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argues with

the Scots

concerning

death.

well bade Drumond stay and hear their conference, which he did. They began in a heavy languid style to lay indeed great load on the king: but they still insisted on that clause in the covenant, by which they swore they would be faithful in the preservation of his Majesty's person: with this they shewed upon what terms Scotland, as well as the two houses, had engaged in the war, and what solemn declarations of their zeal and duty to the king they all along published; which would now appear, to the scandal and reproach of the Christian name, to have been false pretences, if when the king was in their power they should proceed to extremities. Cromwell Upon this, Cromwell entered into a long discourse of the nature of the regal power, according to the the king's principles of Mariana and Buchanan: he thought a breach of trust in a king ought to be punished more than any other crime whatsoever: he said, as to their covenant, they swore to the preservation of the king's person in defence of the true religion : if then it appeared that the settlement of the true religion was obstructed by the king, so that they could not come at it but by putting him out of the way, then their oath could not bind them to the preserving him any longer. He said also, their covenant did bind them to bring all malignants, incendiaries, and enemies to the cause, to condign punishment and was not this to be executed impartially? What were all those on whom public justice had been done, especially those who suffered for joining with Montrose, but small offenders acting by commission from the king, who was therefore the principal, and so the most guilty? Drumond said, Cromwell had plainly the better of

them at their own weapon, and upon their own principles". At this time presbytery was at its height in Scotland.

tion of the

In summer 1648, when the parliament declared The opposithey would engage to rescue the king from his im- general asprisonment, and the parliament of England from my to the parliathe force it was put under by the army, the nobility ment. went into the design, all except six or eight. The king had signed an engagement to make good his offers to the nation of the northern counties, with the other conditions formerly mentioned : and par- 43 ticular favours were promised to every one that concurred in it. The marquis of Argile gave it out that the Hamiltons, let them pretend what they would, had no sincere intentions to their cause, but had engaged to serve the king on his own terms: he filled the preachers with such jealousies of this, that though all the demands that they made for the security of their cause, and in declaring the grounds of the war, were complied with, yet they could not be satisfied, but still said the Hamiltons were in a confederacy with the malignants in England, and did not intend to stand to what they promised. The general assembly declared against it, as an unlawful confederacy with the enemies of God; and called it the unlawful engagement, which came to be the name commonly given to it in all their pulpits. They every where preached against it, and opposed the levies all they could by solemn denunciations of the wrath and curse of God on all concerned in them. This was a strange piece of opposition to the state, little inferior to what was pretended to, and put in practice by the church of Rome.

" And Burnet thought as Cromwell did. S.

The south-west counties of Scotland have seldom corn enough to serve them round the year: and the northern parts producing more than they need, those in the west come in the summer to buy at Leith the stores that come from the north: and from a word whiggam, used in driving their horses, all that drove were called the whiggamors, and The minis- shorter the whiggs. Now in that year, after the an insurrec-news came down of duke Hamilton's defeat, the mi

ters made

tion.

nisters animated their people to rise, and march to Edenburgh: and they came up marching on the head of their parishes, with an unheard-of fury, praying and preaching all the way as they came. The marquis of Argile and his party came and headed them, they being about 6000. This was called the whiggamors inroad: and ever after that all that opposed the court came in contempt to be called whiggs: and from Scotland the word was brought into England, where it is now one of our unhappy terms of distinction °.

The committee of their estates, with the force they had in their hands, could easily have dissipated this undisciplined herd. But they, knowing their own weakness, sent to Cromwell, desiring his assistance. Upon that, the committee saw they could not stand before him: so they came to a treaty, and delivered up the government to this new body. Upon their assuming it, they declared all who had served

• Which unhappy distinctions no man living was more ready to foment than the good bishop himself; and the first inquiry he made into any body's character was, whether he were a whigg or a tory: if the latter, he made

it his business to rake all the spiteful stories he could collect together, in order to lessen their esteem in the world, which he was very free to publish, without any regard to decency or modesty. D.

or assisted in the engagement incapable of any em-
ployment, till they had first satisfied the kirk of the
truth of their repentance, and made public profes-
sions of it. All churches were upon that full of 44
mock penitents, some making their acknowledg-
ments all in tears, to gain more credit with the new
party. The earl of Lowdun, that was chancellor,
had entered into solemn promises both to the king
and the Hamiltons: but when he came to Scotland,
his wife, a high covenanter, and an heiress by whom
he had both honour and estate, threatened him, if
he went on that way, with a process of adultery, in
which she could have had very copious proofs: he
durst not stand this, and so compounded the matter
by the deserting his friends, and turning over to
the other side: of which he made public profession
in the church of Edenburgh with many tears, con-
fessing his weakness in yielding to the temptation
of what had a shew of honour and loyalty, for which
he expressed a hearty sorrow. Those that came in
early, with great shews of compunction, got easier
off: but those who stood out long, found it a harder
matter to make their peace. Cromwell came down
to Scotland, and saw the new model fully settled.

in the isle

During his absence from the scene, the treaty of The treaty the isle of Wight was set on foot by the parliament, of Wight. who seeing the army at such a distance, took this occasion of treating with the king. Sir Henry Vane, and others who were for a change of government, had no mind to treat any more. But both city and country were so desirous of a personal treaty, that it could not be resisted. Vane, Pierpoint, and some others, went to the treaty on purpose to delay matters, till the army could be brought

up to London. All that wished well to the treaty prayed the king, at their first coming, to dispatch the business with all possible haste, and to grant the first day all that he could bring himself to grant on the last. Hollis and Grimstone told me, they had both on their knees begged this of the king. They said, they knew Vane would study to draw out the treaty to a great length: and he, who declared for an unbounded liberty of conscience, would try to gain on the king's party by the offer of a toleration for the common prayer and the episcopal clergy. His design in that was to gain time, till Cromwell should settle Scotland and the north. But they said, if the king would frankly come in, without the formality of papers backward and forward, and send them back next day with the concessions that were absolutely necessary, they did not doubt but he should, in a very few days, be brought up with honour, freedom, and safety to the parliament, and that matters should be brought to a present settlement. Titus, who was then much trusted by the king, and employed in a negociation with 45 the presbyterian party, told me he had spoke often and earnestly to him in the same strain: but the king could not come to a resolution: and he still fancied, that in the struggle between the house of commons and the army, both saw they needed him so much, to give them the superior strength, that he imagined by balancing them he would bring both sides into a greater dependence on himself, and force them to better terms. In this Vane flattered the episcopal party, to the king's ruin as well as their own. But they still hated the presbyterians

as the first authors of the war; and seemed unwill

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