either in politics or war, but belonged to the class of statesmen to whom the word 'opportunist' is most properly applied. When he had become the leader of the country he showed his sagacity and practical wisdom by the moderation of his acts; but he failed to make his rule permanent, because an attempt to govern the majority of a nation by a minority, supported by an armed force, can, in the nature of things, only be transitory; and there is little doubt that a freely elected parliament, any time after the beginning of the war, would have given a majority-possibly to the royalists-certainly to the royalists and Presbyterians combined.

Cromwell.

It is not certain whether Cromwell omitted to nominate a successor, or whether during a 'drowsy fit' he named his eldest son Richard; but the council acted on the supposition that Richard had Richard been legally nominated, and, accordingly, he was inaugurated Protector. It was unfortunate for the Cromwell family that the second son Henry, who was a capable soldier and an experienced statesman, could not have succeeded; for Richard, though he was a kindly and agreeable man, was neither a soldier, a statesman, nor a zealot, and so failed to win the support of any of the classes to whom his father's character had appealed. He was not, however, without friends. Whitelock thought his accession favourable to constitutional government; the Presbyterian Baxter considered it a point in his favour that he had no share in the civil war ; and had he been a stronger man the chances were not altogether unfavourable to his success.

Third Protectorate Parliament.

His accession, therefore, passed off without disturbance; but when his first parliament met, in January 1659, his difficulties began. With a view to securing the utmost show of legality, the English members were elected, not by the newly organised constituencies, but by the old ones; the Irish and Scottish members, however, were chosen by the new. No one was excluded, so Vane, Hazelrig, Bradshaw, Scot, and Ludlow were all in it, and proceeded at once to attack the new House of Lords, and to criticise the prerogatives of the Protector. The army itself was divided; Fleetwood and Desborough, often spoken of, from Fleetwood's house, as the Wallingford House party, wished to divide the civil and military powers of the Protector, and to make Fleetwood commander-in-chief. Lambert, who, to please the army, had been restored to his post, would have liked to be Protector himself. Vane acted with the Wallingford House party. Between these contending parties Richard's position was no sinecure, and when Fleetwood and Desborough came to him and gave him his choice whether he would trust the army or the parliament, and said that

if he did the former they would take care that he was provided for, he decided to trust to them, and dissolved parliament on April 22 before it had even voted supplies.

'Rump.'

The dissolution of parliament resulted in want of money to pay the soldiers; and as Richard was not strong enough to levy taxes as Oliver had done, a parliament of some kind was necessary. AccordThe Army restores the ingly in May, the army, acting on Lambert's advice, restored the members of the Long Parliament who had been dismissed by Cromwell in 1653, an arrangement in which Richard Cromwell acquiesced. In the restored Rump the old Commonwealth men-Vane, Bradshaw, Scot, and Hazelrig-were supreme. They were bent on restoring a republic, and, after making provision for the payment of Richard Cromwell's debts, they insisted on his leaving Whitehall. He retired into private life 'not a sixpence the better or richer for being the son of his father.'

These dissensions encouraged the royalists and Presbyterians, and a general rising was planned for August, in which it was hoped that Booth's a rising in England would be supported by Montague with Rising. the fleet, and Monk with the army of Scotland. However, it was only serious in Cheshire, where Sir George Booth, a great Cheshire squire and a Presbyterian, took the field with a considerable force; but at Winnington Bridge he was utterly routed by Lambert, and neither Montague nor Monk declared for the cause. On his return to London, Fleetwood moved in the House to make Lambert major-general. The House refused, and when the army demanded that Fleetwood should be general, Desborough lieutenant-general, and Monk and Lambert major-generals, parliament dismissed Lambert and Desborough from their posts, and made Fleetwood a merely nominal chief associated with a committee of six members of parliament. Next day Lambert marched down to Westminster, expelled the Rump, and created a committee of safety to manage the affairs of the kingdom till a committee, of which Vane was the chief, should have devised a new constitution.

All this time the proceedings of the army had been disapproved, both by Ludlow, whom the Rump had made commander in Ireland in place of Henry Cromwell, and by Monk, whom it had continued in command in Scotland. Ludlow came over to remonstrate, but without his troops. Monk, on the other hand, after

Monk enters

England.

declaring for the parliament, organised his army for an invasion of England and marched to the border. To meet him Lambert was despatched to Newcastle, but he weakly allowed Monk to gain time

by negotiation; while Fairfax, who detested the rule of the army, raised the Yorkshire militia in his rear, and persuaded his soldiers to desert. Accordingly Lambert, finding his position hopeless, fell back, and Monk marched on towards London. On his way he saw plenty of evidence that the country was tired of the dissentions of the Rump and the army, and wished for a free parliament. However, he kept his own counsel, declaring that if his shirt knew what was in his head, he would burn his shirt'; and quietly took up his quarters in London, whence the old regiments had been removed by order of the parliament.

Meanwhile, by request of Fleetwood, the Rump had resumed its sittings, and Monk, declaring himself the humble servant of the members, announced his readiness to do their bidding. Encouraged by his attitude, Hazelrig and the other Commonwealth men endeavoured to embroil him with the city, where the chief strength of the Presbyterians lay, by ordering him to pull down the gates of London in punishment for a declaration of the common council that as London had no representatives in the Rump, no more taxes should be paid till the vacancies had been filled up. Monk obeyed; but the folly of the action convinced him that the cause of the Rump was hopeless, and immediately afterwards he joined the citizens in a demand for a free parliament. Monk's declara- The Long tion for a free parliament was decisive. What had long Parliament. been denied to mere popular clamour could not be refused to a man with an army at his back. The survivors of the members expelled by Pride in 1648 were restored, and they immediately voted a dissolution. Monk was made captain-general, Montague admiral of the fleet, Lambert was imprisoned in the Tower, and Vane in Carisbrook Castle. Thus ended the Long Parliament, which had existed since 1640; and for the first time for close on twenty years the voters had an opportunity of expressing their views at a free general election. As the writs ordering the elections were not issued by a king the assembly was called a Convention. The members were chosen by the old parliamentary constituencies, and not by those arranged by Cromwell.

On April 25 the Convention met. Its leading members were either Presbyterians or the sons of old cavaliers, while the Independent members were hardly proportionate to their numbers in the country. The ConAgainst such an overwhelming majority Ludlow and vention. Hazelrig could do nothing. Bradshaw was dead; an insurrection, led by Lambert, who escaped from the Tower, came absolutely to nothing; and without the least hesitation, without even waiting, as Fairfax and Manchester would have preferred, to make terms, Charles was requested by the Convention to return. For a short time Monk had

been in correspondence with him; but it will always be a problem how long Monk had regarded a restoration as inevitable. As a soldier, his principle was that of Blake, to fight without question for his legitimate employers; but the inefficiency first of Richard, then of the Long Parliament, had convinced him that nothing was to be hoped from the continu. ance either of a Commonwealth or a Protectorate, and, his own feelings being monarchical, he had readily lent himself to forward a restoration. More important, perhaps, than all the political causes of the fall of the Commonwealth was the attempt of the puritanical party to compel men of all other opinions to conform to their standard of life and morality. The abolition of stage-plays in the towns, the removal of the Maypoles from the village-greens, the stern enforcement of a puritanical strictness in the observance of Sunday, made thousands wishful for a restoration who cared little about forms of government, and were no more admirers of Charles and Laud than was Oliver Cromwell himself. Practical men of all parties saw that the one hope of settled and orderly government lay in a restoration of the Stuarts, and the cries of a dreamer like Milton, who poured forth tract after tract urging the theoretical advantages of republicanism, were utterly disregarded.

CHAPTER V

CHARLES II.: 1660-1685

Born 1630; married, 1662, Katharine of Braganza; died 1685.

The Acts of the Convention Parliaments-Clarendon's Ministry- The First Dutch War-Fall of Clarendon-The Cabal-The Treaties of Dover-Second Dutch War-Fall of the Cabal-Danby's Ministry-Rise of the 'Country' PartyThe Exclusion Bill-Fall of the Whigs.

CHARLES II. landed at Dover on May 25, and entered London on May 29, his thirtieth birthday. Since his escape from Worcester in 1651 he had lived abroad-sometimes in France, sometimes Character of the King. in Germany-dependent for his subsistence on the charity of his French or Dutch kinsfolk, and on the scanty contributions of the English royalists. Charles was a man of great natural sagacity, and his checkered career had given him considerable experience of men and things. More able than his father, he had more knowledge of the world than his grandfather, and he brought back with him a fixed determination never to set out on his travels again.' At the same time, though he would never 'stake either his head or his crown,' he was determined to secure as much power as circumstances would permit. Charles, however, was well aware how much his father had lost by allowing himself to be not only the director of affairs, but also the most obvious agent in carrying out his own policy. He determined, therefore, while keeping the reins in his own hands, to hold himself in the background, and to throw responsibility upon his ministers; and his easy-going manner, which blinded observers to his real character, enabled him to gain a very large measure of success.