1649. October. desired effect. Having led the army without delay to Wexford, he began to batter the town. The garrison, after a slight defence, offered to capitulate; but before they obtained a cessation, they imprudently neglected their guards; and the English army rushed in upon them. The same severity was exercised as at Tredah. Every town before which Cromwell presented himself, now opened its gates without resistance. Ross, though strongly garrisoned, was surrendered by lord Taffe. Having taken Estionage, Cromwell threw a bridge over the Barrow, and made himself master of Passage and Carric. The English had no farther difficulties to encounter than what arose from fatigue and the advanced season. Fluxes and contagious distempers creeped in among the soldiers, who perished in great numbers. Jones himself, the brave governor of Dublin, died at Wexford. And Cromwell had so far advanced with his decayed army, that he began to find it difficult, either to subsist in the enemy's country, November. or retreat to his own garrisons. But while he was in these straits, Corke, Kinsale, and all the English garrisons in Munster deserted to him, and opening their gates, resolved to share the fortunes of their victorious country men. This desertion of the English put an end to Ormond's authority, which was already much diminished by the misfortunes at Dublin, Tredah, and Wexford. The Irish, actuated by national and religious prejudices, could no longer be kept in obedience by a protestant governor, who was so unsuccessful in all his enterprises. The clergy renewed their excommunications against him and his adherents, and added the terrors of superstition to those which arose from a victorious enemy. Cromwell, having received a reinforcement from England, again took the field early in the spring. He made himself master of Kilkenny and Clonmel, the only places where he met with any vigorous resistance. The whole frame of the Irish union being in a manner dissolved, Ormond soon after left the island, and delegated his authority to Clanricarde, who found affairs so desperate as to admit of no remedy. The Irish were glad to embrace banishment as a refuge. Above forty thousand men passed into foreign service; and Cromwell, well pleased to free the island from enemies who never could be cordially reconciled to the English, gave them full liberty and leisure for their embarkation. While Cromwell proceeded with such uninterrupted success in Ireland, which in the space of nine months he had almost entirely subdued, fortune was preparing for him a new scene of victory and triumph in Scotland. Charles was at the Hague, when sir Joseph Douglas brought him intelligence, that he was proclaimed king by the Scottish parliament. At the same time, Douglas informed him of the hard conditions annexed to the proclamation, and extremely damped that joy which might arise from his being recognized sovereign in one of his kingdoms. Charles too considered, that those who pretended to acknowledge his title, were at that very time in actual rebellion against his family, and would be sure to intrust very little authority in his hands, and scarcely would afford him personal liberty and security. As the prospect of affairs in Ireland was at that time not unpromising, he intended rather to try his fortune in that kingdom, from which he expected more dutiful submission and obedience. Meanwhile he found it expedient to depart from Holland. The people in the United Provinces were much attached to his interests. Besides his connexion with the family of Orange, which was extremely beloved by the populace, all men regarded with compassion his helpless condition, and expressed the greatest abhorrence against the murder of his father; a deed to which nothing, they thought, but the rage of fanaticism and faction could have impelled the parliament. But though the public in general bore great favour to the king, the states were uneasy at his presence. They dreaded the parliament, so formidable by their power, and so prosperous in all their enterprises. They apprehended the most precipitate resolutions from men of such violent and haughty disposi 1649. tions. And after the murder of Dorislaus, they found it still more necessary to satisfy the English commonwealth, by removing the king to a distance from them. Dorislaus, though a native of Holland, had lived long in England; and being employed as assistant to the high court of justice which condemned the late king, he had risen to great credit and favour with the ruling party. They sent him envoy to Holland; but no sooner had he arrived at the Hague, than he was set upon by some royalists, chiefly retainers to Montrose. They rushed into the room where he was sitting with some company; dragged him from the table; put him to death as the first victim to their murdered sovereign; very leisurely and peaceably separated themselves; and though orders were issued by the magistrates to arrest them, these were executed with such slowness and reluctance, that the criminals had all of them the opportunity of making their escape. Charles, having passed some time at Paris, where no assistance was given him, and even few civilities were paid him, made his retreat into Jersey, where his authority was still acknowledged. Here Winram, laird of Liberton, came to him as deputy from the committee of estates in Scotland, and informed him of the conditions to which he must necessarily submit before he could be admitted to the exercise of his authority. Conditions more severe were never imposed by subjects upon their sovereign; but as the affairs of Ireland began to decline, and the king found it no longer safe to venture himself in that island, he gave a civil answer to Winram, and desired commissioners to meet him at Breda, in order to enter into a treaty with regard to these conditions. The earls of Cassilis and Lothian, lord Burley, the laird of Liberton, and other commissioners, arrived at Breda; but without any power of treating: the king must submit without reserve to the terms imposed upon him. The terms were, that he should issue a proclamation, banishing from court all excommunicated persons, that is, all those who, either under Hamilton or Montrose, had ventured their lives for his family; that no English subject who had served against the parliament, should be allowed to approach him; that he should bind himself by his royal promise to take the covenant; that he should ratify all acts of parliament by which presbyterian government, the directory of worship, the confession of faith, and the catechism were established; and that in civil affairs he should entirely conform himself to the direction of parliament, and in ecclesiastical to that of the assembly. These proposals the commissioners, after passing some time in sermons and prayers, in order to express the more determined resolution, very solemnly delivered to the king. The king's friends were divided with regard to the part which he should act in this critical conjuncture. Most of his English counsellors dissuaded him from accepting conditions so disadvantageous and dishonourable. They said, that the men who now governed Scotland were the most furious and bigotted of that party which, notwithstanding his gentle government, had first excited a rebellion against the late king; after the most unlimited concessions had renewed their rebellion, and stopped the progress of his victories in England; and after he had intrusted his person to them in his uttermost distress, had basely sold him, together with their own honour, to his barbarous enemies: that they had as yet shown no marks of repentance; and even in the terms which they now proposed, displayed the same antimonarchical principles, and the same jealousy of their sovereign, by which they had ever been actuated: that nothing could be more dishonourable, than that the king, in his first enterprise, should sacrifice, merely for the empty name of royalty, those principles for which his father had died a martyr, and in which he himself had been strictly educated: that by this hypocrisy he might lose the royalists, who alone were sincerely attached to him; but never would gain the presbyterians, who were averse to his family and his cause, and would ascribe his compliance merely to policy and necessity that the Scots had refused to give him any assurances of their intending to restore him to the throne of 1650. 1650. England; and could they even be brought to make such an attempt, it had sufficiently appeared, by the event of Hamilton's engagement, how unequal their force was to so great an enterprise: that on the first check which they should receive, Argyle and his partisans would lay hold of the quickest expedient for reconciling themselves to the English parliament, and would betray the king, as they had done his father, into the hands of his enemies: and that, however desperate the royal cause, it must still be regarded as highly imprudent in the king to make a sacrifice of his honour, where the sole purchase was to endanger his life or liberty. The earl of Laneric, now duke of Hamilton, the earl of Lauderdale, and others of that party who had been banished their country for the late engagement, were then with the king; and being desirous of returning home in his retinue, they joined the opinion of the young duke of Buckingham, and earnestly pressed him to submit to the conditions required of him. It was urged, that nothing would more gratify the king's enemies than to see him fall into the snare laid for him, and by so scrupulous a nicety, leave the possession of his dominions to those who desired but a pretence for excluding him: that Argyle, not daring so far to oppose the bent of the nation as to throw off all allegiance to his sovereign, had embraced this expedient, by which he hoped to make Charles dethrone himself, and refuse a kingdom which was offered him: that it was not to be doubted but the same national spirit, assisted by Hamilton and his party, would rise still higher in favour of their prince after he had intrusted himself to their fidelity, and would much abate the rigour of the conditions now imposed upon him: that whatever might be the present intentions of the ruling party, they must unavoidably be engaged in a war with England, and must accept the assistance of the king's friends of all parties, in order to support themselves against a power so much superior: that how much soever a steady, uniform conduct might have been suitable to the advanced age and strict engagements of the late king, |