SIR, For General Montague, on board the Naseby, in the Down's. Whitehall, 11th August, 1657. You having desired by several Letters to know our mind concerning your weighing anchor and sailing with the Fleet out of the Downs, we have thought fit to let you know, That we do very well ap prove thereof, and that you do cruise up and down in the Channel, in such places as you shall judge most convenient, taking care of the safety, interest, and honor of the Commonwealth. I remain, Your very loving friend, 'OLIVER P.** Under the wax of the Commonwealth Seal, Montague has written, His Highness's letter, Augst. 11, 1657, to comand mee to sayle. SIR, LETTER CLIV. For my loving friend John Dunch, Esquire. Hampton Court,' 27th August, 1657 I desire to speak with you; and hearing a report from Hursley that you were going to your Father's in Berkshire, I send this éxpress to you, desiring you to come to me at Hampton Court. With my respects to your Father,†—I rest, This is the John Dunch of Pusey; married, as we saw, to Mayor's younger Daughter, the Sister-in-law of Richard Cromwell the Collector for us of those Seventeen Pusey Letters; of which we have here read the last. He is of the present Parliament, was of the former; seems to be enjoying his recess, travelling about in the Autumn Sun of those old days,—and vanishes * Newspapers (in Cromwelliana, p. 168). Original Letter, in the passession of Thomas Lister Parker, Esq.' + Father-in-Law, Mayor. Harris, p. 515 from History at this point, in the private apartments of Hampton Court. LETTER CLV. GENERAL MONTAGUE, after a fortnight's cruising, has touched at the Downs again, 28th August, wind at S.S.W.,' being in want of some instruction on a matter that has risen.* 'A Flushinger,' namely, has come into St. Maloes; said to have twenty-five ton of silver in her ;' a Flushinger there, and six other Dutch Ships' hovering in the distance; which are thought to be carrying silver and stores for the Spaniards. Montague has sent Frigates to search them, to seize the very bullion if it be Spanish; but wishes fresh authority, in case of accident. 'For General Montague, on board the Naseby, in the Downs:' Hampton Court, 30th August, 1657. SIR, The Secretary hath communicated to us your Letter of the 28th instant: by which you acquaint him with the directions you have given for the searching of a Flushinger and other Dutch Ships, which, as you are informed, have bullion and other goods aboard them, belong. ing to the Spaniard, the declared Enemy of this State. There is no question to be made but what you have directed therein is agreeable both to the Laws of Nations and 'to' the particular Treaties which are between this Commonwealth and the United Provinces. And therefore we desire you to continue the same direction, and to require the Captains to be careful in doing their duty therein. Your very loving friend, OLIVER P.t LETTER CLVI. By the new and closer Treaty signed with France in March last,+ for assaulting the Spanish Power in the Netherlands, it was stipu * His Letter to Secretary Thurloe (Thurloe, vi., 489). Thurloe, vi., 489. 23 March, 1656-7; Authorities in Godwin (iv., 540–3) lated that the French King should contribute Twenty-thousand men, and the Lord Protector Six-thousand, with a sufficient Fleet; which combined forces were straightway to set about reducing the three Coast Towns, Gravelines, Mardike and Dunkirk; the former when reduced to belong to France, the two latter to England; if the former should chance to be the first reduced, it was then to be given up to England, and held as cautionary till the other two were got. Mardike and Dunkirk, these were what Oliver expected to gain by this adventure. One or both of which strong Haven-towns would naturally be very useful to him, connected with the Continent as he was,―continually menaced with Royalist Invasion from that quarter; and struggling, as the aim of his whole Foreign Policy was, to unite Protestant Europe with England in one great effectual league.* Such was the French Treaty of the 23d of March last. Oliver's part of the bargain was promptly and faithfully fulfilled. Six-thousand well-appointed men, under CommissaryGeneral Reynolds, were landed, 'in new red coats,' 'near Boulogne on the 13th and 14th days of May' last; and a Fleet under Montague, as we observe, sufficient to command those seas, and prevent all relief by ships in any Siege, is actually cruising there. Young Louis Fourteenth came down to the Coast to see the English Troops reviewed; expressed his joy and admiration over them; and hath set them, the Cardinal and he have set them, to assault the Spanish Power in the Netherlands by a plan of theirown! To reduce not 'Gravelines, Mardike and Dunkirk,' on the Coast, as the Treaty has it, but Montmédi, Cambray and I know not what, in the Interior ;—the Cardinal doubling and shuf fling, and by all means putting off the attack of any place whatever on the Coast! With which arrangement Oliver Protector's dissatisfaction has at length reached a crisis; and he now writes, twice on the same day, to his Ambassador, To signify peremptorily that the same must terminate. Of Sir William Lockhart, our Ambassador in France' in these * Foreign Affairs in the Protector's Time (in Somers Tracts, vi., 32939), by some ancient anonymous man of sense, is worth reading. years, there were much more to be said than we have room for here. A man of distinguished qualities, of manifold adventures and employments; whose Biography, if he could find any Biographer with real industry instead of sham industry, and above all things with human eyes instead of pedant spectacles, might still be worth writing, in brief compass.* He is Scotch; of the 'Lock. harts of Lee' in Lanarkshire; has been in many wars and busi. nesses abroad and at home;—was in Hamilton's Engagement, for one thing; and accompanied Dugald Dalgetty or Sir James Turner in those disastrous days and nights at Preston,† though only as a common Colonel then, and not noticed by anybody. In the next Scotch War, he received affronts from the Covenanted King; remained angrily at home, did not go to Worcester or elsewhither. The Covenanted King having vanished, and Lockhart's connexions being Presbyterian-Royalists, there was little outlook for him now in Scotland, or Britain; and he had resolved on trying France again. He came accordingly to London, seeking leave from the Authorities; had an interview with Oliver now newly made Protector,-who read the worth of him, saw the uses of him, advised him to continue where he was. He did continue; married Miss Robina Sewster,' a Huntingdonshire lady, the Protector's Niece; has been our Ambassador in France near two years now ;t-does diplomatic, warlike, and whatever work comes before him, in an effectual and manful manner. It is thought by judges that in Lockhart the Lord Protector had the best Ambassador of that age. Nay, in spite of all considerations, his merits procured him afterwards a similar employment in Charles Second's time. We must here cease speaking of him; recommend him to some diligent succinct Biographer of insight, should such a one, by unexpected favor of the Destinies, turn up. * Noble (ii., 233-73) has reproduced, probably with new errors, certain Ms. Family Memoirs' of this Lockhart, which are everywhere very vague, and in passages (that of Dunkirk for example) quite mythological. Locknart's own Letters are his best Memorial;-for the present, drowned, with so much ease, in the deep slumber-lakes of Thurloe; with or without chance of recovery. † Antea, vol. i., pp. 270-274. Since 30 Dec., 1655 (Family Memoirs' in Noble, ii., 244). 'To Sir William Lockhart, our Ambassador in France."* Whitehall, 31st August, 1657. SIR, I have seen your last letter to Mr. Secretary, as also divers others: and although I have no doubt either of your diligence or ability to serve us in so great a Business, yet I am deeply sensible that the French are very much short with us in ingenuousness† and performance. And that which increaseth our sense of this' is, The resolution we for our part ' had, rather to overdo than to be behindhand in anything of our Treaty. And although we never were so foolish 'as' to apprehend that the French and their interests were the same with ours in all things, yet as to the Spaniard, who hath been known in all ages to be the most implacable enemy that France hath,-we never could doubt, before we made our Treaty, that, going upon such grounds, we should have been failed towards' as we are! To talk of "giving us Garrisons" which are inland, as Caution for future action; to talk of "what will be done next Campaign,"—are but parcels of words for children. If they will give us Garrisons, let them give us Calais, Dieppe and Boulogne ;—which I think they will do as soon as be honest in their words in giving us any one Spanish Garrison upon the coast into our hands! I positively think, which I say to you, they are afraid we should have any footing on that side of the Water,' though Spanish. I pray you tell the Cardinal from me, That I think, if France desires to maintain its ground, much more to get ground upon the Spaniard, the performance of his Treaty with us will better do it than anything appears yet to me of any Design he hath !-Though we cannot so well pretend to soldiery as those that are with him; yet we think that, we being able by sea to strengthen and secure his Siege, and 'to' reinforce it as we please by sea, and the Enemy being' in capacity to do nothing to relieve it, the best time to besiege that Place will be now. Especially if we consider that the French horse will be able so to ruin Flanders as that no succor can be brought to relieve the Place; and that the French Army and our own will have constant relief, as far as England and France can give it, without any manner of impediment,—especially considering the Dutch are now engaged so much to Southward‡ as they are. *Now with the Court at Peronne (Thurloe, vi., 482, 487); soon after at Paris (Ib., 496). t'ingenuity,' as usual, in orig. Spain-ward: so much inclined to help the Spaniard, if Montague 1 |
