God we have done to the best of our judgments, knowing that if some issue were not put to this business it would occasion another winter's war to the ruin of your soldiery, for whom the Scots are too hard in respect of enduring the winter difficulties of this country, and would have been under the endless expense of the treasure of England in prosecuting this war. It may be supposed we might have kept the enemy from this by interposing between him and England, which truly I believe we might; but how to remove him out of this place without doing what we have done, unless we had a commanding army on both sides of the river of Forth, is not clear to us; or how to answer the inconveniences above mentioned we understand not We pray, therefore, that-seeing there is a probability for the enemy to put you to some trouble-you would, with the same courage grounded upon a confidence in God, wherein you have been supported to the great things God hath used you in hitherto, improve, the best you can, such forces as you have in readiness as may on the sudden be gathered together to give the enemy some check until we shall be able to reach up to him, which we trust in the Lord we shall do our utmost endeavour in."

Instructions were despatched to Harrison to attend the enemy's march upon his flanks whilst Lambert hung upon his rear as he moved by way of Carlisle

and Lancaster. Cromwell himself pushed on by the eastern route to head off the Scots as soon as he could gain sufficiently upon their slower march. The only question of importance was to know which of the opposing armies could gain most assistance in England. In Lancashire indeed the Earl of Derby raised a force for the King, but he was defeated by Robert Lilburne at Wigan, and was himself captured. When on August 22 Charles reached Worcester, scarcely a single Englishman had joined him. Large bodies of militia, on the other hand, flocked to Cromwell's standard; and when on September 3-the anniversary of Dunbar-the final battle was fought at Worcester, Cromwell commanded some 31,000 men, whilst the Scottish army did not number above 16,000. Cromwell having laid bridges of boats across the Severn and the Teme, was able to shift his regiments from one bank to the other of either stream as occasion served, and the Scots, fighting their best, were crushed by superior numbers as well as by superior discipline. Charles, when all was lost, rode away from the place of slaughter, and after an adventurous journey, made his escape to France. "The dimensions of this mercy," wrote Cromwell, "are above my thoughts. It is, for aught I know, a crowning mercy. Surely if it be not, such a one we shall have, if this provoke those that are concerned in it to thankfulness, and the Parliament

to do the will of Him who hath done His will for it and for the nation, whose good pleasure it is to establish the nation and the change of government, by making the people so willing to the defence thereof, and so signally blessing the endeavours of your servants in this great work."

Was it really in defence of 'the change of government' that the people had sided with Cromwell? Or was it merely that they would not tolerate a Scottish conquest? At all events, the tide of feeling gave to the Parliament a momentary strength. Of the notable Scots engaged, Hamilton had fallen at Worcester, and the greater number of the remainder were now consigned to English prisons. Of the few Englishmen who had risen, Derby was beheaded at Bolton-leMoors, four of his followers being subsequently executed. The subjugation of Scotland was completed by Monk.

As for Cromwell, he settled down into a quiet and unpretentious life, attending to the discipline of the army, and ready in his place in Parliament to forward the cause which he had most at heart-the establishment of that Commonwealth to which his victories had given a breathing-space. To him, as to many disinterested observers, the time had come to found the government no longer on the sword, but on the consent of the nation, and there can be little doubt that at no time between 1642 and 1660 was there

more chance of gaining a majority for the new system than this. Cromwell, at least, did everything in his power to procure a vote for an early dissolution. It was only, however, by a majority of two that Parliament agreed to fix a date for its dissolution, following the vote by a resolution postponing that event for three years. resolution found support amongst those members who were fattening on corruption; but there was also something to be said for the view taken some time before by Marten, when he compared the Commonwealth to Moses, because the members now sitting 'were the true mother to this fair child, the young Commonwealth,' and therefore its fittest nurses. general election is always somewhat of a lottery, and it was the weakest part of the system-or want of system-on which the Commonwealth was based, that it never represented the people as a whole, and that its actions might easily have been repudiated by them if they had been consulted.

There can be little doubt that this

A

Baffled in his desire to secure an immediate appeal to the electors, Cromwell prepared to use the time which the members had secured for themselves, by coming to an understanding with the leading statesmen on the principles of the future Government. had never committed himself to the doctrine that the executive authority ought to be placed directly in the hands of an elected assembly or of a council subor

He

dinated to it. When at the conference now held the lawyers pleaded that Charles II. or the Duke of York might be called on to accept the government if the rights of Englishmen could be safeguarded, he replied somewhat oracularly: "That will be a business of more than ordinary difficulty; but really, I think, if it may be done with safety and preservation of our rights as Englishmen and Christians, that a settlement with some what of a monarchical power in it would be very effectual". It is very unlikely that Cromwell, being what he was, had as yet formed any settled design in his own mind, but the tendency towards the course which eventually established the Protectorate is quite evident. To secure the rights of Englishmen and Christians rather than to strengthen the absolute supremacy of Parliaments had been his constant aim. Whether he reflected that if the monarchical power was to be given to some one not of the House of Stuart, it could hardly be given to any other man than himself, is a question which every one must answer as he thinks fit.

The conference had led to no decision, and during the first half of 1652 Cromwell had enough to do in defending religious liberty against those who had constituted themselves its champions. Before the Battle of Worcester had been fought, Parliament had passed a Blasphemy Act, for the punishment of atheistical, blasphemous and execrable opinions. In