such a charge of foot and horse,' says one;1 nor did I. Oliver was still near to Yorkshire Hodgson when the shock succeeded; Hodgson heard him say, “They run! I profess they run!" And over St. Abb's Head and the German Ocean, just then, bursts the first gleam of the level Sun upon us, ‘and I 'heard Nol say, in the words of the Psalmist, "Let God arise, let His enemies be scattered," -or in Rous's metre, Let God arise, and scattered Let all his enemies be; And let all those that do him hate Before his presence flee! Even so. The Scotch Army is shivered to utter ruin; rushes in tumultuous wreck, hither, thither; to Belhaven, or, in their distraction, even to Dunbar; the chase goes as far as Haddington; led by Hacker. The Lord General made a 'halt,' says Hodgson, and sang the Hundred-and-seventeenth ' Psalm,' till our horse could gather for the chase. Hundredand-seventeenth Psalm, at the foot of the Doon Hill; there we uplift it, to the tune of Bangor, or some still higher score, and roll it strong and great against the sky: O give ye praise unto the Lord, All nati-ons that be; For great to-us-ward ever are His lovingkindnesses; His truth endures forevermore: The Lord O do ye bless! And now, to the chase again. The Prisoners are Ten-thousand, -all the foot in a mass. Many Dignitaries are taken; not a few are slain; of whom see ' Rushworth's Letter to the Speaker (in Parliamentary History, xix. Printed Lists,-full of blunders. Provost Jaffray of Aberdeen, Member of the Scots Parliament, one of the Committee of Estates, was very nearly slain: a trooper's sword was in the air to sever him, but one cried, He is a man of consequence; he can ransom himself!—and the trooper kept him prisoner.1 The first of the Scots Quakers, by and by; and an official person much reconciled to Oliver. Ministers also of the Kirk Committee were slain; two Ministers I find taken, poor Carstairs of Glasgow, poor Waugh of some other place,—of whom we shall transiently hear again. General David Lesley, vigorous for flight as for other things, got to Edinburgh by nine o'clock; poor old Leven, not so light of movement, did not get till two. Tragical enough. What a change since January 1644, when we marched out of this same Dunbar up to the knees in snow! It was to help and save these very men that we then marched; with the Covenant in all our hearts. We have stood by the letter of the Covenant; fought for our Covenanted Stuart King as we could;-they again, they stand by the substance of it, and have trampled us and the letter of it into this ruinous state!-Yes, my poor friends;—and now be wise, be taught! The letter of your Covenant, in fact, will never rally again in this world. The spirit and substance of it, please God, will never die in this or in any world! 1 Such is Dunbar Battle; which might also be called Dunbar Drove, for it was a frightful rout. Brought on by miscalculation; misunderstanding of the difference between substances and semblances;-by mismanagement, and the chance of war. My Lord General's next Seven Letters, all written on the morrow, will now be intelligible to the reader. First, however, take the following 1 Diary of Alexander Jaffray (London, 1834 ;-unhappily relating almost all to the inner man of Jaffray). PROCLAMATION. FORASMUCH as I understand there are several Soldiers of the Enemy's Army yet abiding in the Field, who by reason of their wounds could not march from thence: These are therefore to give notice to the Inhabitants of this Nation That they may and hereby have1 free liberty to repair to the Field aforesaid, and, with their carts or 'in' any other peaceable way, to carry away the said Soldiers to such places as they shall think fit: provided they meddle not with, or take away, any the Arms there. And all Officers and Soldiers are to take notice that the same is permitted. Given under my hand, at Dunbar, 4th September, 1650. OLIVER CROMwell. To be proclaimed by beat of drum.* LETTER CXL. For the Honourable William Lenthall, Esquire, Speaker of the Parliament of England: These. SIR, Dunbar, 4th September, 1650. I hope it's not ill taken, that I make no more frequent addresses to the Parliament. Things that 1 sic. * Old Newspaper, Several Proceedings in Parliament, no. 50 (5-12 Sept. 1650): in Burney Newspapers (British Museum), vol. xxxiv. are in trouble, in point of provision for your Army, and of ordinary direction, I have, as I could, often presented to the Council of State, together with such occurrences as have happened;—who, I am sure, as they have not been wanting in their extraordinary care and provision for us, so neither in what they judge fit and necessary to represent the same to you. And this I thought to be a sufficient discharge of my duty on that behalf. It hath now pleased God to bestow a mercy upon you, worthy of your knowledge, and of the utmost praise and thanks of all that fear and love His name; yea the mercy is far above all praise. Which that you may the better perceive, I shall take the boldness to tender unto you some circumstances accompanying this great business, which will manifest the greatness and seasonableness of this mercy. We having tried what we could to engage the Enemy, three or four miles West of Edinburgh; that proving ineffectual, and our victual failing,-we marched towards our ships for a recruit of our want. The Enemy did not at all trouble us in our rear; but marched the direct way towards Edinburgh, and partly in the night and morning slips-through his whole Army; and quarters himself in a posture easy to interpose between us and our victual. But the Lord made him to lose the opportunity. And the morning proving exceeding wet and dark, we recovered, by that time it was light, a ground where they could not hinder us from our victual: which was an high act of the Lord's Providence to We being come into the said ground, the Enemy marched into the ground we were last upon; having no us. mind either to strive to interpose between us and our victuals, or to fight; being indeed upon this 'aim of reducing us to a' lock,-hoping that the sickness of your Army would render their work more easy by the gaining of time. Whereupon we marched to Musselburgh, to victual, and to ship away our sick men; where we sent aboard near five-hundred sick and wounded soldiers. And upon serious consideration, finding our weakness so to increase, and the Enemy lying upon his advantage, at a general council it was thought fit to march to Dunbar, and there to fortify the Town. Which (we thought), if anything, would provoke them to engage. As also, That the having of a Garrison there would furnish us with accommodation for our sick men, 'and' would be a good Magazine,-which we exceedingly wanted; being put to depend upon the uncertainty of weather for landing provisions, which many times. cannot be done though the being of the whole Army lay upon it, all the coasts from Berwick to Leith having not one good harbour. As also, To lie more conveniently to receive our recruits of horse and foot from Berwick. Having these considerations, upon Saturday the 30th of August we marched from Musselburgh to Haddington. Where, by that time we had got the vanbrigade of our horse, and our foot and train, into their quarters, the Enemy had marched with that exceeding expedition that they fell upon the rear-forlorn of our horse, and put it in some disorder; and indeed had like 1 sic: but Saturday is 31st. |