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scope for speech; and called Mr. Whitby to the chair. The Speaker, always in close communication with his Majesty, craves leave from us, with much humility, to withdraw "for half an hour;" which, though we knew well whither he was going, was readily granted him. It is ordered, "No other man leave the House upon pain of going to the Tower." And now the speak ing commences, " freer and frequenter" being in Committee, and old Sir Edward Coke tries it again.

"Sir Edward Cook told us, ' He now saw God had not accepted of our humble and moderate carriages and fair proceedings; and he feared the reason was, We had not dealt sincerely with the King and Country, and made a true representation of the causes of all those miseries. Which he, for his part, repented that he had not done sooner. And therefore, not knowing whether he should ever again speak in this House, he would now do it freely; and so did here protest, That the author and cause of all those miseries was-THE DUKE OF BUCKINGHAM.' Which was entertained and answered with a cheerful acclamation of the House."

(Yea, yea! Well moved, well spoken! Yea, yea!) "As, when one good hound recovers the scent, the rest come in with full cry so they (we) pursued it, and every one came home, and laid the blame where he thought the fault was," -on the Duke of Buckingham, to wit. "And as we were putting it to the question, Whether he should be named in our intended Remonstrance as the chief cause of all our miseries at home and abroad, the Speaker, having been, not half an hour, but three hours absent, and with the King, returned; bringing this Message, That the House should then rise (being about eleven o'clock), adjourn till the morrow morning, and no Committees to sit, or other business to go on, in the interim." They have been me. ditating it all night!

"What we shall expect this morning therefore, God of Heaven knows. We shall meet betimes this morning; partly for the business's sake; and partly because, two days ago, we made an order; That whoever comes in after Prayers shall pay twelvepence to the poor.

"Sir, excuse my haste:-and let us have your prayers;

whereof both you and we have need. I rest,-affectionately at your service, "THOMAS ALURED."

This scene Oliver saw, and formed part of; one of the memorablest he was ever in. Why did those old honorable gentlemen' weep?' How came tough old Coke upon Lyttleton, one of the toughest men ever made, to melt into tears like a girl, and sit down unable to speak? The modern honorable gentleman cannot tell. Let him consider it, and try if he can tell! And then, putting off his Shot-belt, and striving to put on some Bibledoctrine, some earnest God's Truth or other,―try if he can discover why he cannot tell!—

The Remonstrance against Buckingham was perfected; the hounds having got all upon the scent. Buckingham was expressly ' named,' a daring feat: and so loud were the hounds, and such a tune in their baying, his Majesty saw good to confirm, and ratify beyond shadow of cavil, the invaluable Petition of Right, and thereby produce bonfires,' and bob-majors upon all bells. Old London was sonorous; in a blaze with joy-fires. Soon after which, this Parliament, as London, and England, and it, all still continued somewhat too sonorous, was hastily, with visible royal anger, prorogued till October next,-till January as it proved. Oliver, of course, went home to Huntingdon to his harvest-work; England continued simmering and sounding as it might. The day of prorogation was the 26th of June.* One day in the latter end of August, John Felton, a short swart Suffolk gentleman of military air, in fact a retired lieutenant of grim serious disposition, went out to walk in the eastern parts of London. Walking on Tower Hill, full of black reflections on his own condition, and on the condition of England, and a Duke of Buckingham holding all England down into the jaws of ruin and disgrace, -John Felton saw, in evil hour, on some cutler's stall there, a broad sharp hunting knife, price one shilling. John Felton, with a wild flash in the dark heart of him, bought the said knife; rode down to Portsmouth with it, where the great Duke then was; struck the said knife, with one fell plunge, into the great Duke's

* Commons Journals, i., 920.

heart. This was on Saturday the 23d of August of this same year.*

Felton was tried; saw that his wild flashing inspiration had been not of God, but of Satan. It is known he repented: when the death-sentence was passed on him, he stretched out his right hand; craved that this too, as some small expiation, right first be stricken off; which was denied him, as against law. He died at Tyburn; his body was swinging in chains at Portsmouth ;— and much else had gone awry, when the Parliament reassembled, in January following, and Oliver came up to Town again.

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1629.

The Parliament Session proved very brief; but very energetic, very extraordinary. Tonnage and Poundage,' what we now call Customhouse Duties, a constant subject of quarrel between Charles and his Parliaments hitherto, had again been levied without Parliamentary consent; in the teeth of old Tallagio non concedendo, nay even of the late solemnly confirmed Petition of Right; and naturally gave rise to Parliamentary consideration. Merchants had been imprisoned for refusing to pay it; Members of Parliament themselves had been supœna'd' there was a very ravelled coil to deal with in regard to Tonnage and Poundage. Nay the Petition of Right itself had been altered in the Printing; a very ugly business too.

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In regard to Religion also, matters looked equally ill. Syco phant Mainwaring, just censured in Parliament, had been promoted to a fatter living. Sycophant Montague, in the like circumstances, to a Bishopric: Laud was in the act of consecrating him at Croydon, when the news of Buckingham's death came thither. There needed to be a Committee of Religion. The House resolved itself into a Grand Committee of Religion; and did not want for matter. Bishop Neile of Winchester, Bishop Laud now of London, were a frightfully ceremonial pair of Bishops; the fountain they of innumerable tendencies to Papistry and the old clothes of Babylon!

It was in this Committee of Re..

Clarendon (i., 68); Hamond L'Estrange (p. 90); D'Ewes (Ms. Auto biography) &c.; all of whom report the minute circumstances of the assas sination, not one of them agreeing completely with another.

ligion, on the 11th day of February, 1628-9, that Mr. Cromwell, Member for Huntingdon, stood up and made his first Speech, a fragment of which has found its way into History, and is now known to all mankind. He said, "He had heard by relation from one Dr. Beard" (his old Schoolmaster at Huntingdon), "that Dr. Alablaster had preached flat Popery at Paul's Cross; and the the Bishop of Winchester" (Dr. Neile) "had commanded him as his Diocesan, He should preach nothing to the contrary. Mainwaring, so justly censured in this House for his sermons, was by the same Bishop's means preferred to a rich living. If these are the steps to Church-preferment," added he, "what are we to expect!"*

Dr. Beard, as the reader knows, is Oliver's old Schoolmaster at Huntingdon; a grave, speculative theological old gentleman, seemingly, and on a level with the latest news from Town. Of poor Dr. Alablaster there may be found some indistinct, and instantly forgettable, particulars in Wood's Athena. Paul's Cross, of which I have seen old Prints, was a kind of Stone Tent, ' with leaden roof,' at the north-east corner of Paul's Cathedral, where Sermons were still, and had long been, preached in the open air; crowded devout congregations gathering there; with forms to sit on, if you came early. Queen Elizabeth used to 'tune her pulpits,' she said, when there was any great thing on hand; as Governing Persons now strive to tune their Morning Newspapers. Paul's Cross, a kind of Times Newspaper, but edited partly by Heaven itself, was then a most important entity! Alablaster, to the horror of mankind, was heard preaching 'flat Popery' there,—' Prostituting our columns' in that scandalous manner! And Neile had forbidden him to preach against it: 'what are we to expect?'

The record of this world-famous utterance of Oliver still lies in manuscript in the British Museum, in Mr. Crewe's Notebook, or another's; it was first printed in a wretched old Book called the Ephemeris Parliamentaria, professing to be compiled by Thomas Fuller; and actually containing a Preface recognizable as his, but nothing else that we can so recognize for 'quaint

Parliamentary History (London, 1763), viii., 289.

old Fuller' is a man of talent; and this Book looks as if com piled by some spiritual Nightmare, rather than a rational Man. Probably some greedy Printer's compilation; to whom Thomas, in ill hour, had sold his name. In the Commons Journals, cf

that same day, we are farther to remark, there stands, in perennial preservation, this notice: 'Upon question, Ordered, Dr. Beard of Huntingdon to be written to by Mr. Speaker, to come up and testify against the Bishop; the order for Dr. Beard to be delivered to Mr. Cromwell.' The first mention of Mr. Cromwell's name in the Books of any Parliament.

A new Remonstrance behoves to be resolved upon; Bishops Neile and Laud are even to be named there. Whereupon, before they could get well 'named,' perhaps before Dr. Beard had well got up from Huntingdon to testify against them, the King hastily interfered. This Parliament, in a fortnight more, was dissolved; and that under circumstances of the most unparalleled sort. For Speaker Finch, as we have seen, was a Courtier, in constant communication with the King: one day while these high matters were astir, Speaker Finch refused to 'put the question' when ordered by the House! He said he had orders to the contrary; persisted in that ;-and at last took to weeping. What was the House to do? Adjourn for two days, and consider what to do! On the second day, which was Wednesday, Speaker Finch signified that by his Majesty's command they were again adjourned till Monday next. On Monday next, Speaker Finch, still recusant, would not put the former nor indeed any question, having the King's order to adjourn again instantly. He refused; was reprimanded, menaced; once more took to weeping; then started up to go his ways. But young Mr. Holles, Denzil

Holles, the Earl of Clare's second son, he and certain other honorable members were prepared for that movement: they seized Speaker Finch, set him down in his chair, and by main force held him there! A scene of such agitation as was never seen in Parliament before. 'The House was much troubled.' "Let him go," cried certain Privy Councillors, Majesty's Ministers as we should now call them, who in those days sat in front of the Speaker, "Let Mr. Speaker go!" cried they imploringly. "No!" answered Holles; "God's wounds, he shall

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