moned before him the House of Commons, and assuming throughout his speech that the Lords were prepared to pass the Attainder Bill, he pleaded guilty in behalf of Strafford, not, indeed, of high treason, but of a misdemeanor.

Like all acts of double dealing, this speech was capable of most contradictory_interpretations, all mysterious. To those who knew that the Bill, coldly received by the Lords, had lain four days untouched upon their table, and therefore expected its rejection, an expectation justified by the practice of that time, and to those who knew 'that it was both possible and probable' that the 'declaration' of the Upper House would be given in Strafford's favour,69 it seemed as if Charles, braving the anger of Parliament, had illegally interfered in its proceedings, to bring punishment on a criminal the Lords were disposed to acquit.

But the Peers were, on the contrary, addressed by the King as if they were all about to vote Strafford guilty of High Treason, though it was notorious that of the four-score present at the trial, not above twenty' held that opinion, and as if they were ready to agree to the Attainder Bill, although then there was little suspicion that it would pass.'70 Nor was that address to them only an offensive proof that Charles' feared their inconstancy," or a breach of privilege: it interrupted the quarrel between the two Houses, and spoilt the fight the Lords hoped to wage. They saw that they now must retract the haughty tone they had assumed towards the Lower House: that as Charles himself had declared Strafford to be a criminal, certainly deserving civil death, they were

71י

69 Narrative, 1647, 82. 1 Ibid., 79.

driven from the technical legal question of high treason, into the moral bearing of his offences. And if compelled so far to accept the decision of the Commons, what course was open but to pass the Attainder Bill?

The effect of that speech does not end here: the Lords and Commons and all classes in society were deeply moved by this perplexing feature in the King's conduct: it exhibited those terrors of a stricken conscience which make 'the wicked flee when no man pursueth.' The whole tenor of his speech to the House of Lords implied that there was extreme danger, even in saving alive, though stripped of honour and estate, the man whom the Peers were prepared to set free; and in the assumed character of intercessor with judges resolved on their victim's death, he begs them to find out a way to satisfy justice, and their own fears.' And the same strain of argument runs through the letter to Strafford; Charles ascribes his inability to employ him hereafter, to the 'strange conjuncture of the times.' neither on the 23rd of April or on the 1st of May, had any special crisis, either in Strafford's fate, or in public affairs, taken place: the times were stormy; but no storm had broken forth: without thought of

Yet

fears,' it seemed very likely,' even then, that he might have passed free by the voices '72 of the Upper House.

No wonder that the King's use of such unaccountable words made all men suspect that something even more alarming was behind. For weeks vague rumours of designs against the State had floated through London ;73 and now, warned from the throne itself, it became known that there was a plot. And

70 Clarendon, ed. 1839, 96, 108. 72 Narrative, 1647, 82.

so there was: Charles had sanctioned and promoted, from the beginning of April, the project of bringing the royal army from Yorkshire to London, to overawe both City and Parliament; and it was evidently for that purpose that he placed it under the charge of Strafford's enemy, the Earl of Holland. The King also knew that the project had been betrayed.74 When he wrote that letter to Strafford, on the 23rd of April, Parliament had acted on that information; on the 19th of April, the Commons made an order, staying the officers who were Members of the House, from obeying the command of their General, the Earl of Holland, 'to go down to their charges in the army very suddenly ;' one of the leaders in the conspiracy being by name connected with that order. And forty-eight hours after the King's speech in the House of Lords, the Army Plot was fully revealed to Parliament. Then it became clear what 'fears' might justly arise if Strafford was not sent out of this world, and what was the source of that undercurrent of alarm which drove Charles to use that word.

'75

The disclosure of the Army Plot was fatal to Strafford; yet the immediate cause of his death was the King's visit to Parliament on the 1st of May. For, to quote a very good authority, that speech 'put the Lords to such a stand, who were before inclinable enough to that unfortunate gentleman (Strafford), that a multitude of rabble '76 beset the doors of Parliament, demanding his execution. They apparently were not acquainted with

the language the King had used from the throne, and that he had made an appeal for his servant's life. On the contrary, they supposed, not that he deemed the Lords to be too ready to condemn Strafford, but not ready enough; and they thought that they must imitate the King, and show themselves before the Upper House to prevent their acquittal of the criminal. And so, inflamed by the King's speech,'77 early in the morning of Monday, 3rd of May, before any revelation of the Army Plot had been made, a crowd of citizens filled Palace Yard, and saluted the Peers as they arrived there with cries demanding Strafford's execution.

Historians give a most exaggerated account of this event, and ascribe the consent of the Lords to the Attainder Bill to panic terror, and the dictation of a mob. This was not the case. The crowd was not composed of rabble, but of wealthy merchants: their threats were only, that to-morrow they will send their servants, if the Lords did not expedite justice speedily.'78 This they did not do. The rumour that an escape of the prisoner from the Tower was imminent, brought next day another, but a smaller gathering to Palace Yard, which soon dispersed; 79 the demonstration of Monday was not repeated. And the Attainder Bill certainly did not pass under the immediate threat of mob violence; not touched by the Lords on that Monday, though undiscussed since the 27th of April, its third reading only took place on the 8th of May, after seven stages of debate.

And a contemporary authority

Vol. i. 207.

75 Com. Journ. ii. 123.

"Narrative, 1647, 84.

"Heylin's Life of Laud, 449.

"Narrative, 1647, 89.

VOL. VII.-NO. XL.

NEW SERIES.

FF

confirms our assertion. At the very moment of the event, the demonstration of the 3rd of May, was not regarded as a spontaneous expression of public feeling, but as an organised affair, arranged by the same agency which had urged the King to make his address to Parliament. Both events are ascribed to the working of Strafford's' seeming friends,' but 'real enemies,' who put the King upon this way, hoping thereby that the Lords should find occasion to pretend necessity of doing that which, perhaps, in regard of common equity, or the King's displeasure, they could not durst have done.' And арраrently that pretended necessity was furnished by the crowd in Palace Yard; for we are told by the same authority, that on the final stage of the Bill, the greatest part of Strafford's friends absented themselves, upon pretence (whether true or supposititious) that they feared the multitude.' '80 It was not, however, to the third reading of the bill, that Strafford attributed his death, but because, to use his own words, by that 'declaration' of the King's, 'on Saturday,' 'the minds of men were more incensed against him,' and because Charles had not intirely left him to the judgment of their lordships. '81

The motives that prompted that untoward act, we do not attempt to fathom: but that ideal being, the historic Charles I., must part with an invented justification of his conduct. It has been assumed that the Army Plot was designed for Strafford's release from prison, and

80 Narrative, 1647, 82, 89.

that his friend, Lord Say, misled the King into making that 'declaration.'82 But supposing that Charles could be ignorant of the intentions of the Upper House, and blind to the effect of his interference, he must have known the dispositions of his advisers, that Savile had 'particular malice to Strafford, which he had sucked in with his milk,'83 and that the Earl of Bristol was foremost in that group of Peers, who by giving security for the loan of 200,000l., had given security against Strafford's acquittal, and that he had been throughout the 'Mercury' of the Scottish Commis

sioners.8

84

But there is no doubt whatever about the Army Plot: the King set that on foot, with the full knowledge of the risk it caused his prisoner, and that it was a design of his enemies to profit by his ruin. Nor was Charles tempted by the proffer of a hopeful project fully matured without his consent; he caught at the hasty tender of an obviously desperate attempt. One, wiser than he, gave him ample warning: it was the Queen. At first 'overjoyed' with him at the prospect thus opened out, reflection told her that jealousy among the conspir ators would provoke disclosure of the plot and as, ' if the secret was once blown,' Strafford would be destroyed, she decided not to do it'; but the King resisted the Queen's playful reiteration of 'No, no no,it shall not be,' and her more serious persuasions; he initiated the plot, and at once it was revealed to Pym and his associates.85

:

Nor

could he have supposed that Strafford's welfare formed any portion of that design: the object of the conspirators, Wilmot and Goring, was to obtain the post Strafford filled of Lieutenant-General of the English Army: nor could they be his 'good willers,' as they were among the 'merry lads,' who depended on the Earl of Holland.86

And one final blow must be given to that false image of Charles Ï. that historians have set up. It is represented that when wrestled breathless' into giving his consent, the King signed the Commission to pass the Attainder Bill, comforted even with that assurance, that his hand was not in' the document itself. If so, it is strange, that not using a common form appropriate to the occasion, the Lord Privy Seal, acting under the authority of that Commission, should have declared to Houses of Parliament, that his Majesty had an intent to have come himself this day, and given his Royal Assent to these two Bills,' of which one was Strafford's Attainder.8 87

both

Speculation whether or no King Charles deliberately intended by his speech of the 1st of May to sacrifice his minister in order to avert the consequences of the disclosure of the Army Plot, is not within our province. Clarendon admits that those events alike were fatal to Strafford: our argument is fulfilled by an explanation of the true meaning of the royal interference with Parliament, by showing that the Earl's enemies were leading spirits in those transactions, and that the King could not have supposed that Strafford's benefit was designed, either by the speech

s6 Warwick's Memoirs, 147.

or by the plot. So completely, indeed, did that conspiracy play into the hands of the inflexible party,' and justify their unpopular policy, that Sir P. Warwick suggests that the 'leading men in Parliament' were the secret authors of the scheme.88 And without laying too much stress on a surmise, it is to the information that must have influenced the Commons to make that order, staying the officers from obeying their general's commands to repair immediately to the army, that we attribute the defection of Strafford's friends on the third reading of the Attainder Bill; that proceeding, at least, took pla two days after the order was voed, and it is evident that up to that time the popular party had, during a protracted contest, shrunk from testing their numbers by the criterion of a division.

Yet, though a positive judgment on the motives that guided the King in his conduct towards Strafford is not to our taste, and though we have refrained from reference to those repeated actions-such as the refusal to disband that very Irish army that had threatened, and still threatened, England-by which Charles indirectly, yet most effectively, prejudiced Strafford's cause. Still, if it be the case that through all the many days which held his fate in suspense the utmost disregard of his safety was exhibited by the King, who certainly hated Parliament more than he loved the servant in jeopardy for his sake, it is well that this should be known. For it is but just that 'the vile person be no more called liberal,' and that King Charles be no longer credited with efforts that he did not make, and with tenderness

ss Warwick Memoirs, 179.