the Empecinado? We are not disposed to power to dispose of the military force, but that pay compliments to Ferdinand; nor do we it would have been absolute insanity in them conceive that we pay him any compliment, to leave that force at the disposal of the king. when we say, that, of all sovereigns in history, From the very beginning of his reign, it had he seems to us most to resemble King Charles evidently been his object to govern by an the First Like Charles, he is pious after a army. His third Parliament had complained, certain fashion; like Charles, he has made in the Petition of Right, of his fondness for large concessions to his people after a certain martial law, and of the vexatious manner in fashion. It is well for him that he has had to which he billeted his soldiers on the people. deal with men who bore very little resemThe wish nearest the heart of Strafford was, blance to the English Puritans. as his letters prove, that the revenue might be The Commons would have the power of the brought into such a state as would enable the sword, the king would not part with it; and king to support a standing military establish- nothing remained but to try the chances of war. ment. In 1640, Charles had supported an army Charles still had a strong party in the country. in the northern counties by lawless exactions. His august office, his dignified manners, his In 1641, he had engaged in an intrigue, the solemn protestations that he would for the object of which was to bring that army into time to come respect the liberties of his subLondon, for the purpose of overawing the jects, pity for fallen greatness, fear of violent Parliament. His late conduct had proved that, innovation, secured to him many adherents. if he were suffered to retain even a small body. He had the Church, the Universities, a majority guard of his own creatures near his person, of the nobles and of the old landed gentry. The the Commons would be in dangei of outrago, austerity of the Puritan manners drove most pernaps 0. massacre. The Houses were still of the gay and dissolute youth of that age to deliberating under the protection of the militia the royal standard. Many good, brave, and of London. Could the command of the whole moderate men, who disliked his former conarmed force of the realm have been, under duct, and who entertained doubts touching his these circumstances, safely confided to the present sincerity, espoused his cause unwillking? Would it not have been frenzy in the ingly, and with many painful misgivings; Parliament to raise and pay an army of fifteen because, though they dreaded his tyranny ur twenty thousand men for the Irish war, and much, they dreaded democratic violence more. to give to Charles the absolute control of this On the other side was the great body of the army, and the power of selecting, promoting, middle orders of England—the merchants, the and dismissing officers at his pleasure? Was shopkeepers, the yeomanry, headed by a very it not possible that this army might become, large and formidable minority of the peerage what it is the nature of armies to become, and of the landed gentry. The Earl of Essex, what so many armies formed under much more a man of respectable abilities, and of some favourable circumstances have become, what military experience, was appointed to the comthe army of the English Commonwealth be- mand of the parliamentary army. came, wnat tne army of ine French Republic, Hampden spared neither his fortune nor his person in the cause. He subscribed two thou- do more to make a general than all the dia sand pounds to the public service. He took a grams of Jomini. This, however, is certain, colonel's commission in the army, and went that Hampden showed himself a far better offiinto Buckinghamshire to raise a regiment of cer than Essex, and Cromwell than Lesley. infantry. His neighbours eagerly enlisted The military errors of Essex were probably under his command. His men were known in some degree produced by political timidiiy. by their green uniform, and by their standard, He was honestly, but not warmly, attached io which borc on one side the watchword of the the cause of the Parliament; and next to a Parliament, “God with us,” and on the other great defeat, he dreaded a great victory. Hampthe device of Hampden,“ Vestigia nulla retror- den, on the other hand, was for vigorous and sum.” This motto well described the line of decisive measures. When he drew the sword, conduct which he pursued. No member of as Clarendon has well said, he threw away the his party had been so temperate, while there scabbard. He had shown that he knew better remained a hope that legal and peaceable than any public man of his time, how to value measures might save the country. No mem- and how to practise moderation. But he knew ber of his party showed so much energy and that the essence of war is violence, and that vigour when it became necessary to appeal to moderation in war is imbecility. On several arms. He made himself thoroughly master of occasions particularly during the operations his military duty, and “performed it,” to use in the neighbourhood of Brentford, he remonthe words of Clarendon,“ upon all occasions strated earnestly wih Essex. Wherever he most punctually.” The regiment which he had commanded separately, the boldness and rapiraised and trained was considered as one of dity of his movements presented a striking the best in the service of the Parliament. He contrast to the sluggishness of his superior. exposed his person in every action, with an In the Parliament he possessed boundless intrepidity which made him conspicuous even influence. His employments towards the close among thousands of brave men. “He was," of 1642 have been described by Denham in says Clarendon, "of a personal courage equal some lines, which, though intended to be sarto his best parts; so that he was an enemy not castic, convey in truth the highest eulogy. to be wished wherever he might have been Hampden is described in this satire, as permade a friend, and as much to be apprehended petually passing and repassing between the where he was so as any man could deserve to military station at Windsor and the House of be.” Though his military career was short, Commons at Westminster; overawing the and his military situation subordinate, he fully general, and giving law to that Parliament proved that he possessed the talents of a great which knew no other law. It was at this time general, as well as those of a great statesman. that he organized that celebrated association We shall not attempt to give a history of the of counties, to which his party was principally

Lord Nugent's account of the military indebted for its victory over the king. operations is very animated and striking. Our In the early part of 1643, the shires lying in abstract would be dull, and probably unintel- the neighbourhood of London, which were deligible. There was, in fact, for some time, no voted to the cause of the Parliament, were ingreat and connected system of operations on cessantly annoyed by Rupert and his cavalry. either side. The war of the two parties was Essex had extended his lines so far, that like the war of Arimanes and Oromazdes, almost every point was vulnerable. The neither of whom, according to the Eastern young prince, who, though not a great general, theologians, has any exclusive domain, who was an active and enterprising partisan, freare equally omnipresent, who equally pervade quently surprised posts, burned villages, swept all space, who carry on their eternal strife away cattle, and was again at Oxford, before a within every particle of matter. There was a force sufficient to encounter him could be as. petty war in almost every county. A town sembled. furnished troops to the Parliament, while the The languid proceedings of Essex were manor house of the neighbouring peer was loudly condemned by the troops.

All the argarrisoned for the king. The combatants were dent and daring spirits in the parliamentary rarely disposed to march far from their own party were eager to have Hampden at their homes. It was reserved for Fairfax and Crom- head. Had his life been prolonged, there is Weii io ierminaie chis desultory warfare. by every reason to believe that the supreme com. moving one overwhelming forcé successively mand would have been intrusted to him. But against all the scattered fragments of the royal it was decreed that, at this conjuncture, Eng party.

land should lose the only man who urited per It is a remarkable circumstance, that the fect disinterestedness to eminent talents-the officers who had studied tactics in what were only man who, being capable of gaining the considered as the best schools—under Vere in victory for her, was incapabie of abusing that the Netherlands, and under Gustavus Adol. victory when gained. phus in Germany-displayed far less skill than In the evening of the 17th of June, Ruperi ihose commanders who had been bred to darted out of Oxford with his cavalry on a peaceful employments, and who never saw predatory expedition. At three the morning even a skirmish till the civil war broke out of the following day, he attacked and dispersed An unlearned person might hence be inclined a few parliamentary soldiers who were quar to suspect that ine military art is no very pro- tered at Postcombe. He then flew to Chinnor, found inystery; that its principles are the burned the village, killed or took all the treops principles of plain good sense; and that a who were posted there, and prepared to hurry quick eye, a cool head, and a stout heart will back with his booty and his prisoners to Oxford Vol. II.--22

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Hampden had, on the preceding day, strong. O Lord, save my country-O Lord, be merci. ly represented to Essex the danger to which ful to--.” In that broken ejaculation passed This part of the line was exposed. As soon away his noble and fearless spirit. as he received intelligence of Rupert's incur- He was buried in the parish church of sions, he sent off a horseman with a mes. Hampden. His soldiers, bareheaded, with resage to the general. The Cavaliers, he said, versed arms and muffled drums and colours, could return only by Chiselhampton Bridge. escorted his body to the grave, singing, as they A force ought to be instantly despatched in marched, that lofty and melancholy psalm, in that direction, for the purpose of intercepting which the fragility of human life is contrasted them. In the mean time, he resolved to set with the immutability of Him, in whose sight out with all the cavalry that he could musier, a thousand years are but as yesterday when it for the purpose of impeding the march of the is past, and as a watch in the night. enemy till Essex could take measures for cut- The news of Hampden's death produced as ting off their retreat. A considerable body of great a consternation in his party, according to horse and dragoons volunteered to follow him. Clarendon, as if their whole army had been He was not their commander. He did not cut off. The journals of the time amply prove even belong to their branch of the service. that the Parliament and all its friends were But “he was,” says Lord Clarendon,“ second filled with grief and dismay. Lord Nugent has to none but the general himself in the obser- quoted a remarkable passage from the next vance and application of all men.” On the field Weekly Intelligencer. “The loss of Colonel of Chalgrove he came up with Rupert. A fierce | Hampden goeth near the heart of every man skirmish ensued In the first charge, Hampdien that loves the good of his king and country, was struck in the shoulder by two bullets, and makes some conceive little content to be which broke the bone, and lodged in his body. at the army now that he is gone. The memory The troops of the Parliament lost heart and of this deceased colonel is such, that in no age gave way. Rupert, after pursuing them for a to come but it will more and more be had in short time, hastened to cross the bridge, and honour and esteem ;-a man so religious, and made his retreat unmolested to Oxford. of that prudence, judgment, temper, valour,

Hampden, with his head drooping, and his and integrity, that he hath left few his like nands leaning on his horse's neck, moved behind him.” feebly out of the battle. The mansion which He had indeed left none his like behind him. had been inhabited by his father-in-law, and There still remained, indeed, in his party, from which in his youth he had carried home many acute intellects, many eloquent tongues, his bride, Elizabeth, was in sight. There still many brave and honest hearts. There still remains an affecting tradition, that he looked remained a rugged and clownish soldier, halffor a moment towards that beloved house, and fanatic, half-buffoon, whose talents, discerned made an effort to go thither to die. But the as yet only by one penetrating eye, were equal enemy lay in that direction. He turned his to all the highest duties of the soldier and the horse towards Thame, where he arrived almost prince. But in Hampden, and in Hampden fainting with agony. The surgeons dressed his alone, were united all the qualities which, at wounds. But there was no hope. The pain such a crisis, were necessary to save the state which he suffered was most excruciating. But --the valour and energy of Cromwell, the dishe endured it with admirable firmness and re-cernment and eloquence of Vane, the humanity signation. His first care was for his country. and moderation of Manchester, the stern inteHe wrote from his bed several letters to Lon- grity of Hale, the ardent public spirit of Sidney. don concerning public affairs, and sent a last Others might possess the qualities which were pressing message to the head-quarters, recom- necessary to save the popular party in the mending that the dispersed forces should be crisis of danger; he alone had both the power concentrated. When his last public duties and the inclination to restrain its excesses in were performed, he calmly prepared himself the hour of triumph. Others could conquer; to die. He was attended by a clergyman of the he alone could reconcile. A heart as bold as Church of England, with whom he had lived his brought up the cuirassiers who turned the in habits of intimacy, and by the chaplain of tide of battle on Marston Moor. As skilful an the Buckinghamshire Green-coats, Dr. Spurton, eye as his watched the Scotch army descending whom Baxter describes as a famous and excel- from the heights over Dunbar. But it was when, lent divine.

to the sullen tyranny of Laud and Charles, had A short time before his death, the sacrament succeeded the fierce conflict of sects and facwas administered to him. He declared that, tions, ambitious of ascendency and burning though he disliked the government of for revenge; it was when the vices and ignoChurch of England, he yet agreed with that rance which the old tyranny had generated, Church as to all essential matters of doctrine. threatened the new freedom with destruction, His intellect remained unclouded. When all that England missed that sobriety, that selfs was nearly over, he lay 'murmuring faint command, that perfect soundness of judgment, prayers for himself and for the cause in which that perfect rectitude of intention, to which the ho died. “Lord Jesus," he exclaimed, in the history of revolutions furnishes no parallel, or moment of the last agony, “receive my soul- furnishes a parallel in Washington alone.

Tue work of Doctor Nares has filled us with radox. Of the rules of historical perspective astonishment similar to that which Captain he has not the faintest notion. There is neither Lemuel Gulliver felt, when first he landed in foreground nor background in his delineation. Brobdignag, and saw corn as high as the oaks The wars of Charles the Fifth in Germany are in the New Forest, thimbles as large as detailed at almost as much length as in Robertbuckets, and wrens of the bulk of turkeys. son's Life of that prince. The troubles of The whole book, and every component part of Scotland are related as fully as in M'Crie's it, is on a gigantic scale. The title is as long Life of John Knox. It would be most unjust as an ordinary preface. The prefatory matter to deny that Doctor Nares is a man of great would furnish out an ordinary book ; and the industry and research; but he is so utterly inbook contains as much reading as an ordinary competent to arrange the materials which he library. We cannot sum up the merits of the has collected, that he might as well have left stupendous mass of paper which lies before us, them in their original repositories. better than by saying, that it consists of about Neither the facts which Doctor Nares has two thousand closely printed pages, that it discovered, nor the arguments which he urges, occupies fifteen hundred inches cubic measure, will, we apprehend, materially alter the opinion and that it weighs sixty pounds avoirdupois. generally entertained by judicious readers of Such a book might, before the deluge, have history concerning his hero. Lord Burghley been considered as light reading by Hilpa and can hardly be called a great man. He was not Shallum. But unhappily the life of man is now one of those whose genius and energy change threescore years and ten; and we cannot but the fate of empires. He was by nature and think it somewhat unfair in Doctor Nares to habit one of those who follow, not one of those demand from us so large a portion of so short who lead. Nothing that is recorded, either of an existence,

his words or of his actions, indicates intellectual Compared with the labour of reading through or moral elevation. But his talents, though these volumes, all other labour—the labour of not brilliant, were of an eminently useful thieves on the tread-mill, of children in facto- kind; and his principles, though not inflexible, ries, of riegroes in sugar plantations is an were not more relaxed than those of his assoagreeable recreation. There was, it is said, a ciates and competitors. He had a cool temper, criminal in Italy, who was suffered to make his a sound judgment, great powers of application, choice between Guicciardini and the galleys. and a constant eye to the main chance. In his He chose the history. But the war of Pisa was youth he was, it seems, fond of practical jokes. too much for him. He changed his mind, and Yet even out of these he contrived to extract went to the oar. Guicciardini, though certainly sonie pecuniary profit. When he was studynot the most amusing of writers, is an Herodotus, ing the law at Gray's Inn, he lost all his furor a Froissart, when compared with Doctor niture and books to his companion at the Nares. It is not merely in bulk, but in specific gaming-table. He accordingly bored a hole gravity also, that these memoirs exceed all in the wall which separated bis chambers from other human compositions. On every subject those of his associate, and at midnight bellow. which the professor discusses, he produces ed through his passage threats of damnation three times as many pages as another man; and calls to repentance in the ears of the vicwand one of his pages is as tedious as another rious gambler, who lay sweating with fear all man's three. His book is swelled to its vast night, and refunded his winnings on his knees dimensions by endless repetitions, by episodes next day. “Many other the like merry jests," which have nothing to do with the main action, says his old biographer, “I have heard hina by quotations from books which are in every telí

, too long to be here noted.” To the last, circulating library, and by reflections which, Burghley was somewhat jocose; and some of when they happen to he just, are so obvious his sportive sayings have been recorded by that they must necessarily occur to the mir Bacon. They show much more shrewdness of every reader. He employs more words in than generosity; and are, indeed, neatly exexpounding and defending a truism, than any pressed reasons for exacting money rigorously, other writer would employ in supporting a pa- and for keeping it carefully. It must, however,

be acknowledged, that he was rigorous and * Memoirs of the Life and Administration of the Right careful for the public advantage, as well as for Honourable William Cecil Lord Burghley, Secretary of State in the Reign of King Edward the Sixth, and Lord his own. To extol his moral character, as High Treasurer of England in the Reign of Queen Eliza: Doctor Nares has extolled it, would be absurd. beth. Containing an Historical View of the Times in which It would be equally absurd to represent him as he lived, and of the many eminent and illustrious Persons with whom he was connected; with extracts from his Pri- a corrupt, rapacious, and bad-hearted man. He date and Official Correspondence and other rapers, nou first paid great attention to the interest of the state, published from the Originals. By the Reverend EDWARD and great attention also to the interest of his NANES, D.D., Regius Professor of Modern History in the University of Oxford. 3 vols. 4to. London. 828, 1832. own family. He never deserted his friends till