service to speak of publicly, which I shall humbly represent to the Council of State, wherewith I desire we may be accommodated." Cromwell then winds up after his fashion with an exhortation "to fear the Lord, to fear unbelief and self-seeking." Was this hypocrisy ? Or did Cromwell really believe that there was no self-seeking in him? Or, being a clear-sighted man and knowing that it abounded in him, did he sincerely pray to God to be delivered from it? If he did, it would appear that his prayers as regarded that particular were unheard or unheeded. an In the beginning of the month of January 16 estimate was brought in of the charge of fitting and setting out a fleet of 44 men-of-war and 28 merchant ships, manned with 8082 men,1 to serve for eight months on the narrow seas, as a summer's guard for the year 1650. The House approved of this estimate, amounting to £886,220, and ordered the commissions of their three admirals, Popham, Blake, and Deane, to be renewed for the whole year. The names of all the ships intended for this summer's guard are entered on the journals. Three of these ships being styled the Prince, the Charles, and the Mary, the House ordered that it be referred to the Council of State to give other fit names to those ships.2 If their care for constitutional liberty was open to many doubts, they were determined to extinguish all traces of the monarchy which they had abolished. The Parliament having received letters from General Cromwell, lord-lieutenant of Ireland, from Major-General 1 Some estimate may be formed of the number of men in each of the larger ships from a minute of the Council of State which specifies "4 of the great ships appointed by this Council to be set to sea manned with the I number of 1000 men."-Order Book On Ireton, and from Lord Broghill, dated at Cork, the 18th and 19th of December, passed a resolution on the 8th of January, that the said Lord-Lieutenant be desired to come over, and give his attendance in Parliament: and that the Council of State do prepare a letter to be read to him for that purpose, to be signed by the Speaker; and at the same time to render him the thanks of the House for his great service and faithfulness to the Commonwealth. the same day a Bill, which had been some time depending, for settling certain lands upon Cromwell and his heirs, was reported to the House and ordered to be read a second time.1 Cromwell's services may certainly be said to have been far greater than either Ireton's or Vane's. Nevertheless the contrast between his conduct and theirs in regard to the acceptance of Parliamentary grants cannot be overlooked. While Cromwell readily accepted votes of £65002 per annum in land, a handsome residence at Whitehall, the use of the palace at Hampton Court, and other provisions from the Parliament, Ireton absolutely refused the grant of £2000 per annum in land, and Vane voluntarily gave up in consideration of his country's necessities his very lucrative appointment of treasurer of the navy, and even refunded £2500, being the moiety of what he had received from the time the Parliament had made him sole treasurer. Such 1 Parl. Hist. vol. iii. p. 1345. 2 This would make at that time one of the largest rentals in the possession of a subject. The Duke of Buckingham's rental, which was reckoned exorbitant, is stated by Pepys in 1669 to have been £19,600 a year. Pepys says "The Duke of Buckingham's condition is shortly this: that he hath about £19,600 a-year of which he pays away about £7000 a year in interest, about £2000 in fee farm-rents to the King, about £6000 in wages and pensions, and the rest to live upon and pay taxes for the whole."-Pepys' Diary, Feb. 14, 1668-9. It may be mentioned as an example of the gross inaccuracy of satirists that Pope in a note on his lines on this Duke of Buckingham, erroneously describing him as dying "in the worst inn's worst room," describes him as "having been possessed of about £50,000 a year." 3 Sikes, after saying that at the beginning of the war with Holland is the effect always when "self in the highest" predominates. We see it in many forms. But it presents itself very prominently in the spectacle of what a politician, a lawyer, and sometimes but far more rarely a soldier will do that they may have money enough to support the dignity of a peerage. On the 10th of January the House ordered their Attorney-General to prepare a patent to be passed under the great seal of England, appointing Major-General Ireton to be President of the province of Munster, he observing such instructions as should be given him by the Parliament, Council of State, or the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland for the time being.1 On the 30th of January, upon the Lord Grey's report from the Council of State, that they had agreed that the style to be used in all transactions with foreign Powers should run thus, "Reipublicæ Anglicana Ordines," unless the Parliament thought fit to appoint any other; after debate it was resolved, "That in all negotiations and transactions with foreign States, the style or title to be used should be, 'Parliamentum Reipublicæ Angliæ:' that the Lords Commissioners of the great seal be required to pass, under the great seal of England, several commissions in common form, mutatis mutandis, to the two agents ap Vane resigned his treasureship of the navy which during that Dutch war, would have amounted to near £20,000 a year, adds "He had also long before this, upon the self-denying ordinance (little observed by others) refunded five and twenty hundred pounds, for public uses, being the moiety of his receptions in the said office, from such time as the Parliament had made him sole treasurer, who, before the war, was joined with another person."Life and Death of Sir Henry Vane, Knight, 1662. Ludlowe says he was very much blamed by his good friend Sir Henry Vane for preventing the sale of Hampton Court. Vane said "that such places might justly be accounted amongst those things that proved temptations to ambitious men, and exceedingly tend to sharpen their appetite to ascend the throne."-Ludlowe's Memoirs, p. 258, folio. London, 1751. Parl. Hist. vol. iii. p. 1345. N pointed by the Council of State, to be employed to Spain and Portugal: and that the style and title of every address to the Parliament from foreign princes and States shall be, The Parliament of the Commonwealth of England,' and no other style or title whatsoever." 1 On the 31st of January the House received letters from the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland, at Cork, advising that several garrisons in Munster had surrendered to the Parliament's forces without blood, or striking a strike; and that the army was in so good health that regiments which lately marched only 400 men, now marched 800 or 900; and that the horse were disposed of into garrisons.2 They The time appointed for the continuance of the present Council of State expiring about the middle of February, 1648, the House proceeded to the election of a new Council of State for the ensuing year. They first agreed that the number, as before, should not exceed 41. next read over a list of the names of the present Council, and proceeded to put the question upon every single person; when they were all re-elected except the Earl of Mulgrave, the Lord Grey of Warke, and Sir John Danvers. Besides these three vacancies, however, there were two more caused by the deaths of the Earl of Pembroke and Alderman Rowland Wilson. There were thus five vacancies to be The filling up of these vacancies in the Council of State gave occasion to much debate and many divisions of the House. On such occasions the contest for place and power caused the number of members present to amount to more than double the number which met for the dispatch of ordinary business. On this occasion the number present was 98; and the following five persons were nominated of the Council of State for the year 1 Parl. Hist. vol. iii. p. 1345. 2 Parl. Hist. vol. iii. p. 1345. filled up. ensuing, Mr. Thomas Challoner, Mr. John Gurdon, Col. Herbert Morley, Sir Peter Wentworth, the Lord Howard. "The question being propounded that Sir Henry Vane, senior, be one of the Council of State for the year ensuing; and the question being put, ("the previous question"), that that question be now put; "The House was divided. "The Noes went forth. "Colonel Ludlow (Tellers for the Noes: 54 "Sir William Armyn, (Tellers for the Yeas: "Sir John Trevor, With the Yeas, 44 "So it passed with the negative." Philip the new Earl of Pembroke was rejected without a division. 1 1 The Parliament, as before mentioned, having desired Cromwell to come over into England, made an order on the 25th of February, "That His Excellency have the use of the lodgings called the Cockpit, the Spring Garden, St. James's House, and the command of St. James's Park." During the months of April and May the Parliament signalised themselves by legislation on which it will be necessary to make some observations. In April they passed an Act "For inflicting certain Penalties for breach of the Lord's Day and other Solemn Days." By this Act no person was to use or travel with boat, horse, coach, or sedan, except to church, upon pain of 10s. The like penalty was inflicted for being in a tavern, alehouse, &c. Where distress could not be found sufficient to satisfy the respective penalties, the offender was to sit in the stocks 1 Commons' Journals, Die Mercurii, 20° Februarii, 163. This division is given here partly to show to the general reader the meaning of what is called "THE PREVIOUS QUESTION," which is often misunderstood. |