fied with the justice of this judicial opinion was afterwards fully exposed; but whatever the suspicions or knowledge of the House of Commons might then be, neither their loyalty nor their moderation as a legislative body were yet shaken. "The Parliament," says Lord Clarendon, "had managed these debates and "their whole behaviour with wonderful order and so

At the end of six days the King became impatient because no progress was made towards voting the supplies. To hasten this object, the House of Peers was prevailed on by the Court to tender their advice to the Commons to begin with voting the supplies. The Commons were indignant at a breach of privilege never attempted before in the annals of Parliament. The Lords retracted, but not to the entire satisfaction of the Commons; and further delay was occasioned by this ill-advised attempt to hurry them into acquiescence with the King's wishes. Then came the King's written message, delivered by his Secretary of State, Sir H. Vane, offering to give up in future all title or pretence to ship-money, provided the Commons would vote him the twelve subsidies he required. The message was debated; many objected to the largeness of the sums demanded; and others, who were not indisposed to give, as a free testimony of duty and affection, recoiled from a bargain in which the King tendered as his share of the engagement to give up that to which they firmly believed he could be shown to have no right. Mr.

Hist. of the Rebellion, vol. i. p. 236.

Hampden desired the question might be put, whether the House would consent to the King's proposition.

The House being in Committee, the Speaker, Serjeant Glanvil, addressed them. He freely admitted that the judgment on the imposition of ship-money was against the law, "if he knew what law was;" but urged, and with great effect, the expediency of complying with the King's desire, in order to reconcile him to Parliaments for ever. Mr. Hampden's question 2 was again proposed, and would certainly have been negatived, as those who thought the sum too large,3 and those who disliked the conditional terms offered by the King, would have joined against it. Mr. Hyde then proposed an amendment, which recommended that the question should be put only upon giving the King a supply, without reference to the sum or to the rest of the message. A loud call ensued as to whether Mr. Hampden's question or Mr. Hyde's question should be put. The latter was on the point of being carried, and, being in its object far the most favourable of the two to the King's interest, it seemed strange at first that Mr. Herbert, the King's Solicitor, should strongly oppose it. But Sir H. Vane removed all surprise on that score by rising to declare that "he had authority to tell them that

1 Vide Clarendon's 'Hist. of the Rebellion,' vol. i. p. 242. Lord Clarendon adds he was "known to be very learned," and that this expression very much irreconciled him at Court."

Viz. whether the House would "consent to the proposition made to "the King as it was contained in the message ?"-p. 241.

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"There were very few, except those of the Court (who were ready to

I give all that the King would ask, and indeed had little to give of their own), who did not believe the sum demanded to be too great, and wished "that a less might be accepted."-p. 240.

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"if they should pass a vote for the giving the King "a supply, if it were not in the proportion and manner proposed in his Majesty's message, it would "not be accepted by him." The conduct of Sir H. Vane has been impugned, and this declaration in the King's name treated as an act of treachery; but it is hard to decipher his motives, if he had any less obvious than the fulfilment of his sovereign's command. That long-sighted desire to bring things into confusion, of which he has been accused, is an easier motive to assign when the story can be read backwards, than a very probable one for a man to act upon whose position was already too well assured to be much tempted to court the uncertain favours and events of the future. It is said that he and the Solicitor Herbert misrepresented to the King the temper of the House; and that it was in consequence of their misrepresentations and influence that on the following day, without further deliberation, the King dissolved the Parliament. This undiminished confidence on the part of the Court in the trustworthiness of Sir H. Vane and the Solicitor Herbert must be admitted to confirm

1 Clarendon's' Hist. of the Rebellion,' vol. i. P. 244.

2 Lord Clarendon says, "What followed in the next Parliament, within "less than a year, made it believed that Sir Henry Vane acted that part maliciously and to bring all into confusion."-Ibid., p. 245.

3 Ibid.

"Let their motives be what they would, they two, and they only, "wrought so far with the King that, without so much deliberation as the "affair was worthy of, his Majesty the next morning ⚫ sent for "the Speaker to attend him, and took care that he should go directly to "the House of Peers, upon some apprehension that, if he had gone to "the House of Commons, that House would have entered upon some ingrateful discourse, which they were not inclined to do; and then,

the impression that neither the former nor the Solicitor (who supported him) had gone beyond their instructions in the House of Commons; nor was it till the King

sending for that House to attend him, the Keeper, by His Majesty's "command, dissolved the Parliament."-Clarendon's 'Hist. of the Rebellion,' vol. i. pp. 245, 246. See Com. Journ., vol. ii. p. 19.

The Queen's account of this transaction given to Madame de Motteville shows the imperfect manner in which facts are remembered after a lapse of time, and the misrepresentations that occur when the recollections of the past are embittered by painful associations; it is indeed too incorrect to do much towards inculpating Sir Harry Vane or exculpating the King.

"Le Parlement témoigna peu de dessein de lui complaire. Il trouva que les demandes du Roi étoient trop fortes et que le peuple en seroit surchargé. Par là les parlementaires commencèrent à le mettre en "mauvaise odeur parmi les peuples, qui tous, et en tous pays, n'aiment "point à donner de l'argent. Dans cette conjoncture il arriva qu'un "Secrétaire d'Etat en qui le Roi avoit de la confiance, et que la Reine "même, le croyant fidèle, lui avoit donné, fit à ce prince, en haine de Straf"ford, Viceroi d'Irlande et premier ministre, une insigne trahison; car, "ayant pris liaison avec les ennemis du Roi, et reçu ordre de lui d'aller au "Parlement de sa part porter ses volontés, il leur fit voir que le sentiment "de ce prince était fort contraire à leur désir. L'intention du Roi avoit "été de se contenter à bien moins qu'il n'avoit demandé, pourvu que ce "moins lui fût accordé surement, et qu'il en pût faire état; et comme "le Roi se mettoit entièrement à la raison, il commanda à ce Secrétaire "d'Etat, si ce Parlement ne s'y mettoit pas aussi, qu'il le congédiât de sa part, et qu'ainsi le Parlement fût fini. Cet homme malintentionné leur "dit tout le contraire; il demeura ferme dans la première résolution du "Roi; et comme le Parlement y résista, il leur fit commandement de se "séparer. Ce procédé si dur, mais qui ne venoit point du Roi, aigrit tout "à fait les esprits contre lui."-Mém. de Mad. de Motteville, vol. ii. p. 96.

The question in agitation during this short Parliament was in no way affected by enmity to Lord Strafford; the question was of supply, and the illegality of raising revenue by means independent of, and unsanctioned by, Parliament. The Queen has also entirely omitted to mention that the ground on which the Parliament refused to comply with the King's demands was not only the amount of the sum, but the conditions on which it was to be granted. The King could be under no delusion as to the line adopted by the Solicitor-General, Mr. Herbert, and Sir Harry Vane, and he publicly sanctioned and confirmed the authority upon which they had acted in the House of Commons, by fulfilling the threat uttered in his name, and dissolving the Parliament the following day.

had come to the conviction that the Parliament would have voted him a supply but for the fatal declaration on authority that it would have been refused by him, "that he was heartily sorry for what he had done, and "denied having given such authority." He even

wished to recall by proclamation the Parliament he had thus hastily dissolved, but that was impossible. The King's will could not restore as it had destroyed, and thus ended the brief existence of the fourth Parliament of this reign, summoned from absolute necessity, and dismissed in haughty displeasure.

Such was the course of events that passed before Lord Falkland on his first introduction to Parliament. The seeds then sown in his mind were destined to ripen ere long into active participation in the affairs of state. The impression produced on his opinions by this short Parliament is thus described by Lord Clarendon :"From the debates, which were there managed with all imaginable gravity and sobriety, he contracted such a reverence for Parliaments that he thought it really impossible they could ever produce mischief or "inconvenience to the kingdom, or that the kingdom "could be tolerably happy in the intermission of them. "And from the unhappy and unreasonable dissolution "of that Convention, he harboured, it may be, some jealousy and prejudice to the Court, towards which he "was not before immoderately inclined." 2

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Parliament was no sooner dissolved than the King had recourse to every expedient for procuring money; 'Clarendon's' Hist. of the Rebellion,' vol. i. p. 247; and see Appendix G. 2 Ibid., vol. iv. p. 244.