Lord. I hope I shall have your prayers in the Business to which I am called. My Wife, I trust, will be with you before it be long, in her way towards Bristol.

Sir, discompose not your thoughts or Estate for what you are to pay me. Let me know wherein I may comply with your occasions and mind, and be confident you will find me to you as your own heart.

Wishing your prosperity and contentment very sincerely, with the remembrance of my love, I rest, Your affectionate brother and servant,

OLIVER CROMWELL. §

Mayor has endorsed this Letter: "Received 27th July 1649, per Messenger express from Newbury." He has likewise, says Harris, jotted on it "some shorthand," and "an account of his cattle and sheep." - Who the "Major Long" was, we know not: Cromwell undertakes to "do" for him what may be right and reasonable, and nothing more.

Cromwell, leaving London as we saw on Tuesday evening July 10th, had arrived at Bristol on Saturday evening, which was the 14th. He had to continue here, making his preparations, gathering his forces, for several weeks. Mrs. Cromwell means seemingly to pass a little more time with him before he go. In the end of July, he quits Bristol; moving westward by Tenby* and Pembroke, where certain forces were to be taken up, towards Milford Haven; where he dates his next Letters, just in the act of sailing.

LETTER C.

THE new Lord Lieutenant had at first designed for Munster, where it seemed his best chance lay. Already he has sent some regiments over, to reinforce our old acquaintance Colonel, now Lieutenant-General Michael Jones, at present besieged in § Harris, p. 510: no. 8 of the Pusey seventeen.

* At Tenby, 2d August, Commons Journals, vi. 277.

Dublin, and enable him to resist the Ormond Army there. But on the 2d of August an important Victory has turned up for Jones: surprisal, and striking into panic and total rout, of the said Ormond Army;* which fortunate event, warmly recognised in the following Letter, clears Dublin of siege, and opens new outlooks for the Lord Lieutenant there. He sails thitherward; from Milford Haven, Monday, August 13th. Ireton, who is Major-General, or third in command, Jones being second, follows with another division of the force, on Wednesday. Hugh Peters also went; and "Mr. Owen" also, for another chaplain.

The good ship John is still lying in Milford waters, we suppose, waiting for a wind, for a turn of the tide. "My Son" Richard Cromwell, and perhaps Richard's Mother, we may dimly surmise, had attended the Lord Lieutenant thus far, to wish him speed on his perilous enterprise?

'For my loving Brother Richard Mayor, Esquire, at Hursley: These.'

Loving BROTHER,

'Milford Haven,' From Aboard the John, 13th August 1649.

I could not satisfy myself to omit this opportunity by my Son of writing to you; especially there being so late and great an occasion of acquainting you with the happy news I received from Lieutenant-General Jones yesterday.

The Marquis of Ormond besieged Dublin with Nineteen-thousand men or thereabouts; Seven-thousand Scots and Three-thousand more were coming to 'join him in' that work. Jones issued out of Dublin with Fourthousand foot and Twelve-hundred horse; hath routed this whole Army; killed about Four-thousand upon the place; taken 2,517 prisoners, above Three-hundred 'of them' officers, some of great quality.**

*Rout at Rathmines or Bagatrath: Ormond's own Account of it, in Carte's Ormond Papers, ii. 403, 407-11: Jones's Account, in Cary's Memorials, ii. 159-62. Commons Journals, vi. 278 (14th August 1649).

** The round numbers of this account have, as is usual, come over greatly exaggerated (Carte, ubi supra).

This is an astonishing mercy; so great and seasonable that indeed we are like them that dreamed. What can we say! The Lord fill our souls with thankfulness, that our mouths may be full of His praise, and our lives too; and grant we may never forget His goodness These things seem to strengthen our faith and love, against more difficult times. Sir, pray for me, That I may walk worthy of the Lord in all that He hath called me unto!

to us.

I have committed my Son to you; pray give him advice. I envy him not his contents; but I fear he should be swallowed up in them. I would have him mind and understand Business, read a little History, study the Mathematics and Cosmography: these are good, with subordination to the things of God. Better than Idleness, or mere outward worldly contents. These fit for Public services,* for which a man is born.

Pardon this trouble. I am thus bold because I know you love me; as indeed I do you, and yours. My love to my dear Sister, and my Cousin Ann your Daughter, and all Friends. I rest,

Sir,

Your loving brother,

OLIVER CROMWELL.

'P. S.' Sir, I desire you not to discommodate yourself because of the money due to me. Your welfare is as mine: and therefore let me know, from time to time, what will convenience you in any forbearance; I shall answer you in it, and be ready to accommodate And therefore do your other business; let not this hinder. §

you.

*Services useful to all men.

§ Forster's Statesmen of the Commonwealth, iv. 267: From certain Mss. of Lord Nugent's.

Of Jones and his Victory, and services in Ireland, there was on the morrow much congratulating in Parliament: revival of an old Vote, which had rather fallen asleep, For settling Lands of a Thousand Pounds a-year on him; and straightway, more special speedy Vote of "Lands to the value of Five-hundred Pounds a-year for this last service;" - which latter Vote, we hope, will not fall asleep as the former had done. *

LETTER CI.

Same date, same conveyance.

To my beloved Daughter Dorothy Cromwell, at Hursley:

These.

From Aboard the John, 13th August 1649.

MY DEAR DAUGHTER,

Your Letter was very welcome to me. I like to see anything from your hand; because indeed I stick not to say I do entirely love you.

And therefore I hope a word of advice will not be unwelcome nor unacceptable to thee.

I desire you both to make it above all things your business to seek the Lord: to be frequently calling upon Him, that He would manifest Himself to you in His Son; and be listening what returns He makes to you,

for He will be speaking in your ear and in your heart, if you attend thereunto. I desire you to provoke your Husband likewise thereunto. As for the pleasures of this Life, and outward Business, let that be upon the bye. Be above all these things, by Faith in Christ; and then you shall have the true use and comfort of them, and not otherwise.** I have much

*Commons Journals, vi. 278, 81 (14th, 18th August 1649).

** How true is this; equal, in its obsolete dialect, to the highest that man has yet attained to, in any dialect old or new!

satisfaction in hope your spirit is this way set; and I desire you may grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ; and that I may hear thereof. The Lord is very near: which we see by His wonderful works: and therefore He looks that we of this generation draw near to Him. This late great Mercy of Ireland is a great manifestation thereof. Your Husband will acquaint you with it. We should be much stirred up in our spirits to thankfulness. We much need the spirit of Christ, to enable us to praise God for so admirable a mercy.

The Lord bless thee, my dear Daughter.

I rest,

Thy loving Father,

OLIVER CROMWELL.

'P. S.' I hear thou didst lately miscarry. Prithee take heed of a coach by all means; borrow thy Father's nag when thou intendest to go abroad. §

Is the last phrase ironical; or had the "coach," in those ancient roads, overset, and produced the disaster? Perhaps "thy Father's nag" is really safer? Oliver is not given to irony; nor in a tone for it at this moment. These gentle domesticities and pieties are strangely contrasted with the fiery savagery and iron grimness, stern as Doom, which meets us in the next set of Letters we have from him!

On the second day following, on the 15th of August,* Cromwell with a prosperous wind arrived in Dublin; "where," say the old Newspapers, ** "he was received with all possible "demonstrations of joy; the great guns echoing forth their "welcome, and the acclamations of the people resounding in

§ Forster, iv. 268: From certain мss. of Lord Nugent's.

* Carte, ii. 83.

** In Kimber: Life of Cromwell (London, 1724), p. 126.