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"false that were recited of him. And to tell you the truth, they were so much engaged in affection before this, that she could "not think of breaking it off. So that my Sister engaged me and "all the friends she had, who truly were very few, to speak in her "behalf to my Father. Which we did; but could not be heard to any purpose: only this my Father promised, That if he were sa"tisfied as to the report, the estate should not break it off. With "which she was satisfied.

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"And so after this, there was a second Treaty; and my Lord "Warwick desired my Father, To name what it was he demanded more; and to his utmost he would satisfy him. So my Father upon this made new propositions; which my Lord Warwick has "answered as much as he can. But it seems there are Five-hun"dred pounds a year in my Lord Rich's hands; which he has 'power to sell: and there are some people, who persuade his Highness, that it would be dishonourable for him to conclude it unless these 500l. a year be settled upon Mr. Rich, after his fa・ther's death. And my Lord Rich having no esteem at all of his

son, because he is not so bad as himself, will not agree to it; "and these people upon this persuade my Father, That it would 'be a dishonour to him to yield upon these terms; it would show, that he was made a fool of by my Lord Rich. So the truth is, how it shall be, I cannot understand, nor very few else;1 and truly I must tell you privately, they are so far engaged, that the "match cannot be broke off! She acquainted none of her friends "with her resolution, when she did it.

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"Dear Brother, this is, as far as I can tell, the state of the bu"siness. The Lord direct them what to do. And all, I think, ought to beg of God to pardon her in her doing of this thing;— "which I must say truly she was put upon by the 'course'2 of things. Dear, let me beg my excuses to my Sister for not writing. My best respects to her. Pardon this trouble; and be"lieve me that I shall ever strive to approve myself,-dear Bro"ther, your affectionate sister and servant,

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"MARY CROMWELL."
"3

Poor little Fanny Cromwell was not yet much turned of Seventeen, when she had these complex things to do, with her friends, 'who truly were very few.' What 'people' they were that put, or strove to put, such notions into his Highness's head, with intent to frustrate the decidedly eligible Mr. Rich, none knows. I could suspect Ashley Cooper, or some such hand, if his date of favour still lasted. But it is gone, long months ago. Ashley is himself 1 Good little Mary! 3 Thurloe, v. 146.

2 Torn out.

frustrated; cannot obtain this musical glib-tongued Lady Mary, says Ludlow; goes over to opposition in consequence; is dismissed from his Highness's Council of State; and has to climb in this world by another ladder.-Poor Fanny's marriage did nevertheless take effect. Both Mary and she were duly wedded, Fanny to Rich, Mary to Lord Fauconberg, in November next year, within about a week of each other 2 our friends, who truly were very few,' and our destinies, and our own lively wits, brought all right in the end.

LETTER CCXIII.

It was last Spring Assizes, as we saw, that the 'great appearances of country gentlemen and persons of the highest quality' took place; leading to the inference generally that this Protectorate Government is found worth acknowledging by England. Certainly a somewhat successful Government hitherto; in spite of difficulties great and many. It carries eternal Gospel in the one hand, temporal drawn Sword in the other. Actually it has compressed the turbulent humours of this Country, and encouraged the better tendencies thereof, hitherto; it has set its foot resolutely on the neck of English Anarchy, and points with its armed hand to noble onward and upward paths. All which, England, thankful at lowest for peace and order, by degrees recognises ; with acquiescence, not without some slow satisfactory feeling. England is in peace at home; stands as the Queen of Protestantism abroad; defies Spain and Antichrist, protects poor Piedmont

1 Here is the passage, not hitherto printed; one of several 'Suppressedpassages from Ludlow's Memoirs,' which still exist in the handwriting of John Locke (now in the possession of Lord Lovelace), having been duly copied out by Locke for his own poor Life of the Earl of Shaftesbury, to whom they all relate:

'Sir Anthony Ashley Cooper, who was first for the King, then for the Par'liament; then, in Cromwell's first Assembly,' the Little Parliament, was 'for 'the reformation; and afterwards for Cromwell against the reformation. Now' again, being denied Cromwell's Daughter Mary in marriage, he appears against Cromwell's design in the last Assembly,' the constitutioning Parliament, where his behaviour was none of the best; and is therefore dismissed 'the Council, Cromwell being resolved to act there as the chief juggler him'self; and one Colonel Mackworth, a Lawyer about Shrewsbury, a person fit 'for his purpose, is chosen in his room.'-Mackworth was a Soldier as well as Lawyer; the same who, as Governor of Shrewsbury, gave negative response to Charles Second, when he summoned him on the road to Worcester, once upon a time. Mackworth was in the Council, and had even died, and entirely left the Council, before Anthony Ashley left it (Thurloe, iii. 581; and Godwin, iv. 288). My solid friend, absent in Ireland, sulkily breathing the air in Essex, falls into some errors! Court-rumour, this of his; truth in the heart of it, details rather vague;-not much worth verifying or rectifying here.

2 Vol. i. p. 55.

Protestants and servants of Christ;-has taken, all men admit, a nobler attitude than it ever had before.

Nor has the task been easy hitherto; nor is it like to be. No holiday work, governing such an England as this of Oliver Protector's; with strong Papistry abroad, and a Hydra of Anarchies at home! The domestic Hydra is not slain; cannot, by the nature of it, be slain; can only be scotched and mowed down, head after head, as it successively protrudes itself;-till, by the aid of Time, it slowly die. As yet, on any hint of foreign encouragement it revives again, requires to be scotched and mowed down again. His exiled Majesty Charles Stuart has got a new lever in hand, by means of this War with Spain.

Seven years ago his exiled Majesty's 'Embassy to Spain,' embassy managed by Chancellor Hyde and another, proved rather a hungry affair; and ended, I think, in little,-except the murder of poor Ascham, the then Parliament's Envoy at Madrid; whom, like Dutch Dorislaus, as an accursed regicide or abettor of regicides,' certain cut-throat servants of the said hungry Embassy broke-in upon, one afternoon, and slew. For which violent deed no full satisfaction could be got from Spain, the murderers having taken sanctuary,' as was pleaded. With that rather sorry result, and no other noticeable, Chancellor Hyde's Embassy took itself away again; Spain ordering it to go. But now, this fierce Protestant Protector breathing nothing but war, Spain finds that the English domestic Hydra, if well operated upon by Charles Stuart, might be a useful thing; and grants Charles Stuart some encouragements for that. His poor Majesty is coming to the seashore again; is to have Seven-thousand Spaniards' to invade England, -if the domestic Hydra will stir with effect. The domestic Hydra, I think, had better lie quiet for a while! This Letter to Henry Cromwell is to bid him too, for his part, be awake in Ireland to these things.

For the Hydra is not dead; and its heads are legion. Major Wildman, for example, sits safe in Chepstow: but Sexby, the Anabaptist Colonel, whom we could not take on that occasion, is still busy; has been trying to seduce the Fleet,' trying to do this and that; is now fairly gone to Spain, to treat with Antichrist himself for the purpose of bringing-in a Reign of Christ, the truly desperate Anabaptist Colonel !2 It is a Hydra like few. Spiritual and Practical: Muggletonians, mad Quakers riding into Bristol, FifthMonarchists, Hungry Flunkeys: ever scheming, plotting with or

1 Clarendon, iii. 498-509; Process and Pleadings in the Court of Spain upon the Death of Anthony Ascham (in Harl. Miscell. vi. 236-47).

2 Clarendon, iii. 852; Thurloe, iv. 698, &c.

without hope, to seduce the Protector's Guard,' 'to blow up the Protector in his bed-room,' and do "other little fiddling things," as the Protector calls them,-which one cannot waste time in specifying! Only the slow course of nature can kill that Hydra: till a Colonel Sexby die, how can you keep him quiet?—

But what doubtless gives new vitality to plotting, in these weeks, is the fact that a General Election to Parliament is going on. There is to be a new Parliament ;-in which may lie who knows what contentions. The Protector lost it last time, by the arithmetical account of heads; will he gain it this time? Account of heads is not exactly the Protector's basis; but he hopes he may now gain it even so. At all events, this wide foreign and domestic Spanish War cannot be carried on without supplies; he will first try it so, then otherwise if not so.

To Henry Cromwell, Major-General of the Army in Ireland!' SON HARRY,

Whitehall,' 26th August 1656. We are informed, from several hands, that the old Enemy are forming designs to invade Ireland, as well as other parts of the Commonwealth; and that he and Spain have very great correspondence with some chief men in that Nation, for raising a sudden rebellion there.

Therefore we judge it very necessary that you take all possible care to put the Forces into such a condition as may answer anything that may fall out in this kind. And to that end, that you contract the Garrisons in Ireland, as many as may be; and get a considerable marching Army into the field, in two or three bodies, to be left in the most proper and advantageous places for service, as occasion shall require. Taking also, in all other things, your best care you can to break and prevent the designs and combinations of the Enemy;-and a very particular regard is to be had to the North, where, without question, busy and discontented persons are working towards new disturbances. I do not doubt but you will communicate this thing to Colonel Cowper, to the end he may be more watchful and diligent in looking to this danger. I rest, your loving father,

OLIVER CROMWELL.*

*Sloane MSS. 4157, f. 209; and (with insignificant variations) Thurloe, v.

'Colonel Cowper' commands the Forces in Ulster. Plenty of details about him in Thurloe's Fourth Volume:-our readers can sufficiently conceive him without details. We are more interested to state, from a Letter of Thurloe's which goes along with this, that there are Fourteen Spanish ships plying about the Isle of Islay,' doubtless with an eye to Carrickfergus; that we hope, and indeed believe, my Lord Henry will be on the alert. For the rest, the Elections are going well; all for peace and settlement,' as we hear, and great friends to the Government.' Ashley Cooper, indeed, has been chosen for Wilts: but, on the other hand, Bradshaw has missed in Cheshire; Sir Henry Vane has tried in three places and missed in all. This is of date 26th August 1656; poor England universally sifting itself; trying what the arithmetical account of heads will do for it, once more.

LETTER CCXIV.

THE Portugal has done justice; reluctantly aware at last that jesuitries would not serve him.2 The Spaniards, again, cower close within their harbours; patient of every insult; no ship will venture out, and no Plate Fleet will come in: and as for attempting Cadiz or Gibraltar,' the Sea-Generals, after mature survey, decide that without other force it cannot prudently be done. This is what Montague, with his clear eyes, has had to report to Secretary Thurloe on the latter enterprise: "I perceive much desire "that Gibraltar should be taken. My thoughts as to that are, in short, these That the likeliest way to get it is, By landing on the sand, and quickly cutting it off between sea and sea, or so securing our men there as that they may hinder the intercourse "of the Town with the Main; frigates lying near, too, to assist "them-and it is well known that Spain never victualleth any

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place for one month. This will want Four or Five thousand men, well formed and officered.-This is my own only thought "which I submit, at present."3

Whereupon the Lord Protector sends the following Orders; one other Sea Letter of his which we happen to have left. Mainly of

1 Thurloe to Henry Cromwell, date 26th Aug. (v. 349).

2 Meadows to Blake and Montague, 13th May 1656: Thurloe, v. 14;-sec ib. 69, 116, and 118 (the Portugal's Letter to Oliver, 24th June 1656).

3 Montague to Thurloe, in cipher, 20th April to 29th May 1656 (Thurloe, v. 67-70), 'received by Captain Lloyd, who arrived here 11th July,' and has brought other Letters, joint Letters from the Generals, of somewhat later date, as we shall perceive.