Monk

By
Sir Julian Stafford Corbett
 Monk
CHAPTER I
DEVONSHIRE AND FOREIGN SERVICE
In the middle of September, , the great expedition by which Charles the
First and Buckingham meant to revenge themselves upon the Spaniards for
the ignominious failure of their escapade to Madrid was still choking
Plymouth harbour with disorder and confusion. Impatient to renew the
glories of Drake and Raleigh and Essex, the young King went down in
person to hasten its departure. Great receptions were prepared for him at
the principal points of his route, and bitter was the disappointment at
Exeter that he was not to visit the city. For the plague was raging within its
walls, and while holiday was kept everywhere else, the shadow of death
was upon the ancient capital of the west.
Hardly, however, had the King passed them by when the citizens had a
new excitement of their own. The noise of a quarrel broke in upon the
gloom of the stricken city. Those within hearing ran to the spot and found a
sight worth seeing. For there in the light of day, under the King's very nose,
as it were, a stalwart young gentleman of about sixteen years of age was
thrashing the under-sheriff of Devonshire within an inch of his life. With
some difficulty, so furious was his assault, the lad was dragged off his
victim before grievous bodily harm was done, and people began to inquire
what it was all about.
Every one must have known young George Monk, who lived with his
grandfather, Sir George Smith, at Heavytree, close to Exeter. Sir George
Smith of Maydford was a great Exeter magnate, and his grandson and
godson George belonged to one of the best families in Devonshire, and was
connected with half the rest; and had they known how the handsome boy
was avenging the family honour in his own characteristic way, they would
certainly have sympathised with him for the scrape he was in.
For the honour of the Monks of Potheridge in North Devon was a very
serious thing. There for seventeen generations the family had lived. Ever
since Henry the Third was King they had looked down from their high-
perched manor-house over the lovely valley of the Torridge just where the
river doubles upon itself in three majestic sweeps as though it were loath to
leave a spot so beautiful. By dint of judicious marriages they had managed
to be still prosperous and well connected. It was no secret indeed that they
claimed royal blood by two descents on the distaff side. For the
grandmother of George's father, Sir Thomas, was Frances Plantagenet,
daughter and co-heiress of Arthur Plantagenet, Viscount Lisle; and his
grandfather's grandmother, as co-heiress of Richard Champernown of
Insworth, had brought him the Cornish bordure and kinship with King
John through Richard, King of the Romans, and his son, the Earl of
Cornwall.
But of late things had been going very hard at Potheridge. Sir Thomas had
succeeded to a heavily encumbered estate, and his attempts at economy
had done little or nothing to better his position. An increasing family
added to his difficulties and his sorrows. Ten children had already been
born to him, and four, including his two eldest boys, were in the grave.
Thomas was now the future heir, and then came George. After him was his
favourite brother, the quiet studious Nicholas who was to be a parson; and
then little Arthur the baby, who became a soldier like George. George had
been born on December and was now nearly seventeen years old. He grew
up a handsome lusty boy, and from his earliest years his daring and spirit
had destined him to be a soldier. It was the career of all younger sons of
metal, and few can have looked forward to it more ardently than George
Monk. It was the tradition of his family. His uncle Richard had died a
captain; his uncle Arthur had fallen in at the glorious defence of Ostend by
that renowned captain, Sir Francis Vere. His great-uncle, Captain Francis
Monk, had sailed with Drake and Norris in their famous descent upon
Portugal, and having been severely wounded at the storm of Corunna, had
died a few days afterwards when the fleet was driven by stress of weather
into Peniché.
The very soil he trod was fertile with the romance of war. For George was
born in the heart of the country which bred the greatest of the Elizabethan
heroes. The soldiers and sailors who most adorned the great Queen's age
were living memories in his childhood, their exploits were the tales of his
nursery, their names the first words he learnt to lisp. Hard by lived his
aunt Grace, who had married the brilliant young Bevil Grenville, heir and
grandson of the immortal Sir Richard himself. His aunt Elizabeth was wife
to Luttrell of Hartland Abbey, and through her he could claim kinship with
the Howards; while all around the home by Tor and Torridge were
clustered the old North Devon families with whom Kingsley's undying
romance has made us so familiar. Nor were these influences lessened as
time went on. Sir George Smith took such a fancy to the fearless high-
spirited boy that he one day offered to educate him if he might live half the
year at Maydford. Poor embarrassed Sir Thomas could only consent, and
George entered a new sphere of life even fuller of romance and adventure
than the old. At Larkbere, within easy distance of his new home, lived Sir
Nicholas Smith, Sir George's eldest son, where the lad found endless
cousins to foster the dreams of Devon boyhood. But all his games and
stories there were tame beside the attractions of his aunt Frances's house at
Farringdon. For Frances Monk had married Sir Lewis Stukeley, Vice-
Admiral of Devon, and there George must have found for a play-fellow
little Tom Rolfe, the child of Pocahontas, whose guardian Stukeley had
become since the Indian beauty's death. Sir Lewis, too, was a cousin and
intimate friend of Raleigh himself, and George must have seen in the
company of his uncle that latest born child of the sixteenth century and
even heard his stirring adventures from his own lips. He would certainly
have missed no opportunity of seeing the famous navigator. Raleigh was
the hero of every lad with an English spirit or an ear for a tale.
HisDiscovery of Guiana was a book that was in every one's hands, and
George and his cousins must have known by heart its wonderful stories of
El Dorado and the Amazons. At any rate the lad was old enough to have
witnessed with eager eyes the setting forth of Sir Walter's last expedition to
find the land of gold; to have heard with sinking heart how his uncle
Stukeley had gone forth to arrest the hero upon his disastrous return; to
mourn with all England when Raleigh's head fell on Tower Hill, and to
burn with shame and anger when he heard the cry of execration that rose
against his uncle, the treacherous friend who betrayed the last of the
Elizabethans.
It is not difficult to imagine how a boy of George's nature, brought up in
the midst of such surroundings, must have chafed to see his friends and
kinsmen joining their colours while he was too young to be allowed to go.
Richard Grenville, Sir Bevil's brother, whom George must have known
well, was with the expedition, and George can have wished nothing better
than to serve under him. Sir Richard Grenville, though he afterwards
disgraced himself by his excesses in the Civil War, was then the very hero
for a boy like George. He was a typical Low Country soldier. From an early
age he had served with Prince Maurice, the first captain of his time, in the
regiment of that pattern soldier Lord Vere. In a few years he had risen to
the rank of captain, and was now commanding a company in the regiment
of Sir John Borough, chief of the staff to the expedition. It was a splendid
opportunity for George to begin his career, but it was not to be, and it must
have been with mixed feelings that he heard the expedition was not to be
delayed a year.
When the King came down it was of course impossible that a man of such a
position as Sir Thomas Monk should not go and pay him his respects like
the other county gentlemen. Unfortunately there was an annoying
difficulty in the way. He was by this time hopelessly in debt, and so many
judgments were out against him that he was little better than a prisoner at
Potheridge. To appear in public meant certain arrest. There was but one
escape from the dilemma, and that was to bribe the under-sheriff. The only
question was to whom so delicate a mission was to be entrusted, and it
cannot but raise our opinion of young George that he was chosen for the
task. His mission was successfully carried out, and in due course Sir
Thomas rode out to meet his sovereign with all the best blood in Devon.
But before the royal party came in sight the proceedings were interrupted
by a painful incident. Either the under-sheriff had blabbed, or George had
been boasting of his diplomacy. At all events the rascally attorney had
received a bigger bribe from the other side, and now at this solemn
moment and in face of the whole county the villain came forward and
arrested Sir Thomas.
George Monk was not a boy to sit down quietly under such an indignity.
Without saying anything to anybody he took the first opportunity of
slipping off into Exeter regardless of the plague. Once inside the gates he
went straight to the perfidious attorney, and having told him in the
plainest words what he thought of him, there and then proceeded to
administer the cudgelling in the midst of which he has been already
introduced, and which was to prove his introduction to an eventful career.
For George was in a desperate scrape. The bruised lawyer threatened
merciless proceedings, and to cudgel an under-sheriff was an outrage of
which the law was likely to take a very serious view. It was clear that the
boy must be concealed till the storm blew over. There was only one way of
doing it. The fleet was lying in Plymouth nearly ready to sail. Once there he
would be safe. So George, to his intense delight we may be sure, was
smuggled off and hurriedly engaged as a volunteer under his kinsman Sir
Richard Grenville. Early in October the expedition sailed. The baffled
attorney had to hang up his unserved writ on the office-files, and George
Monk, by the force of the straitened circumstances of the family, found
himself prematurely a soldier with the burden of an imperfect education to
carry through life.
It is unnecessary to follow closely the disastrous expedition to Cadiz in . Ill-
planned, ill-disciplined, ill-officered, and ill-supplied, it was doomed from
the first to failure. For young George Monk it was a bitter awakening from
the dreams a boy will have of the glories of a soldier's life. The ship in
which he sailed and the company in which he served, bad as it was, can
hardly have been so bad as the rest. Grenville was at least a soldier by
profession and a good officer. Borough's regiment must at least have tasted
discipline. The veteran general was one of the most distinguished and
scholarly soldiers of his time; a man who had seen grow up under the
Veres that immortal English brigade which by patient effort and
undaunted perseverance had wrested from the Spaniards their till then
unchallenged claim to be the finest infantry in the world. He had seen more
service than any man in the army, and in all questions of military science
his word was law.
Thus George began his career under good masters, and two years later he
was fortunate enough to bring himself again under their command. At the
head of another expedition, as ill-found as the first, Buckingham early in
June, , effected a landing on the Isle of Rhé, and laid siege to St. Martin, the
citadel of the island. Its capture proved a more difficult matter than he had
expected. Already nearly a fortnight had been expended in fruitless
attempts when Buckingham's anxieties were further increased by
unwelcome news. A young gentleman was announced with an important
verbal message from the lips of the King. It was George Monk, who at the
risk of his life had made his way through France; though ignorant of the
language he had penetrated the army which lay before Rochelle, and so
reached Rhé with the intelligence that a large combined naval and military
force was being prepared in France to relieve the island.
For this daring service, the risks of which it is difficult to exaggerate, Sir
John Borough gave him a commission as ensign in his own regiment, of
which Sir Richard Grenville was major, or sergeant-major, as the rank then
was, a rank involving all the duties which are now performed by adjutants,
as well as the command of a company. It was most probably his kinsman's
colours that the young ensign carried, and this is why he always regarded
Sir Richard as his father-in-arms. For now he had begun in earnest his
career as a professional soldier, and it was with every opportunity of laying
the foundations of that consummate technical knowledge which afterwards
distinguished him. To enforce the sound teaching of his colonel came the
appalling disaster with which the expedition closed. It was a lesson he
never forgot, and long after he would often grieve over the iniquitous
mismanagement with which the whole affair had been conducted.
In the following year he took part with his regiment, which was now
commanded by Grenville, in the last half-hearted attempt to relieve
Rochelle, and then followed a period of inactivity. Buckingham was dead,
and Conway with his policy of non-intervention reigned in his stead.
Richelieu had no desire to retaliate; Spain was too weak to strike a blow,
and England settled down to enjoy her repose. At home there was no
chance of employment for the professional soldier for many years to come,
and adventurous youth must look abroad.
There over the sea was a tempting prospect. Frederick Henry, the young
Prince of Orange, had begun his brilliant career. In the previous year he
had suddenly taken the offensive and snatched Grol from the very arms of
the great Spinola. His treasury was overflowing with the plunder of the
plate-fleet which Peter Hein had captured, and now he was besieging Bois-
le-duc. Lord Vere had returned at his summons to command the English
brigade and to give the young Stadtholder the benefit of his unrivalled
experience. It was a name to conjure with, and volunteers flocked over
from England eager for the reputation of having served under the most
accomplished soldier England had yet produced. But amateur soldiering
would not now satisfy George Monk, nor would his purse bear the
expenses which a gentleman-private must incur. Fortunately he was not
without interest, and was able to procure a commission in the regiment of
which Lord Vere's kinsman, the young Earl of Oxford, had just obtained
the command.
Before he could join Bois-le-duc had fallen, and it was not till that the
Stadtholder took the field again. This year, however, saw the annihilation
of the Spanish flotilla which attempted to surprise the island of Tholen.
Lord Oxford had command of the English contingent, which was detailed
to man the prince's boats, and at last George tasted the sweets of victory.
The following year he was to witness one of the most brilliant campaigns
which had ever been fought in the Low Countries. No sooner was the
prince in motion than Venlo, Stralen, Ruremonde fell in rapid succession,
and by the middle of June he had completely invested Maastricht. Three
armies flew to its relief, but the prince beat them all, and at last was left to
prosecute the siege unmolested. The brunt of the work in the English lines
fell on Monk's regiment, but the young ensign passed through the four
months of almost daily fighting without a scratch. His colonel was not so
fortunate. The earl was shot dead in the second month of the siege while
bringing up reinforcements to the support of the advanced picket in the
trenches. On August st Maastricht capitulated, and the campaign was
brought to a glorious conclusion. Lord Vere returned to England, having
assigned the command of his regiment to George Goring, the eldest son of
Lord Norwich and the future notorious cavalry officer of the Civil Wars.
It was about this time that Monk was promoted to the rank of captain, and
found himself in a position which laid the foundations of his fortunes. He
was in command of the colonel's company, that is to say, a double
company, of which the colonel was nominal captain. For in the early days
of the regimental system every colonel had his company just as every
general had his regiment; and as the general had his lieutenant-colonel, so
each colonel had his captain-lieutenant taking precedence of all the other
captains. It was this rank that Monk now bore, and it was one to which
great honour and responsibility were attached. It was in the colonel's
company that the volunteers chiefly chose to trail their pikes, and so great
was the prestige of Lord Vere's regiment, and so popular the fascinating
reprobate who commanded it, that his company was sometimes half
composed of unruly young gentlemen who had come abroad to see the
wars and sow their wild oats. Thus it was that Monk became personally
acquainted with half the officers who afterwards distinguished themselves
in the coming Civil Wars, and not only did he make their acquaintance but
he won their respect as well. It was only by enforcing the strictest discipline
that order could be maintained amongst such a company. Monk took his
profession seriously. During his service in Holland he had made deep
study of the military sciences, no doubt in company with old Henry
Hexham, the learned and literary quartermaster of the regiment. He had no
idea of young gentlemen playing at soldiers and disgracing the name by
using it only as an excuse for every kind of licence. Soldiering under
Captain Monk was found to be a very serious thing. The wildest blades
were soon tamed by the impassive stare and rough speech of the captain-
lieutenant, young as he still was, and many there were who lived to thank
him long afterwards for the severity of the lessons he taught.
Yet he was no mere soldier of the lecture-room and parade-ground either,
for all his science and severity. Those who followed George Monk had to
tread in thorny places, as any one who knew it not before found out at the
siege of Breda. It was the last piece of service for Monk in the Low
Countries, and it was the one in which he crowned his reputation for that
absolute intrepidity which afterwards used to terrify the carpet-knights of
the Restoration, and even make Prince Rupert hold his breath.
In Frederick found himself strong enough to invest the town with a
combined army of Dutch and French, together with his English brigade.
The French and English attacks were directed on an important hornwork,
and here Goring's regiment had plenty of hard work and hard fighting.
Monk soon found himself without a colonel; for Goring here received the
wound that gave him the attractive limp the young cavaliers used
afterwards so to envy, and he had to give up the active command of his
regiment. But in spite of every difficulty, by the night of September th the
English mines were almost ready. On the morrow they were to be reported
complete. Monk was in command of the advanced picket in the trenches.
Some attempt of the besieged to destroy the English works was only to be
expected, and but for Monk's vigilance the labour of weeks might have
been undone in a single night. In discharge of his duty as commander in
the trenches he was making the round, and at one point he had to pass
close under the hornwork. No sooner had he reached the spot than he saw
a number of Spaniards dropping silently from the berme into the trenches.
He had but four pikes and a couple of musketeers at his back, but without
a moment's hesitation he hurled himself at the dark mass in front of him. A
desperate hand-to-hand struggle ensued, till the picket, alarmed by the
firing, came up, and the enemy were driven within their own works.
The mines were saved, and next morning were reported ready to be
sprung. The prince at once ordered the English and French to assault, and
Monk himself was told off to lead a forlorn hope of twenty musketeers and
ten pikes. In support were a few sappers and two small parties like his own
to right and left. After them were the whole of the gentlemen-volunteers.
When all was ready the mines were discharged. A great piece of the work
crumbled into ruins, and Monk, followed by his party, disappeared into
the cloud of dust and smoke before it had time to settle. Without a check he
reached the summit of the breach and leaped out upon a body of
musketeers drawn up to resist the stormers. Completely surprised by the
fury and suddenness of Monk's attack, the Spaniards broke and fled as he
sprang out of the smoke. Regardless of his followers, half of whom slunk
back into the breach, Monk kept on right into the enemies' work and
dashed straight at a body of some six or seven score men who stood with
pikes charged to receive him. But nothing would stop him now. Shouting
at the top of his voice, "A Goring! a Goring!" he fell furiously on them with
the handful who had followed. Fortunately the supports were close at his
heels, and shaken by his desperate onslaught, the Spaniards broke before
the charge of the volunteers. In disorder they fled into an interior work
followed by the English and French, who rushed bravely to the rescue, and
the hornwork was won.
It was the beginning of the end. The loss of the hornwork made the city
untenable, and a few weeks later the garrison surrendered. It was Monk's
last stroke in the service of the States-General. In the following year, as he
lay in winter-quarters at Dort, the burghers took deep offence at some
disturbances of which his young reprobates had been guilty, and claimed
to try them for the offence. No one had a higher sense of his duty to his
employers than Monk, and no one stood up more stoutly for the rights of
the men under his command. He insisted on settling the matter by court-
martial. The burghers appealed to the States. Such cases were not
unknown, and had always been decided in favour of the military. But Dort
was an important town, and not to be offended lightly. The States-General
decided in favour of the burgomaster, and the prince had to order Monk
and his troops into quarters which were by no means a change for the
better. Monk was highly offended. He considered the honour of the army
was outraged in his person. Unable to support the indignity, and disgusted
at the want of consideration shown to a man of his services, he resigned his
commission, and resolved to place his sword and experience at the service
of his own country.
 CHAPTER II
FOR KING AND PARLIAMENT
The great drama was about to begin. The star-chamber had given judgment
in Hampden's case: the prayer-book had been read in Edinburgh; and it
was amidst ominous mutterings of coming evil that Captain Monk set foot
once more upon his native shore.
How great a tragedy was to develope itself out of the prologue upon which
the curtain was about to rise, no one as yet could tell. Still less were there
any to guess that the plain Low Country officer stepping on to the Dover
beach was the man who was to cut the knot of the last act and end the play
in a blaze of triumph.
We can see him clearly as he rides towards London, brooding, as his
manner was, on the ungrateful treatment he had received at the hands of
his masters. He is now in his thirtieth year, rather short than tall, but
thickset and in full possession of the physical strength which the ill-starred
under-sheriff had tasted at Exeter years ago; and as with an air of dogged
self-reliance he sits erect upon his horse, handsome, fresh-coloured, well-
knit, he looks every inch a soldier. Quietly chewing his tobacco for
company, as the fashion was, he speaks little to those who overtake him on
the road, except perhaps it is to grumble at the Mynheers when the subject
turns that way. He answers strangers with a blunt, almost rude brevity, at
which men are offended, but which somehow they feel little inclined to
openly resent. He is an ill-mannered, thick-headed soldier, they say, and it
is best to leave him alone to take his own way.
And indeed he was little more. He was frankly the ideal of a soldier of
fortune, versed in his art to the point of pedantry, wary to the verge of
craftiness, fearless to a fault, jealous of his honour as the knight of La
Mancha himself. The name by which such men were known is unfortunate,
for it has led to much misconception of their character. Then it was well
understood to mean a soldier by profession, no more nor less than what
every officer in our army is to-day. The ideal soldier of fortune was marked
not so much by his readiness to change his colours as by his blind devotion
to those with which for the time being he was engaged. Until the period of
his commission, or of the war or campaign for which he had engaged was
ended, his loyalty to his paymasters was as ungrudging as it was
unassailable. Nothing would have induced him to enter a service which he
considered dishonourable, but having once engaged he fought and toiled
and bled in contemptuous indifference to the political manœuvres of the
men whose commission he held. To look upon such men as cruel,
unprincipled adventurers is the very reverse of the truth where worthy
pupils of the heroic Veres are concerned. We must remember that it was in
their school that Monk learnt his trade, and not in that which produced
men like the Turners and Dalziells and brought disgrace upon the name of
the soldier of fortune. They were men who could only teach virtues,
though perhaps the only virtues they could teach were honesty and
obedience. At any rate that was the lesson which Monk learnt. To be true to
his paymaster, that was his rule in life; to obey the civil authority which
employed him, that was his political creed. Such was the code which Monk
brought home with him from the Low Countries. Simple and rude as it
was, it was all he had to guide him through the labyrinth he was about to
tread.
As yet the Revolution stirred but in restless slumber, and it is probable that
it was not the prospect of civil strife which brought Monk to England in
search of employment. Prince Rupert and his brother were at Court in
hopes of getting their uncle's aid for the recovery of the Palatinate; and the
King, sobered by failure, was turning and doubling every way to shirk the
responsibility and enjoy the credit of assisting his beautiful and
unfortunate sister. Of all the schemes which were suggested to this end the
most extraordinary was the project for the colonisation of Madagascar. The
idea was that a thousand gentlemen should join, each with a thousand
pounds and a number of servants. The King was to provide twelve ships
from the navy, and thirty merchantmen were to complete the fleet. Every
adventurer was to sail in person, and the whole was to be commanded by
Prince Rupert himself, with the title of Governor-General of Madagascar or
St. Lawrence. But Elizabeth grew anxious about her son, and opposed the
wild scheme in which she could see no reason. "As for Rupert's romance,"
she wrote to Roe, "about Madagascar, it sounds more like one of Don
Quixote's conquests when he promised his trusty squire to make him king
of an island." In the end practical merchants and seamen threw so much
cold water on the scheme that it began to lose favour, and Rupert did not
go.
Meanwhile all the world was run mad on the romantic adventure.
Davenant wrote a little epic about it, which made Endymion Porter
exclaim, himself as mad as the rest:
"What lofty fancy was't possest your braine,
And caus'd you soare into so high a straine?"
Suckling so far forgot himself in the craze of the hour as to write a copy of
verses that may still be read without a blush. Even the phlegmatic Captain
Monk was carried away. Man of the new time as he was, in the bottom of
his heart he was Elizabethan. The project was more than enough to revive
the dreams of his Devonshire boyhood, of Raleigh, of Guiana, and the early
days of Virginia, and he promised to go. But it was not to be. Ere long he
withdrew, either because his native shrewdness showed him it was all a
bubble or else because the curtain was up at last, and he turned to the
thrilling play beside which the Madagascar adventure was only a childish
fairy tale.
Scotland was to be coerced into conformity, and in the bustle of
preparation Monk saw his chance. To every soldier in England his name
must have been perfectly familiar. Every young gentleman who had seen
any service was hurrying to the King's standard on the chance of a
commission, and the majority of them would be only too glad to claim
George Monk as their father-in-arms, and boast of their service in the
colonel's company of the crack regiment in the Low Country Brigade.
Nor did Monk lack powerful friends. He was a wide-kinned man, so wide
that it is impossible to trace the multitudinous ramifications of his family.
He had connections in high places, and they began to take him up. Above
all Lord Leicester seems to have found a pleasure in pushing his
distinguished young kinsman's fortunes, and at this moment there was no
better friend a young man could have than Robert Sidney, second Earl of
Leicester. His family was just now rising into high favour. His brother-in-
law, the Earl of Northumberland, was Lord Admiral, while for sister-in-
law he could claim the lovely Countess of Carlisle herself.
This "Erinnys of the North," as Warburton called her, for whom Waller
could forget awhile his Sacharissa, who made Davenant sing his sweetest,
and wrung from Suckling his most lascivious note, was still the reigning
beauty of the Court. As she entered middle age her charms seemed only to
ripen. Her eyes were as bright, her wit as keen, her vivacity as sparkling as
ever. The only change was in the field of her conquests. Weary of breaking
the hearts of fops and poets, she was seeking new excitement in political
intrigue and new pleasures in charming tried leaders of men such as Pym
and Strafford. At this moment a blunt manly soldier like Captain Monk
was just the man to find favour in her capricious eyes. Monk was always
soft-hearted with a woman, and his admiration of such a beauty must have
been frank and undisguised. Whatever was the cause, he found her willing
to support Lord Leicester's request for his advancement. The task was not
difficult. Officers of tried worth who could be trusted in the quarrel were in
high demand for lieutenant-colonels of the newly-raised regiments. Half
the colonels were noblemen of little experience, and the rest were occupied
with their duties on the staff. Monk, as a man who despised politics and
was without convictions, was in every way fitted for a command, and his
fair friend was soon able to hand him his commission as lieutenant-colonel
of Lord Newport's regiment of foot.
Monk soon found plenty of work to do; but all his efforts to turn his men
into soldiers were thrown away. In June, , to his intense disgust a
pacification was patched up with the Scots, and the First Bishops' War
came to an ignominious end before a blow had been struck. To Monk,
whose narrow but enthusiastic patriotism had been only increased by his
service abroad, such a fiasco was deeply mortifying. With a stupid
constancy, for which it is impossible not to love him, he clung through life
to the fixed idea that one Englishman was any day worth two or three of
any other nation. To face an army of Scots for months and then come to
terms without fighting was a piece of pusillanimity he could not
understand, and never forgot.
Nor did the conduct of the Second Bishops' War mend his opinion of the
King. His regiment was amongst the first that were ready to take the field.
It was present at the rout at Newburn Ford, where its lieutenant-colonel
distinguished himself by saving the English guns. But with that disgraceful
action the campaign ended. Monk and a few other officers at the Council of
War urged every argument which the pedantic strategy of the day could
suggest in order to induce the King to attack the Scots with the
concentrated army which was now strengthened with the Yorkshire and
Durham trained-bands. But all was in vain, and an armistice preliminary to
peace was concluded at Ripon, by which the two northern counties were
left in possession of the Scots as security for a war-indemnity.
For these two miserable failures Monk never forgave the King. To the end
of his life he used to harp on the fatal mistake Charles made in not
following the advice he gave, and to the last maintained, with characteristic
ignorance of the real questions at issue, that all the blood which flowed in
the following years was to be imputed to the folly of sparing it then.
While the Scots were eating up the fat of the land and Monk was fretting at
the part he had to play, the plot was thickening fast. The Long Parliament
had met and Strafford was brought to bay. The breach between King and
Parliament was widening daily, and Charles was foolish enough to listen to
schemes which the most hairbrained of his courtiers devised for dragging
the army into the quarrel. Men ready to coerce the Houses were to be
placed in command, and the army was to be brought up to London and the
Tower snatched from the hands of Lord Newport, who was now constable.
But there was a difficulty in the way. The Low Country officers, true to
their principles, refused to have anything to do with the plot, and the
conspirators fell out before the question of command could be settled.
Goring, who had been promised the post of Lieutenant-General, in a fit of
spite betrayed the plot to Lord Newport. Newport told Pym, and at the
critical moment when Strafford's fate hung in the balance Pym played the
information as a trump-card. The effect was electrical, and its sequel of no
little consequence to Monk. The revelation produced a revulsion of feeling
which brought Strafford's head to the block, and Lord Leicester, as a
favourite with both King and Parliament, was hastily summoned from
Paris to succeed him as Lord Lieutenant and Commander-in-Chief in
Ireland.
As the truth about the army-plots was allowed to transpire the worst was
believed of the King's intentions. The belief even began to spread that
Charles was privy to a popish plot, of which the queen was the centre, to
bring troops from Ireland for the utter subversion of the Protestant faith.
Then into the midst of the growing distrust there burst like a thunderbolt
the news of the Irish rebellion, and the smouldering fires of the
Reformation, which had slumbered since the great days when they
scorched the throne of Spain, burst into a flame. On the heels of the news
came down a letter from Scotland in which the King commended to
Parliament the care of reducing the rebels to obedience. The Commons
voted on the spot an army of eight thousand men and confidently called
for volunteers. But that was not all. The weapon was easy to forge, but it
must now be placed out of the King's reach. It was not enough that
Leicester was made Captain-General. His second in command must also be
a man in whose honour and fidelity the House had implicit confidence.
Astley and Conyers were unwilling to serve. It says not a little for the
reputation which Monk had won both as a man and a soldier, that his
name was the next mentioned. It was proposed that he should be given the
command as Lieutenant-General, with Henry Warren, his veteran major
and devoted friend, as his Adjutant-General, or Sergeant-major-general, as
it was then called. It was a splendid chance, but Monk was doomed to
disappointment. The Houses were suddenly informed that Ormonde had
been chosen for the command and commissioned Lieutenant-General by
the King, and the tactics of the Parliament had to be changed. It was
determined to raise an army by an Impressment Bill, to which a clause was
to be added vesting the control of it in their own hands. As the month of
November wore on and it was still in debate, by every post came news of
fresh atrocities committed by the Papist rebels upon the English
Protestants. Never perhaps again till the story of the Cawnpore massacre
set the nation's teeth, did such a frenzy of revenge take possession of the
people. More and more troops were voted every week. Every tale, no
matter how hideous or improbable, was greedily believed. It was necessary
that something should be done at once. Leicester was ordered to raise two
regiments of foot and one of horse by voluntary enlistment, and that the
Parliament might keep a firm hand on the reins it was further resolved that
he should submit the list of officers he proposed to commission to the
Houses for approval. Monk was named for lieutenant-colonel and Warren
for major of Leicester's own regiment of foot. Both were at once approved;
and the nominations of Leicester's two sons, Lord Lisle and Algernon
Sidney, as well as that of Sir Richard Grenville, were confirmed for the
horse.
On February st, , Colonel Monk landed in Dublin at the head of the Lord-
General's regiment of foot. It was a splendid body of men, two
thousandstrong and officered by the flower of the disbanded army of the
north. And with him was Sir Richard Grenville, commanding four hundred
of Leicester's new regiment of horse. Over the scenes which followed there
is no need to linger. In fire and blood the wretched Irish had to do penance
for the outburst of savagery to which they had been goaded by Strafford's
imperious rule. The most important operation of the campaign of was the
expedition for the relief of the English settlements in Kildare and Queen's
County. With two thousand five hundred foot under Monk, five hundred
horse under Lucas, Coote, and Grenville, and six guns, Ormonde left
Dublin on April nd, and by the th had successfully relieved Athy,
Maryborough, and some smaller settlements. The work was accomplished
with all the horrible accompaniments which characterised Irish warfare. "In
our march thither," wrote an officer in Monk's regiment, "we fired above
two hundred villages. The horse that marched on our flanks fired all within
five or six miles of the body of the army; and those places that we marched
through, they that had the rear of the army always burned. Hitherto we
met not with any enemy to oppose, yet not a mile nor a place that we
marched by, that the dead bodies of the rebels did not witness our
passage." But the most difficult part of the enterprise yet remained. Some
thirty miles beyond the river Nore, in a country swarming with rebels, lay
several garrisons yet unrelieved. Ormonde's provisions were running so
short that to reach them by a regular operation was impossible; but sooner
than abandon them Grenville, Lucas, and Coote undertook to make a dash
to their aid with the cavalry, while Monk covered the retreat. On the
morning of Saturday the th, in the dead of night, the horse sallied from
Maryborough, and succeeded in passing the river unobserved. The Irish at
once took the alarm, and seized the only two fords by which they could
return. That at Portnahinch they barred by an intrenchment, and leaving
the other open they laid a strong ambush along the dangerous causeway
by which it was approached. There, certain of their prey, they quietly
waited to wreak a terrible vengeance on Grenville's ruthless troopers. On
Monk rested the only chance of escape. Early on Monday morning, with a
party of six hundred musketeers, he attacked a neighbouring castle, which
belonged to one of the rebel leaders, hoping to draw to its relief the forces
which held the fords; but not a man would they stir. In desperation he
determined to force the pass at Portnahinch, but on reaching it he found
the river so swollen that it was impassable for foot. The last hope seemed
gone, but Monk was not to be beaten. Seizing every point of vantage on his
own bank, he placed his musketeers with such skill that the Irish could
neither abandon nor reinforce their intrenchments. Assured that the horse
must mean to force a passage at this point under cover of Monk's fire, they
at last withdrew the whole of their strength from the other ford, and while
Monk occupied them with a deadly fusilade, Grenville and his exhausted
comrades rode unmolested along the abandoned causeway and reached
Maryborough in safety.
The horse were saved, and, now his object was accomplished, Ormonde
began to retire to Dublin. It was in the course of this march that he won his
brilliant action at Kilrush. Monk was present with the staff during the
general's reconnaissance on the eve of the battle, and we may credit him
with at least a share of the masterly tactics by which the victory was
obtained. That Ormonde appreciated his services is certain, for on this
occasion he was mentioned in despatches "for the alacrity and undaunted
resolution" he had displayed.
By the end of June eight more regiments, including Lord Lisle's carbineers,
were landed in Dublin, and the Parliament seemed to have exhausted all
the resources it could spare for Ireland. The Civil War was beginning. By
straining every nerve it could only hold its own against the King in
England, and the Irish army was left to shift for itself. Constant forays
became a necessity, and indeed were the only operations possible. In these
no one was so successful as Monk. He displayed in them all the qualities
which endear a commander to his men, and soon no officer in the army
was so popular with rank and file as he. No one, they used to say, was too
sick or sorry for action, and nobody's boots were too bad for a march, when
the word was passed that "honest George" was off foraying again. It
became a joke that his regiment was the purveyor for the whole of Dublin.
This was hardly the work that Monk had promised himself when he
volunteered for Ireland; but at any rate it was a great relief to him that he
was leaving behind the politics which he detested and only half
understood for some hard fighting which was his meat and drink. But he
was to be sadly disappointed. Lord Leicester, commissioned by the King
and paid by the Parliament, was still in England, detained by orders from
Oxford. In Ormonde Charles knew he had a representative in every way
satisfactory. He was a royalist above suspicion. The advent of Leicester
could only strengthen the hands of the Lords Justices, who represented the
Lord Lieutenant in his absence. These men were staunch Parliamentarians,
and made it their business to oppose Ormonde's influence in every way.
Indeed their enemies accused them of deliberately thwarting his operations
in order that, by allowing the rebellion to spread, there might be a larger
area of land for confiscation. In return for providing money for the
suppression of the rebellion an influential body of London capitalists had
obtained from Parliament a concession of one quarter of the land which
should become liable to confiscation; and it is to be feared the Lords
Justices were to some extent interested in this gigantic job. The Lords
Justices had their fortunes to make, and they saw them in their power of
distributing the forfeited lands. Their interests as well as their opinions
were in sympathy with the parliamentary cause. Thus Ormonde
represented for them a double danger, and without accusing them of
actually fostering rebellion, it is certain that they did their best to discredit
Ormonde with the King in order to procure his recall.
To seek Monk's attitude in the strife we need not go far. If he had any
sympathies either way, which is very doubtful, they were certainly at this
time parliamentarian. Indeed a slight he received about this time must
have sharply spurred him to the side to which contempt for the King,
anxiety about his pay, and the influence of his friends the Sidneys already
inclined him. In May Sir Charles Coote, the governor of Dublin, had been
killed in action. No one deserved to succeed him so well as "honest
George." No one had done so much for the place, above all, in keeping in
temper the troops who were always on the verge of mutiny for want of pay
and clothes and food. Accordingly Lord Leicester, on the recommendation
of the Lords Justices, sent over a commission by which he was appointed
governor at a double salary of forty shillings a day, a little addition which
made the post doubly dear to the soldier of fortune; but hardly had the
commission arrived when there came a letter direct from the King
approving the permanent appointment of Lord Lambert, who had been
acting as Coote's deputy, and Monk found the governorship and his forty
shillings a day snatched out of his very mouth.
Important as this affair was to poor Monk, it was but one of many such
passages between the two parties. Ormonde, on the whole, was getting the
upper hand; but the condition of friction which this state of things set up
could have but one result. The rebels gained ground by strides. In
September General Preston landed from Spain with quantities of supplies
of all kinds for their use. A popish plot was winded once more. A new
design was suspected of raising an army for the King in Ireland with
Catholic money and arms. Ormonde's popularity was growing alarming.
What was to prevent him suddenly joining hands with the rebels and
turning with the whole army upon the Parliament? How could it then
withstand the King? An old prophecy was in every one's mouth:
"He that would old England win
First with Ireland must begin."
The action which the Commons took at this crisis gives us a startling peep
beneath the boards where the wire-pullers sat. Joint-committees were sent
out to the various provinces, consisting each of two delegates, one
nominated by the Commons and one by the Syndicate which was working
the Irish concession. Reynolds and Goodwin were the two appointed for
Dublin. On their arrival they were at once, without a shadow of right,
admitted to the Council, and set to work to put Lisle at the head of the
army instead of Ormonde, and oust from the governorship of Dublin the
man who had supplanted the parliamentary candidate. They even tried to
commit the army to an oath of fealty to Parliament, but £, was all the
money they had brought to satisfy arrears, and it was not enough to allay
the distrust of the soldiers.
As the winter advanced the distress and discontent of the troops increased.
Their clothes were in rags, many had not even boots to their feet, and
proper food could hardly be obtained. They cried aloud for their pay, and
the delegates saw a new device must be tried to silence the dangerous
clamour. In testimony of the goodwill of the Parliament, they offered all
such as should be willing to accept it a grant of rebel land in satisfaction of
arrears. The idea was extremely ingenious and nearly succeeded. Monk
was far too dull a man to see through it, and he at once subscribed the
agreement. But there were many to point out what it meant. It was soon
seen to be a mere device to commit the army to the cause of the Parliament,
and those who had so hastily signed insisted on withdrawing, for ruin
stared them in the face. Ormonde had received instructions from the King
to negotiate a pacification with the Irish rebels. In him the army saw their
only chance of redress, and in spite of all the delegates could do they set
out their grievances in a loyal address and sent it to the King.
By the end of January, , Ormonde, strengthened by a new commission from
Oxford, was able to exclude Reynolds and Goodwin from the Council, and
after a few weeks spent in undisguised attempts to suborn the troops, they
sailed for England, just in time to escape arrest on the royal warrant.
The cavalier had triumphed; but until he had carried out his instructions to
come to terms with the rebels his victory was useless to the royal cause.
The negotiations went on but slowly. The Anglo-Irish lords of the Pale
were anxious for peace, but the Lords Justices were careful to obstruct
Ormonde's diplomacy by forcing him into military operations. Their policy
deferred the cessation, but only to make it more inevitable. Each expedition
left the Government more exhausted. The scanty resources that remained
were only the more rapidly consumed, and, though with the singleness of
purpose that had marked his conduct throughout, Monk strained every
nerve to do his duty, no real impression was made upon the rebels.
Very shortly after Ormonde's victory at Ross, Preston was threatening
Ballinakill, twenty miles north of Kilkenny, and the garrison was only
saved for the time by Monk dashing out of Dublin with half a regiment and
four troops. Close to the town he met a large number of rebels, put them to
flight, relieved the garrison, and returned safe to Dublin. Still food grew
scarcer. Preston knew his game was a waiting one, and avoided an
engagement. As time went on the English army could hardly be kept
together. The troops were scattered about, working on lands by which the
chief officers were pacified. Desertions in all ranks took place wholesale.
Negotiations for peace were revived, and the military situation was in
complete stagnation.
It was about this time that Monk heard of his father's death, and probably
in consequence of this he asked and obtained leave from Ormonde to go
home. There was an annuity of £ a year to look after, which was left him by
Sir Thomas's will, but the matter had to wait. In June Preston and O'Neill,
the leader of the native Irish party, had advanced almost within touch of
each other into King's County and West Meath. Ormonde, hoping to bring
them to their knees, determined once more to try and force them to an
action. A strong force of two thousand foot and three hundred and fifty
horse was prepared and Monk called on to take the command. On the
strength of his leave he refused, and all the pressure which the Lords
Justices could bring to bear on him was of no avail. Sir John Temple, the
father of Sir William, was the man who at last induced him to consent, and
he marched. Under the nose of Preston, with less than a third of his
numbers, he succeeded in relieving the important garrison of Castle-
Jordan, but want of provisions rendered a forward movement impossible,
and he was compelled to retreat without coming to an engagement.
On all sides the rebels were closing in. Ormonde learnt that Lord Inchiquin
in Munster was in as desperate a position as himself. Still he would not
grant the rebels their terms, and Monk, in spite of all his grievances, stood
by him with obstinate devotion. No more was heard of his leave, and all
through those terrible weeks of danger and privation he held on to
encourage the troops with his presence. In the autumn he was operating
successfully in Wicklow, and occupying positions there to hold Lord
Castlehaven and General Preston in check till the harvest was secured. But
from the north O'Neill was advancing, and Monk was recalled to reinforce
Lord Moore, who was opposing the Ulster Nationalists. Once more every
effort was paralysed by the commissariat. Moore was killed, and Monk had
to retire to Dublin to find all he had gained in Wicklow was lost.
Further resistance was hopeless. The army was at starvation point. Preston
was raiding within two miles of Dublin gates, and north and south O'Neill
and Castlehaven held in irresistible force the whole of the country on
which the English relied for supplies. To add to Ormonde's
embarrassments, ever since the Scots had declared for the Parliament
Charles had been pressing him to conclude an armistice with the rebels
upon any terms, and at last he gave way. On September th was signed that
cessation from which, in insane contempt for the deepest feelings of his
people, the King hoped so much, and which was at last to bring upon him
so terrible a retribution.
 CHAPTER III
THE KING'S COMMISSION
As early as April Ormonde had received secret instructions which can have
left him in no doubt as to the real meaning of the King's anxiety for the
success of the negotiations. No sooner was the matter settled than the
Lieutenant-General busied himself in carrying out his master's orders.
Every man that could be spared was to be sent to the assistance of the King
against the Scots, and the greatest care was to be exercised that they sailed
under commanders who could be trusted.
Meanwhile, in face of the catastrophe they had so long apprehended, the
parliamentary agents were not idle. They promised the troops full
discharge of arrears and every other inducement to enter their service, and
with such success that Ormonde considered it necessary to take the
precaution of demanding the signature of a "protestation" from the officers
who were to go to England. To his intense disgust Monk was called upon
to formally pledge himself to be true to the flag under which he was about
to serve. That he had any serious objection to the royal cause is hardly
probable. His friends, Lord Lisle and Algernon Sidney, were not in Dublin
to influence him. Monk, with the rest of the officers, must have long lost
faith in parliamentary promises of pay; and, moreover, through the
Commons' antipathy to martial law, there had been trouble in Ireland of
the same nature as that which led to his leaving the Dutch service. Then the
prospect of coming to blows with the Scots, before whom he had been
disgraced, had irresistible attractions for him. Morally there was nothing to
prevent him entering the royal service. Although paid by the Parliament it
was the King's commission he held. But to be asked to pledge himself to
the politics of those for whom he fought was in his eyes a monstrous
proposal, while to be called on to swear fidelity to the man whose
commission he held was an insult. Rigid even to pedantry in his notions of
military honour, he did not know what it was to swerve a hair's-breadth
from the duty of his place. Through jealousy and disappointment, through
every danger and temptation, he had been true to Ormonde, and now his
reward was to be suspected of being able to forget what was due to himself
as a soldier. It was more than he could tamely endure. Ormonde presented
the protestation, and Monk flatly refused either to sign or swear, nor did he
scruple to say plainly what he thought of it. Only one man had the spirit or
honesty to follow his example, and that was Colonel Lawrence Crawford,
the sturdy Scot whose bigotry would not now permit him to draw sword
against the Covenant, and was ere long to bring down upon him the
merciless resentment of Cromwell.
Monk was deprived of his regiment, and Warren reluctantly accepted the
command. Ormonde could do no less, but so great was his respect for
Monk's character and capacity that he took no further step. Monk was
simply granted leave to go home, and there the matter might have rested
but for the injudicious conduct of his sanguine young admirer, Lord Lisle.
The Parliament was about to send reinforcements into Ulster, and the
choice of a commander lay between the Scotchman Munroe and Lisle.
Munroe's recommendation was his influence with the old Scotch colonists,
while Lisle claimed that he could command the services of Monk, and
through him half Ormonde's army. Lord Digby, the King's Secretary of
State, although his good opinion of Monk was unshaken by the rumours he
heard, still took the precaution of warning Ormonde, and writing in the
King's name a very flattering letter to the colonel himself. So far all was
well. His spotless integrity was enough to lift him above every suspicion.
Ormonde seems still to have had enough confidence in him to allow him to
sail with the troops to Chester, when somehow he got to know that a
special messenger from Pym himself had arrived in Dublin to urge Monk
to prevent the troops joining the King.
It now was impossible for Ormonde to ignore the danger of the injured
colonel's power for evil so long as he remained with the army, and he felt it
his duty to send him to Bristol under arrest. Instructions went with him
that he should be confined till further orders from Oxford, whither the
Lieutenant-General sent a report of the step he had taken. "In the
meantime," he says in his letter to Sir Francis Hawley, the governor of
Bristol, "I must assure you that Colonel Monk is a person very well
deserved of this kingdom, and that there is no unworthy thing laid to his
charge, therefore I desire you to use him with all possible civility."
Hawley, who was one of Monk's innumerable kinsmen, interpreted his
instructions so widely as to release the colonel on parole at once, indignant,
as it seems, that a man of such distinguished service should be treated so
shabbily. But his responsibility was not to last long. Digby showed
Ormonde's despatch to the King, who decided at once that Monk was a
man worth the trial to gain, and he was sent for to Oxford.
Lord Digby had ready for the injured soldier a most flattering reception.
"Honest George" was but a child in the hands of such a man. The brilliant
Secretary of State was irresistible with his polished wit, his scholarly
discourse, and great personal charm. It was he who had provided Charles
with his most trusted counsellors. It was he who had beguiled Sir John
Hotham into betraying his trust at Hull. He had even a personal experience
of ratting himself, and easily persuaded the colonel to give him his
company to Christchurch, where the King lodged.
The inevitable result ensued. No one had in a greater degree the trick of
attaching such men to him than Charles. No one had a keener eye for a
weakness to be played upon. He was taking the air in the gardens of the
College when the two visitors arrived, and we can see them even now as
they meet amidst the trim lawns. The artful secretary making his
presentation in a few flattering words that say everything to the King: the
stalwart soldier saluting somewhat abruptly with a frank honest stare; and
Charles with his careworn smile saying something that brings a flush to the
handsome face he scrutinises. We can hear him speak of the daring journey
to Rhé, of the breach at Breda, of the guns at Newburn, and of all that has
since been done in Ireland. He is glad also to have so great an authority on
military science in Oxford, as he wants some confidential advice on the
prosecution of the war. We can see the look of half-amused surprise as
honest George "deals very frankly with his Majesty," and tells him his army
is only a rabble of gentility, whose courage and high birth are worthless
beside the growing discipline that Fairfax and Skippon and Cromwell are
teaching his enemies. Let the King cut down his numbers to ten thousand
men, properly organised and equipped; let him officer them with real Low
Country soldiers, and send the high-born amateurs to the right-about, and
with such an army he would bring the rebels to their knees in a trice. It is
hardly, perhaps, the answer his Majesty expected, but he trusts to hear
more of the matter another time. So Monk is dismissed, delighted at the
King's good sense and condescension. Pay, arrears, and all are forgotten.
He is taken by assault, and soon informs Lord Digby he is ready to take
service in the royal army.
The only question now was where the man who was worth a trial to gain
should be employed. There was a general impression that he should go to
Devonshire, where his eldest brother, Sir Thomas, was doing good work.
But Monk made difficulties. A civil war in his native county was peculiarly
distasteful to a man of his nature. Besides, his heart was not there. He had
left it with the regiment that was devoted to him, and that was now, with
the rest of the Irish brigade, investing Nantwich under Lord Byron. The fall
of the place was looked on as certain; when all at once in the midst of the
Christmas revels there was a cry that help was at hand. Under peremptory
orders from London, Fairfax had left his winter-quarters about Lincoln,
and had succeeded in penetrating Cheshire with a large force by the end of
January. There was no doubt about Monk's destination then. The hardships
of the unexpectedly long siege and two small reverses had seriously
affected the temper of the Irish brigade, and their idol was hurried to
infuse a better spirit into his old comrades for the coming struggle.
The sight of "honest George" was as good as another regiment to the
besiegers, and when he took his place, pike in hand, at the head of the first
file of his old corps, Lord Byron saw his force had got a new heart. Monk
had in his pocket a commission to raise a regiment and a promise of the
post of Major-General to the brigade, but in spite of this and of Warren's
entreaties to take his old command, he insisted on retaining his humble
position.
The very day after Monk joined the alarm was given that Fairfax was at
hand, and the position of the Royalists was suddenly found to be
desperately weak. Byron's army was investing the town on both sides of
the river Weaver. Warren's and four other regiments of foot were on the
left bank, and it was on this side that Fairfax was advancing. On the first
news of his approach they had taken up a position at Acton Church, about
a mile in rear of their works, where they intended to stop his advance,
while to prevent a sortie of the garrison a small guard was left to hold the
bridge by which the town was reached. On the other side of the river was
Lord Byron with the rest of the infantry and all the horse. Communications
had been kept up hitherto by fords, but a sudden thaw had so swollen the
river as to render them impracticable. Only by a ride of six miles could the
horse reach the foot at Acton, and the way lay through lanes that the
melting snow had rendered almost impassable. Still there was but one
thing to do, and Byron galloped off along the river through the slush and
mire, trusting there might yet be time to get round before the enemy
attacked.
Meanwhile Fairfax had come in sight of the isolated foot. Monk's old Low
Country comrade saw his advantage immediately, and continued his
advance with the intention of cutting his way through the infantry to join
hands with the garrison before Byron could come to the rescue. Nearer and
nearer he pressed, opening a way through the hedges as he came straight
across country. Suddenly there was an alarm in the rear-guard. In spite of
the mud and narrow lanes and swollen river Byron was upon him at last.
Quick as thought "Form your files to the rear and charge for horse!" was
the order which rang from Fairfax's lips, and Byron's breathless troopers
were hurled back from a solid wall of pikes and muskets. Three of the
Parliament regiments had reversed their front and with the rest Fairfax
dashed at Monk and his friends. Warren's was in the centre, and it broke at
once. The rest stood firm but with flanks exposed. Pike in hand Monk
raged through his disgraced regiment and rallied it for one more charge.
Again it broke, and Fairfax poured in between the wings a resistless flood.
At the same moment the garrison sallied out, forced the guard at the
bridge, and fell upon the Royalist rear. All was over. Drowned in a sea of
armed men that flowed on every side of them, the regiments which till now
had held their ground could resist no longer. Surrender or flight was all
that was left. Too late Monk found the regiment he was so proud of would
not fight in such a cause. He even had to hear it said that a number of his
men had turned their fire on the hard-pressed wings. Acton Church,
around which the train was parked, was hard by, and thither with the rest
of the officers he took refuge. For a while Byron hovered round to try a
rescue with the horse, but the attempt was hopeless. Church, guns,
baggage and all were surrendered, and after barely a week's service in the
King's army Monk found himself a prisoner.
A few days afterwards nearly the whole of his old regiment had enlisted
with Fairfax, while he and Warren were sent prisoners to Hull. But for such
a man Hull was not safe enough. It had but recently been relieved, and was
not out of danger so long as Lord Newcastle was at York. Fairfax and the
other officers who had fought by Monk's side in the Low Countries knew
well the value of his services, and impressed upon the Parliament that he
was "a man worth the making," and not without effect. He was ordered up
to London with Warren, and on July th brought to the bar of the House.
There the two unfortunate officers were charged with high treason and
committed to the Tower. No sooner were they there than Lord Lisle set
about justifying his boasts to the Council. He was still doing his best to get
appointed Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, and there could be no better
testimonial to his fitness than that he could command the services of the
officers in the Tower. Of Monk there was every hope, for he alone had
refused to bind himself not to serve the Parliament, nor were the most
enticing offers wanting to tempt him.
Already the New Model Army was in contemplation. Men of all parties
saw that nothing decisive would ever be done except by adopting the
methods which Monk had urged on the King. A compact mobile field-
force, complete and organised in every detail on the Low Country system,
must replace the unmanageable mobilised militia with which the war had
hitherto been aimlessly dragged on. Cromwell had now definitely come to
the front and thrown himself into the task. Except possibly Sir Jacob Astley,
who was at Oxford with Charles, there was no one in the kingdom more
fitted for the all-important work than Monk. Cromwell, who knew how to
choose a man, must have been perfectly aware of his qualifications, even if
he had not been as intimate as he was with Lord Lisle. Nor was it from
Cromwell alone that the prisoner was tempted. Though all were agreed the
weapon must be forged, they were by no means at one as to the hands in
which it was to be placed. Independents and Presbyterians were
manœuvring for the control. In spite of standing orders members were so
constantly visiting the prisoners that the House had strictly to forbid the
practice without special leave. The same day a leading Presbyterian was
granted permission, and towards the end of October Monk's case was
specially referred to the committee of examinations.
But they all mistook their man. He still held the King's commission. The
war for which he had engaged was still raging, and the most brilliant offers
that could be made him he only regarded as insults. Pressure was even
brought to bear, it is said, by a more rigorous confinement, but it was
useless, and he indignantly refused his liberty except by a regular cartel.
Days and weeks went by and no exchange came. Although, as he had
refused to desert in Ireland, he was not affected by the order which forbade
the exchange of the other Irish officers upon any terms, Parliament had no
intention of allowing so valuable an officer to get back to the royal camp. In
vain Daniel O'Neill urged the King to procure his release for service in
Ireland. Charles seems to have done his best. Clarendon says that many
attempts were made to exchange him; that one was we know. Care,
however, seems to have been taken by his would-be employers not only
that these attempts should be unsuccessful, but that Monk should not even
hear of them. The wretched colonel thought himself forgotten. His money
was gone, and a penniless prisoner in those days was the most miserable of
men. Of his annuity fifty pounds was all he had had, and on November th,
but four months after his committal, he sat down to write an urgent appeal
to his brother for another fifty. The letter concludes with a pathetic cry for
his release: "I shall entreat you," he says, "to be mindful of me concerning
my exchange, for I doubt all my friends have forgotten me. I earnestly
entreat you, therefore, if it lies in your power, to remember me concerning
my liberty; and so in haste, I rest, your faithful brother, GEORGE MONK."
In haste and in the Tower! But any excuse was good enough with the
taciturn soldier if it saved words. And he might have saved them all.
Exchange and remittance were alike out of the question with his hard-
pressed brother, and as the weary months went by he thought himself
indeed deserted. Once out of the very depth of his poverty Charles sent
him a hundred pounds—an extraordinary mark of esteem as things went at
Oxford then. But that was all. Bitterly he felt the seeming ingratitude, but
in spite of all with obstinate loyalty he refused to desert his colours, and sat
himself down to forget in the pursuit of literature the fancied wrongs
under which he smarted.
Like many other active-minded men before and since, having absolutely
nothing to do he determined to write a book. He had before him the
example of Lord Vere and his brother-in-arms, Hexham, the literary
quartermaster of his old Low Country regiment, and most worthily he
followed in their steps. The book is full of vigorous and pithy aphorisms
which flash on us the condensed opinions of a man who spoke little and
thought much. We can hear, as we read it, the few well-digested words,
rugged, blunt, and direct, with which he compelled the attention of
councils of war and won the respect and admiration of his men. Its
subdued enthusiasm tells us of a genuine soldier reverently devoted to his
profession, and looking mournfully from the place apart, where his almost
aggressive patriotism had placed him, at the distractions with which his
beloved country was torn. It gives us as clearly as though we saw him face
to face the key of the character that has been as much misunderstood and
abused as any in history. He was an English citizen first, a soldier next, and
a politician not at all. Of the real meaning of the strife he was incapable of
grasping any conception. For him it was all a mere question of the interior,
and in his eyes no question of the interior, not even religion itself, was
worth a civil war, or the sacrifice of England's military renown.
He called his work Observations upon Military and Political Affairs. The
military part is admirable, and shows us the consummate soldier he was. It
strikes one of the first notes of modern military science, and takes for its
dominant theme the comparatively small part which actual fighting plays
in the duties of a general and the success of a campaign. The political
observations are more crude but equally characteristic. With the exception
of some sagacious remarks on governing a conquered country, they are
confined to the methods of preventing civil war. After recommending a
strong centralised government, technical education, and uniformity of
religion, if it can be obtained without danger, he enunciates those
principles which caused him to take the final step at the great crisis of his
life. Still under the influence of his Devonshire training he strongly insists
on State colonisation as a means whereby sources of weakness may be
turned into strength. "But the principal and able remedy," he says, "against
civil war is to entertain a foreign war. This chaseth away idleness, setteth
all on work, and particularly this giveth satisfaction to ambitious and
stirring spirits; it banisheth luxury, maketh your people warlike, and
maintaineth you in such reputation amongst your neighbours, that you are
the arbitrators of their differences." And it is from this point of view that he
expresses his only opinion on the great question that was coming. "A
sovereign prince," he lays down, "is more capable to make great and ready
conquests than a commonwealth, and especially if he goeth in person into
the field."
When the manuscript was complete he gave it to Lord Lisle to take care of,
and thus we may be sure that it was from Monk's pen that Cromwell, to
whom Lisle would not have omitted to show his treasure, learnt something
at least of his knowledge of war.
But literature was not his only consolation. There was another more to his
taste and less to his credit. For there used to come to the Tower one Ann
Ratsford, the wife of a perfumer who lived at the sign of the Three Spanish
Gypsies in the Exchange. By trade she was a milliner, and in that capacity
used to look after Monk's linen. She was neither pretty nor well bred; she
had a sharp tongue and manners that were not refined. But the colonel was
soft-hearted, and she was very kind; the colonel was so handsome and had
such a soldierly air, and then all his friends had forgotten him and the
perfumer was detestable. So the gloomy walls of the Tower were
brightened with an unholy idyl, and thus began the intrigue which was to
make a duchess of plain Nan Clarges, the farrier's daughter of the Savoy.
 CHAPTER IV
THE PARLIAMENT'S COMMISSION
While Monk lay thus honour-bound in the Tower the New Model had
done its work. The war was practically over, and Parliament turned its
attention to clearing the prisons. On April th, , a return was ordered of all
soldiers of fortune then prisoners to the Parliament who were desirous of
going abroad, with the intention that on taking the negative oath they
should be permitted to do so. Under this order Monk must have applied,
and on July st he got leave to go beyond the seas.
Besides the oath there was a further condition that he was to leave the
country within a month of his release, but his friends seem to have had
influence enough to get the time extended. With the close of the war
Parliament was able to devote its energies to Ireland, and each party was
scheming to appoint the Lord Lieutenant, in order to secure for itself the
prestige of avenging the Protestant blood that had been shed. During
Monk's imprisonment the situation there had changed considerably.
Ormonde still held Dublin and the greater part of Leinster for the King, but
Lord Inchiquin in a fit of pique had gone over to the Parliament, and from
Cork was administering Munster as president in its name. The Scotch in
the Ulster garrisons and plantations were also on the side of the
Parliament. The rest of the island was in the hands of the Papal Nuncio,
and recognised no authority either of King or Parliament. He had
succeeded in uniting the Anglo-Irish under Preston and the native Irish
under Owen O'Neill into one ultra-Catholic party, with vague aims at an
independent state under the protectorate of Spain or the Pope.
Parliament saw something must be done to keep Inchiquin from returning
to his allegiance and joining Ormonde; and being still unable to agree upon
a definite appointment, they determined to send out Lord Lisle for a year.
He immediately offered the command of his regiment to Monk. There was
now no reason why he should not accept it. The war for which he had
engaged was at an end, and the new service that was offered to him was
one which he had been bred to think as noble as a crusade. It was against
an enemy in open rebellion against England and in secret league with
Spain.
But though perfectly willing to accept the negative oath, to which as a
merely military precaution he had no objection, he utterly refused to take
the Covenant. Till he did he was not qualified for a parliamentary
commission.
By the end of September, however, Ormonde found it was impossible to
hold out much longer, and rather than let Dublin fall into the hands of the
Catholics, he offered to surrender it to the Parliament. At the same time he
urged them to send out Monk and the Irish officers to take command of the
army of occupation. The difficulties about the recusant colonel's
appointment began to vanish like magic. The Presbyterians, who, it must
be remembered, were in theory Royalist, and practically becoming so every
day in a greater degree, naturally were only too glad to accept a
nomination of Ormonde's. Monk was sent for by the Irish committee of the
Council of State sitting at Derby House. There he pledged his honour that
he would faithfully serve the Parliament in the Irish war, and announced
himself ready to start at a day's notice. What was said about the Covenant
is a mystery, but the committee reported to the House that he was ready to
take it. That he did not take it is certain, for this was the chief ground on
which the Ulster-Scotch quarrelled with him three years afterwards. It is
difficult even to believe that honest George said he was ready to do so. The
ambiguous expression looks strangely like an ingenious piece of jockeying
on the part of Lisle, who was a member of the Derby House committee, to
make it easy for the Presbyterians to consent to Monk's appointment. At all
events it had the desired effect, and with only one dissentient voice it was
voted that Colonel Monk should be employed as the committee directed.
Lord Lisle was less successful in his own case. Not till Christmas did he get
his route, and still there were obstacles which prevented him sailing till the
middle of February. Even then he did not go to Dublin. Ormonde and the
parliamentary commissioners had not been able to agree on the details of
the surrender, and Lisle had to land in Cork. It was the st of the month
before he reached his command, and his commission would expire on
April th. Barely two months remained of his term of office, and that time
was spent in incessant wrangling between Lord Inchiquin and the newly
arrived officers. It is needless to say that the expedition was an entire
failure, and on the first of May Monk and his friends found themselves
once more back in London.
It shows plainly how Monk had kept himself clear of any political taint that
he did not share in his chief's fall. The force which had been sent to occupy
Dublin on the first overtures of Ormonde had been ordered on to Ulster
pending the completion of the negotiations. On the eventual signing of the
treaty of rendition, as a strong force was on its way from England, only a
small part of the original army of occupation had been ordered to Dublin,
and an officer was required to command the regiments which remained in
Ulster. Everything pointed to Monk as the man. His appointment was
strongly urged by his friends in the House, and probably by Cromwell
himself, and in July he was gratified with a commission as Major-General
over all the forces both Scotch and English, in the counties of Down and
Antrim and all those parts of Ulster which were not in the command of Sir
Charles Coote.
Michael Jones was supreme in Dublin, and with a man like Monk to second
him he soon set the tide running back. Early in August he inflicted a
crushing defeat on Preston, and O'Neill alone remained to be dealt with.
But that was different. He was a wary old Low Country officer who had
been long in the Spanish service. He knew his power lay in guerilla
warfare, and nothing would entrap him into an engagement. He was a foe
worthy of the new commanders' steel, but they knew the game as well as
he. All through August and the two following months Monk and Jones
were raiding up and down, sometimes in concert, sometimes apart,
burning, ravaging, plundering, and collecting provisions.
Such work was all that Monk could do with the forces at his command, and
he did it well. To hold his ground till the great expedition, which was in
contemplation for the conquest of Ireland, could start was all he could
hope; and till one party or the other got the upper hand in the English
Parliament that would never be. So while politicians at home were
scheming as to who should set the King on his throne again and the sterner
voices were beginning to mutter darkly that it was not there he must find
his rest, honest George in his matter-of-fact business-like way was quietly
busy with the duty of his place. For him the growing dissensions amongst
his paymasters were nothing, except in so far as they found them too
absorbing to make time to send him money and supplies.
Till the questions of the King and the command of the army were settled
things were at a deadlock, and Monk was thrown on his own resources. It
was now that he began to show how great these resources were, and how
to the reckless courage and strategic sagacity of the soldier he added all the
qualities that go to make the successful proconsul. In his province he was
an autocrat. He had a commission to execute martial law, an extraordinary
mark of confidence in those days, and governed despotically in a state of
siege. Yet no administration had ever been more generally popular. So just
or judicious were his decisions on every point that came before him that
long after he was gone they were quoted as unassailable precedents. The
Protestants began to feel the colony had got a new start in life.
Nor in the duties of judge and governor did he relax the unsleeping
vigilance of the general. Time after time O'Neill attempted a raid, but it
was only to fall into the midst of a force that scattered his troops like chaff;
and when he succeeded in regaining the desolate fastnesses from which he
had issued, it was but to hear how Monk's soldiers had swept down in his
absence on some distant spot and carried off a precious booty of cattle and
provender. For honest practical George was far too much of a soldier not to
know the value of spies, and he used them unscrupulously. O'Neill could
not move hand or foot before an iron grip was on him. Splendid soldier as
he was he had met his match, and never could he get within striking
distance of his enemy's magazines.
Nor was this all. For while the Irish were kept at a distance in a state of
starvation the English soldiers were digging pay and provision out of the
desolation, where once the wretched partisans of O'Neill had had their
homes. And so by a happy combination of the patient industry of the
ploughman and the daring activity of the mosstrooper Monk made the war
support itself, a thing as strange as it was palatable to the authorities at
home; and while he thus delighted his masters he no less attached his
troops to him by his judicious distribution of loot, as well as by keeping an
open house to which every officer had at all times a hearty welcome. His
maxim was to "mingle love with the severity of his discipline," believing
that "they that cannot be induced to serve for love will never be forced to
serve for fear."
But troubles were at hand. The province was no bed of roses, or if it were,
the thorns grew faster than the flowers as the breath of party strife began to
reach it in fitful gusts. Ever since Ormonde had left Dublin he had been
busily engaged with the King's friends, who were taking advantage of the
growing royalism of the Presbyterians to form a new combination against
the Parliament. In Scotland and Munster lay their chief hopes of backing a
rising in England, and so well did Ormonde play his part that in April, , the
Independent officers under Inchiquin found it necessary to make a
desperate attempt to save the province by seizing Cork and Youghal. The
plot failed, Inchiquin at once showed his hand for the King, and Munster
was lost to the Parliament. This was followed at the end of the month by a
declaration from Scotland in favour of Charles, and the mobilisation of the
forces of the Northern Kingdom.
The second Civil War had begun, and Inchiquin sought to improve his
position by concluding a cessation and alliance with Clanrickarde and his
Irish party, and by secretly negotiating with the Scots in Ulster. Already
Monk had had sufficient trouble with them. At the outbreak of the
Rebellion in Munroe had sailed from Scotland to the assistance of the old
Scotch settlers. Since then he and his New Scotch, as they were called, had
succeeded by their overbearing conduct in making themselves extremely
unpopular with the Old Scotch, and Monk had plenty to do to hold the
balance between them. Now there was a new complication. The Old Scotch
party was as yet decidedly anti-Royalist. They had never forgiven Charles
for his attempted alliance with O'Neill and the execrated authors of the
Ulster massacres. It was then with Munroe and the New Scotch that
Inchiquin sought to deal, and not in vain. Munroe adhered to the coalition,
but his adhesion was kept a profound secret till the time came for action.
The idea seems to have been that so soon as Ormonde arrived from France
to take command in Ireland Monk should be seized. No attempt appears to
have been made to tamper with him. Though Ormonde tempted Coote and
Jones, he knew Monk too well to be ignorant that his sting could only be
drawn by violence.
The danger was extreme, and the fate of the cause hung in a balance.
Besides the three English officers, O'Neill and his Nationalists were all in
Ireland that were not in arms for the King. Across St. George's Channel the
Scots were already over the border with a force so formidable that none
could foresee the issue when they and Cromwell met. Munroe held
Carrickfergus and Belfast. Ormonde was on his way from France, and if
ever Charles had a chance it was now. The fate of Ireland hung for the
moment on Monk. With Ulster in Ormonde's hands O'Neill's last chance
was gone, and Coote and Jones single-handed could never hold out.
But from Monk's vigilance the danger could not be concealed, and for him
to know was to act. He saw his duty, he saw his chance, and sharp and
sudden he struck his blow. One day in the middle of September Munroe
was in his quarters ready for the moment of action, when suddenly there
was a confused alarm, and before the Scotchman well knew what it meant
he found himself a prisoner in the hands of Monk, and the towns of Belfast
and Carrickfergus in possession of the English and the Old Scotch.
The bells were ringing for Cromwell's overwhelming victory at Preston
when the news came that Ulster was safe as yet and Ireland reprieved. In
an outburst of gratitude the Houses ordered a public thanksgiving, voted
the hero of the hour a letter of thanks, appointed him Governor of Belfast,
gave him the disposal of Carrickfergus and a gratuity of £, and resolved to
try and pay all his men's arrears. From that moment his fortune was made.
The Independents were now supreme. For them his blow had been struck,
and people began to forget he had ever drawn sword for the King.
Still in spite of his success his position in Ireland was anything but
enviable. The Parliament was triumphant in England, but the account was
still open between the Independents and the Presbyterians, and until it was
closed little could be done for the relief of Ireland. Even when Cromwell
had settled it with a squad of musketeers, and the execution of Charles had
removed the great obstacle to a permanent settlement, much remained to
be done before the great Irish Expedition could start. For the moment
history turned on the race for Ireland, and a close race it was. The execution
of Charles was followed by the Scots of Ulster declaring unanimously
against the Republic. Coote was shut up in Derry, and Monk with the
greatest difficulty escaped a surprise, and took refuge inDundalk. The
situation was growing desperate indeed. The Royalists held the whole
country with the exception of the ground which was covered by the guns
of the garrisons, or occupied by O'Neill's Nationalists. The English
Expedition was far from ready, and Ormonde was leaving no stone
unturned to make the whole island his own before it could sail. Again he
was tempting Jones and Coote, though again he did not waste time on
Monk. He was offering baits to O'Neill. He was urging the new King to
come over and complete the work with his presence. So well was he
working that in February the Papal Nuncio fled, leaving him in possession
of the field. O'Neill's supporters began to desert. Every day the country
which the Ulster chief could call his own grew less and less. The fall of
Dublin and the other English garrisons began to stare the English Council
in the face. Something must be done to stave off the end yet a little while,
and the strangest and most obscure of all that time is the story of the means
the Council employed for the work.
 CHAPTER V
THE TREATY WITH THE IRISH NATIONALISTS
About the middle of February, , Dr. Winstad, a worthy English Catholic
physician residing at Rouen, went to welcome his friend, Sir Kenelm
Digby, who had just ridden into the town on his way from Paris with
several young gentlemen in his company. He was surprised to find
amongst the party a "wry-necked fellow" with manners to match, and was
pained to see his respected friend making a great fuss of the stranger
although he did not scruple to "openly dispute against the blessed Trinity."
He was certainly not fit company for Catholic gentlemen. But worse was
yet to come. The doctor was soon informed that the wry-necked scoffer
was none other than Scoutmaster-general Watson, the Head of the
Intelligence Department of the New Model Army, and the whole party
were possessed of passes to go into England, which he had procured for
them from headquarters.
Thoroughly alarmed, the doctor wrote off to Secretary Nicholas to warn
him that a desperate plot was on foot. Lord Byron happened to be there,
too, on his way to Paris to urge the King's departure for Ireland, and just as
he was getting into the saddle the news came to his ears. Sir Kenelm and
his young gentlemen had kept their secret ill, and so soon as Byron reached
Caen he was able to send off post-haste to Ormonde a warning that the
ultra-Catholics were conspiring with the Independents to abolish
hereditary monarchy in return for toleration of their own religion. He
begged him to keep his eyes open in Ireland, where the plot might have
very serious consequences. Secretary Nicholas caught the alarm and
warned Ormonde of a possible alliance between O'Neill and the English
officers.
At a moment when the great Presbyterian body was in the last stage of
exasperation at the expulsion of its members from the House by Cromwell
it seemed almost incredible that the Independents should dare to try and
strengthen their position by the very scheme which ruined Charles. Yet it
was all true. In spite of the storm which Glamorgan's attempt had raised
less than three years ago, the Council of State was secretly holding out its
hand to the blood-stained savages who were the very authors of the
massacres about to be avenged. Such at least was the sentiment which the
name of O'Neill and the Ulster Nationalists called up in England, and yet
the risk must be run.
Ever since the preceding August, Jones had been in communication with
O'Neill. An emissary of Monk's had been caught in secret negotiation with
an officer from the Irish army. In October the Nuncio had announced to his
superiors that there was a danger of the Nationalists joining with the
Independents and "steeping the kingdom in blood." How far the
proceedings were authorised from headquarters it is impossible to say. All
we know is that for some time past there had been strange rumours about
in London and mysterious goings and comings of Catholic gentlemen
whose passports were always in order. But now Ormonde had got definite
information to go upon, and he acted with his usual address. His attempts
to gain Jones and Coote were redoubled, and offers were made which seem
to have shaken O'Neill himself. Monk was not spared. The Ulster
Presbyterians, who had revolted from him, were set on to appeal to him
with the only reasons to which his ears were open, and he found himself
face to face with the moral dilemma that was to haunt him year after year
till the Restoration brought him rest. To whom was the duty of his place?
The Presbyterians argued that they could not recognise any authority but
that of a covenanted Parliament, and urged Monk to join them in
supporting their position. Monk replied that he considered himself bound
by his commission to stand by the de facto authority in England, which
was the Purged Parliament and the Council of State, and demanded why
they refused to do the same. They replied that the de facto government was
not a lawful authority. It existed merely by virtue of its coercion of the
lawful authority which was Parliament as it existed before Pride's Purge;
and as an ultimatum they required him to take the Covenant and obey no
orders but those of the Council of War at Belfast. Monk flatly refused. It
was a difficult question. But his notions of duty pointed clearly to the
thorny path of resistance, and he determined to defend Dundalk to the last.
Meanwhile the Independent plot had been maturing. Towards the end of
March an agent from O'Neill had appeared in London and managed,
probably through Jones's recommendation, to communicate with the
Council of State. The Council refused to receive him, but appointed a secret
committee to hear what he had to say. The effect of their report was that
the game was too dangerous, and the agent was ordered to leave London.
Still if the game were too dangerous for the Council, Cromwell knew it was
too good not to carry on a while longer, and there is little doubt that Jones
received from him some secret instructions to that effect, which were
communicated to Monk. It was absolutely necessary for the success of the
coming expedition to Ireland that the Scotch and northern Royalists should
be kept from joining hands with Ormonde, Clanrickarde, and Inchiquin,
and so completing the investment of Dublin. The maimed and shattered
forces of Monk and O'Neill were all that held them apart.
O'Neill for some time had been in receipt of ammunition and supplies from
the English officers, and Cromwell either now or not long afterwards was
giving him regular pay; but this would no longer do. At the end of April
O'Neill wrote a Latin letter to Monk urging him to press the Council once
more to conclude a treaty on the terms his agent had unsuccessfully
offered. But for this there was no time. A strong force was advancing upon
O'Neill under Lord Castlehaven. It was a crisis in view of which Monk may
or may not have had his instructions. At any rate he replied to O'Neill's
letter asking what his terms were, and then after a short negotiation
concluded with him on May th an armistice for three months, in order to
give time for communication with England. The convention included a
general defensive and offensive alliance between them against Ormonde
for the time, provided always that no agreement was to be made by either
with any one in arms against the Parliament.
The effect was immediate. The Scots lost heart and ceased to press Monk,
and he had leisure to forward O'Neill's new terms to England. How far he
knew Cromwell was behind "the special friends and well-wishers to this
service" who were advising him is uncertain. At any rate he was aware the
Council must not know all, and that Cromwell was the man to address. So
he sat down and wrote a long letter thanking the general for his many
favours, and telling him the whole story of how his own desperate position
and the necessity of keeping O'Neill from accepting Ormonde's terms had
decided him to take the step he had. "I do not think fit," he continues, "to
signify this to the Council of State, but do wholly refer the business to you
either to make further use of it, or else to move it, or as you conceive most
fit to be done. Since there was great necessity for me to do it, I hope it will
beget no ill construction." And so he concludes beseeching Cromwell "to
continue his good opinion" towards him.
It was well for Monk he took the cautious line he did. Up to the end of the
first week in May the Council had been sending him flattering letters of
encouragement and promises of ships, provisions, and everything he asked
for. A large sum of money was actually on shipboard consigned to him.
When suddenly the day before the armistice was concluded a messenger
was galloping down to the coast to stop it. Special precautions were taken
to prevent the reason of this sudden order being known, and we can only
guess that something of Monk's purpose or secret instructions had leaked
out. But some one there was to smooth things over, and before the week
was out the money was on its way again with a letter addressed by the
Council to Monk thanking him for his services and integrity.
Whatever it was that Cromwell thought most fit to be done, it was not to
reprimand Monk. His vast preparations for the conquest of Ireland were
approaching completion, and by the armistice he gained the delay he
required. All that was wanted was to keep the treaty secret till he was well
on his way, and then he could do without it. Meanwhile Monk was
allowed to believe that his conduct was approved by the authorities at
home, and told to keep the whole matter a profound secret.
It was not long before he had to test the value of his treaty. Early in June
Ormonde had concentrated all his forces and advanced to Dublin. Taking
up a position there he detached Inchiquin to take Drogheda and Trim, and
so open up communication with his allies in the north. At the end of the
month Drogheda fell and Inchiquin advanced to besiege Dundalk. Monk at
once sent to O'Neill to come to his assistance. O'Neill replied that he could
do nothing for want of ammunition. Monk was ready to supply the want,
and told his ally to send up a strong convoy to receive it. All went well till
the party was returning laden with supplies. So hospitably had they been
treated in Dundalk that most of them were drunk. Indeed no precautions
seem to have been taken to prevent a surprise, possibly because O'Neill
was still coquetting with Ormonde, and had some understanding that he
should be allowed to get ammunition from Monk. At any rate before his
men reached their camp a detachment of Inchiquin's army fell upon them
and cut them to pieces. Hardly a man escaped, the whole of the train was
captured, and so great was the panic in O'Neill's quarters when the news of
the disaster came, that the whole army fled in disorder to Longford and left
Dundalk to its fate.
It was a trying moment for Monk, and one in which the blunt narrow-
minded soldier of fortune stands out in his fearlessness and staunch self-
reliance a figure almost heroic. The end for which he had been striving so
long was nearly gained. Any time within the next few weeks Cromwell
might set foot in Ireland. The army was gathered at Milford. The Lord
Lieutenant had left London. The race for the key of England was now neck
and neck. One more struggle and success might still be won. So like a true
man Monk resolved at all hazards to cling to his charge till he could cling
no more.
His troops were his only fear. Arrears and the O'Neill treaty had been a
sore trial to their devotion, but still they were the only tools he had. Calling
them about him he told them what he meant to do, and begged that, if any
there feared to stand by him, he would be gone. A single man stepped from
the ranks and said he could not fight by the side of Popish rebels red with
Protestant blood. He was dismissed with a safe-conduct, and the rest
pledged themselves to stand by their beloved commander till the last.
It is sad to tell how night cooled their courage. Next day when Inchiquin
appeared before the walls the sight was more than their conscientious
scruples and empty pockets could endure. Wholesale they deserted to the
enemy, till Monk at last was left with but seventeen faithful out of all his
force. Still he would have held out, though resistance then meant certain
death. Fortunately the seventeen faithful were not so obstinate, and he was
but one against them. By main force they compelled him to surrender.
Inchiquin gave him handsome terms. They were simply that he should be
allowed to dispose of himself and his property as he pleased, and in
pursuance of them he presently sailed for England.
But his troubles instead of being ended were only begun. No sooner was he
landed at Chester than he found public opinion in a high state of agitation
over his armistice. He was interviewed by excited politicians: he was
eagerly asked what induced him to make so monstrous an alliance; but
little could be made of him. The cautious, taciturn soldier must have been a
difficult man to interview, and to every inquisitive attack he replied that he
had the warrant of his superiors for what he had done. He had obeyed his
orders, he had done his duty, and he had no fear of the consequences; nor
did it concern him whether the treaty was justifiable or not.
Once ashore he lost no time in hurrying on to Milford Haven to report
himself to Cromwell, who as Lord Lieutenant was his immediate superior.
There he found matters worse even than at Chester. The soldiers had got
wind of the unlucky armistice and were deserting in large numbers. They
had enlisted to avenge innocent Protestant blood, and found themselves
asked to join hands with the monsters who had shed it. The stories of the
massacres were still believed, and feeling ran very high. One of Milton's
first commissions from the Government had been aimed at involving their
opponents in the execration with which Ormonde's peace with the Irish
Papists was regarded, and men's ears were still ringing with his
tremendous invective against the Ulster Scots for joining hands with a man
who had so stained himself with the touch of Antichrist. It was a time
when Cromwell must have repented his patriotic resolve to command the
Irish army. He well knew the danger he ran in leaving London. He was
sure his Presbyterian and Cavalier enemies would leave no stone unturned
to damage him and his party. And here at the very outset the weapon
which Milton had been wielding with such deadly effect was placed within
their reach. The connection between the Independents and the Papists once
exposed, there would be a resistless outcry such as had greeted the
Glamorgan disclosures, and the cause of individual liberty, of toleration, of
independency would be lost for ever. Whatever the cost the truth must not
transpire.
Such must have been Cromwell's thoughts as Monk was announced. What
would we not give to see that meeting now, to see those two men, so alike
and yet so widely different, face to face at a moment so dramatic!
Cromwell with the fierce earnestness that carried all before it telling his
friend that no more must be said about the warrant of his superiors, that on
his own shoulders he must for the sake of the good cause take the blame;
telling him how he had laid his confidential letter and O'Neill's terms
before the Council, and how they had voted entire disapproval of the
whole scheme, and had not even dared to put it before Parliament. And
then the honest soldier, hurt to be so deserted, but yet borne down by the
resistless personality of his commander, consenting at last for high reasons
of state to lie. He who, as Clarendon said, was never suspected of
dissimulation in all his life passed his word to lie, and Cromwell knew—
none better than he—a man that was to be trusted.
So much is all we can gather of that meeting on which so much depended.
No sooner was it over than the scapegoat was hurried off to London. No
time was to be lost. The rising storm must be allayed before it got beyond
control, and Cromwell could not sail till he knew the end. There was a
magic sword lying almost in his enemies' grasp, and till it was removed he
could not leave—no, not for all Ireland.
Armed with letters to Cromwell's friends Monk arrived in London early in
August. "They should commit him to the Tower," said one when he knew
he had come. "Better commit the Tower to him," was the reply, for
Cromwell's letters made friends plentiful. It would even appear that
Oliver's partisans in the Council had a hint to make things as smooth for
Monk as was consistent with their own safety, and very cleverly they went
about it.
It was of course now necessary that they should make a report of the whole
affair to Parliament. The secrecy which had been ordered in reference to
the matter was removed by vote. Monk was sent for and examined as to his
reasons for taking the course he had. He replied without hesitation that it
was an act of military necessity, and what he had done was entirely on his
own responsibility in expectation of the Council's confirmation. Nothing
could be more satisfactory. He was ordered to draw up a report explaining
the position and to attend the House with it on the following Wednesday.
He was further informed that the Council disapproved of the whole matter
from beginning to end; all which things were next day embodied in formal
resolutions for report to the House, and it is worth remarking that this was
the only occasion during the whole month on which Lord Lisle attended
the Council.
On the th Monk went down to the House with his report. Jones's despatch
announcing his great victory over Ormonde and the safety of Dublin had
just arrived. After it had been read Monk was called to the bar and
presented his report. But the House was not so easily satisfied as the
Council. The Opposition were still strong, and they felt they were being
hoodwinked. Monk's letter to Cromwell had been laid on the table with the
rest of the papers, and in it was the fatal admission that he had been
advised by some well-wishers to the cause. The House demanded to know
who those persons were.
It must have been an anxious moment for many there as the Speaker's
voice ceased and silence fell upon the eager throng while they listened for
Monk's reply. Who could tell he would stand staunch at that trying
moment?
"I did it," said Monk with his stolid air, "on my own score without the
advice of any other persons. Only formerly I had some discourse of
Colonel Jones, and he told me if I could keep off Owen Rowe and Ormonde
from joining it would be a good service."
"Had you any advice or direction," continued the Speaker, "from
Parliament, or the Council, or the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, or any person
here to do it?"
"Neither from Parliament," answered Monk categorically, "nor the Council,
nor the Lord Lieutenant, nor any person here had I any advice or direction.
I did it on my own score for the preservation of the English interest there,
and it has had some fruits accordingly."
There was no denying that. Lying on the table before them was Jones's
despatch, in which he attributed his great victory to the fact that Ormonde
had been compelled to detach Inchiquin to oppose O'Neill. Monk was
ordered to withdraw, and a long debate ensued. The Opposition felt their
weapon was being filched from their hands, and they argued long for a
vote of censure, while Monk waited anxiously without. At last the question
was put, "That this House do approve the proceeding of Colonel Monk?"
The House divided, and the motion was lost. Then it was put that "the
House do utterly disapprove, and that the innocent blood which hath been
shed is so fresh in the memory of this House that the House doth detest
and abhor the thoughts of any closing with any party of Popish rebels there
who have had their hands in shedding that blood." But an amendment was
moved by adding words to the motion that Monk's conduct was excusable
on the ground of necessity. In this form it was carried, and Monk was safe.
Cromwell had won. He was still lying in Milford Haven. The money for
which he had stayed had been sent off a fortnight ago: the corn-ships had
gone some days before; yet still he tarried. On August th the news of the
momentous vote reached him, and next day he sailed. If it was not this that
loosed his moorings the good tidings came at least with strange
opportuneness, and permitted him to leave England with his greatest
anxiety allayed.
The victory was indeed complete. At the end of the week the official press
came out full of flattering expressions about Monk. A full account was
published by authority for the information or delusion of the public. In
vain the opposition "Man in the Moon" railed, and said the whole thing
was a "blindation." The public were satisfied with the result, and the
incident was at an end.
And now for the last time in his life Monk knew what it was to be out of
employment. His brother, Colonel Thomas Monk, the zealous Cavalier,
had recently been killed by a fall from his horse, and George seems to have
used his leisure to go down to Potheridge and take possession of the family
estates, which fell to him as heir-in-tail. It was probably at this time that he
became fully impressed with the abilities of his kinsman Mr. Morice, who
was afterwards to influence his career so profoundly. This remarkable
man, scholar, historian, recluse, and man of business, had been managing
the Grenville property with great skill ever since Monk's uncle, Sir Bevil,
had been killed at the battle of Lansdowne, and the colonel found he could
not do better than commit his own property to the same stewardship.
But that it was not only in this manner that he enjoyed his repose and
consoled himself for the way the Government had treated him is only too
clear. For it was in this year that the frail Mrs. Ratsford was separated from
her husband.
 CHAPTER VI
CROMWELL'S NEW LIEUTENANT
Monk had hardly time to weary of his inactivity before a new storm burst
in the north. Scotland had taken to herself a covenanted King, and an
invasion was resolved upon by the English Parliament. Cromwell was
recalled from Ireland, and in June, , to the confusion of the Presbyterian
opposition, he was voted to the command of the army. He at once sent for
Monk to assist him in the organisation of his forces, and promised him a
regiment.
The significance of this it is hard to exaggerate. When we remember how
fastidious Cromwell was about the private character of the men he worked
with, it cannot but impress us with the extraordinary sense he must have
had of his obligations to Monk. The highest military abilities would never
have induced him to employ a man who was living in open contempt of
the seventh commandment. It was an offence of such gravity at that time
that it had been recently made capital. Yet Cromwell was determined his
trusty friend should have his reward, and that in spite of the difficulty of
finding him a regiment. The command of Bright's, which lay at Alnwick,
was vacant, but a dangerous spirit of democracy and autonomy was
growing in the army. Bright's had been one of the victorious regiments at
Nantwich. They had to be asked if they would accept Monk for colonel,
and they refused. "We took him prisoner," they cried, "at Nantwich not
long since, and he will betray us," and ominously enough Lambert, with
whom the last great struggle was to be, was chosen in his stead. From that
moment the two most celebrated of Cromwell's lieutenants were doomed
to an incessant rivalry.
But Cromwell was not to be thwarted. As there was no regiment for his
friend, he made one. At Newcastle lay Sir Arthur Haslerig's renowned
Blue-Coats, and at Berwick was Colonel Fenwick with his newly raised
Northumberland regiment. The field-force which had been voted for
Cromwell was complete, but in his masterful way he drew five companies
from each of these regiments and made up a new one for Monk. Then he
laconically informed the House what he had done, and coolly requested
that the new regiment should be taken on the establishment and the two
weakened garrisons recruited. Like lambs the Government consented, and
so in lawless birth, a reward for service that none dared name, began the
famous Coldstream Guards.
The staff-appointment which Monk held was that of acting lieutenant-
general of the Ordnance. Cromwell would doubtless have preferred to see
him sergeant-major-general—an appointment which in those days of
amateur soldiering it was usually thought necessary to fill with a soldier of
fortune—that as chief of the staff he might supply the technical
shortcomings of the commander-in-chief. It was, however, already
occupied by Lambert, whose training as a lawyer can hardly have qualified
him for the proper discharge of its complex duties. Indeed more than once,
in cases of extreme difficulty, we shall see that Monk had to take over his
work, and thus intensify the antipathy which marked their relations from
the first.
It is impossible here to repeat the oft-told tale of the Dunbar campaign;
which is the more to be regretted as Monk's share in it has never been done
justice to. Cromwell had excellent reasons for not saying too much about
him in despatches; and Hodgson, the other best known authority, being in
Lambert's regiment, studiously keeps in the background the rival of his
idolised colonel. Yet it is certain that no voice had so much weight with
Cromwell as Monk's, and he was consulted at every point. Up to Dunbar,
too, the lion's share of the active operations fell upon him. The artillery
duels by which it was sought to goad Leslie into an engagement were
under his direction, and it was he who took the castles of Colinton and
Redhall during Cromwell's attempt to turn the Scotch position before
Edinburgh.
During the terrible retreat on Dunbar it is hardly too much to say his
consummate technical skill saved the army from destruction. More dead
than alive the remnants of Cromwell's splendid force had reached
Haddington. Sick, shattered, and harassed to death with incessant
marching through the rain and mire, they seemed now an easy prey. About
midnight an attack on the rear-guard had been repulsed, but the position
was none the less desperate. Leslie was at their heels bent on destroying
them before they could reach their ships. He was out-marching them to the
right on a line parallel to their own, and it was certain that with the first
glimpse of daylight he would be upon them. Yet it seemed impossible to
do anything. A Scotch mist was driving across them and the darkness was
absolutely impenetrable. As they stood in the ranks the soldiers could
hardly see their right and left hand files. Yet Monk undertook to draw the
army up in line of battle fronting to its true right. It was Lambert's duty as
major-general; and it must have been a rough blow to his vanity that his
rival was not only allowed to undertake a task for which his own
experience was inadequate, but that he succeeded in what seemed an
impossibility. For succeed he did. By feeling or instinct he set about the
work, of which we can now have little conception. Complicated
mathematical calculations were involved; foot had to be mingled with
horse, and pikemen with musketeers. But all this was child's play to Monk.
The dismal morning broke, and there Leslie saw facing him a line of battle,
perfect in every distance and resting on Gladsmuir and Haddington, with a
swollen tributary of the Tyne to protect its front. Without hesitation the
Scotch general declined the action, and hurried on to secure
Cockburnspath and cut off Cromwell from Berwick.
We must pass on to the evening of September nd. In Dunbar the spiritless
supper at the headquarters' mess was over and Cromwell was walking
with Lambert hoping against hope for a chance of escape. But the position
was unchanged. There was still the swollen Brock roaring along its
impassable channel in heavy spate from the right to where it joined the sea
on the extreme left: there was the narrow stretch of meadow beyond; and
then the hills, where dimly in the gathering gloom the Scottish host lay out
and penned them in past hope. Suddenly there was a movement. The
Scotch were beginning to draw down from the hills, the horse on their right
flank were taking ground towards the sea. It was clear Leslie meant to
attack on the morrow where on the English left the Berwick road crossed
the Brock. The manœuvre was difficult. In the narrow piece of level ground
that was available between the hills and the burn it would take long to
execute, and until it was complete the right flank of the Scots which had
hitherto been secure in the difficult ground about Cockburnspath was
exposed. Leslie must be attacked when his movement was half-done. It
was a desperate chance, but the only one against his overwhelming
numbers.
Lambert agreed with Cromwell's suggestion, but the General would not
decide without Monk's opinion. He was probably busy superintending the
embarkation of his heavy guns, but he was quickly found and received the
idea favourably. All depended on the success of the first attack. The ford
must be seized before Leslie was ready to cross, and then the Scotch line as
it lay between the hills and the burn taking ground to the right might be
rolled up like a scroll. There must be no thought of repulse; he offered to
lead the foot in person, and again he was given the post that Lambert as
major-general ought to have filled.
The Council of War was assembled at once, and Monk demonstrated to the
colonels the practicability of Cromwell's idea. The attack was decided on,
and the first glimmer of dawn saw Monk standing beside the burn, half-
pike in hand, at the head of his regiment of foot. All was ready to begin,
but Lambert, who was to lead the attack at the head of the horse, was
away, to Cromwell's annoyance, worrying about Monk's guns with which
he had suggested a feint should be made upon the Scots' left. Valuable time
was lost, but at last he came, and the horse dashed across the ford followed
by Monk in support. A desperate hand-to-hand fight ensued. For an hour
the thing hung in a balance. The flower of the Scotch regiments was there,
and the resistance they offered was worthy of their reputation. But
regiment after regiment poured over from the Dunbar side, ever inclining
to the left till the Scotch right was overlapped. All this time Monk was
fighting desperately at pike's length with a regiment that would not break.
But now as the rout of the out-flanked regiments exposed it to the horse it
had to go with the rest, and then the day was won. Galled by the guns and
small-shot from across the swollen burn, the Scots' left and centre,
incapable of reaching their enemy, would stand no longer. As the beaten
right fell back upon them, rolling up the line as they came, a panic ensued.
Throwing down their arms they fairly ran, nor stopped till they reached
Edinburgh.
The fall of Edinburgh Castle ended the campaign of . Monk had been
appointed governor of the city, and with the duties of his office and the
preparations for the next campaign he was occupied during the winter. By
February, however, in the following year, he was at active work again.
Tantallon Castle was his first care, and by the aid of the splendid siege-
train he had organised he battered the ancient stronghold of the Douglas
into submission in forty-eight hours: Blackness Castle on the Forth
followed in March; and thus by the time spring had fairly begun the way
was cleared for the real object of the campaign, and Monk's services were
rewarded with the substantive rank in which he had been acting.
Leslie during the winter had reorganised his army, and was occupying an
intrenched position at Torwood, to the north of Falkirk, covering Stirling.
Beyond him the government was being carried on in security at Perth. The
Torwood position was far too strong for a direct attack to be risked. Every
endeavour to turn it or to tempt Leslie to leave failed, and yet it was
imperative that he should be dislodged.
Who suggested the daring manœuvre by which the end was at last
achieved we do not know. At this time Monk was higher in his
commander's counsels than ever. Brilliant tactician as he was, Cromwell
had hitherto given little evidence of far-sighted strategy. He was not a
trained soldier, and Lambert was only a talented civilian like himself.
Deane had had no scientific training in the continental school, nor did he
join the army till May. Indeed Monk was the only professional soldier on
the staff at the time the manœuvre was projected. But if Cromwell was no
professional soldier he had the military instinct too highly developed not to
know his own shortcomings, and to appreciate at its full value the
consummate technical knowledge of his new adviser. The few words that
fell blunt and sure from the taciturn soldier of fortune had more weight in
the Council of War than all the rest together. At any rate we may be sure
the movement was the result of Cromwell's and Monk's reconnaissance of
Leslie's position at Stirling in September, and that it was worked out by
Monk on his return to Edinburgh. For in November a requisition went up
to the Council of State for the flotilla of flat-bottomed boats which the
contemplated operation required.
It was known at the English headquarters that there was a party about the
King who were urging an advance into England. The plan had much to
recommend it, and Cromwell determined to spoil it by forcing Leslie's
hand. A footing was to be secured upon the opposite side of the Forth, and
a blow threatened upon Perth. If Leslie attempted to quit his intrenchments
to parry it he was to be attacked in his true front, and compelled to
reoccupy his position. The English army was then to be thrown suddenly
across the Forth, and a dash on Perth developed before he could move
again. Thus the Torwood position would be turned, Stirling taken in
reverse, and no way would remain of loosing Cromwell's new hold except
to attack him on his own ground, or by advancing into England to compel
him to follow. In either case the victory was almost a certainty for the
Commonwealth.
As early as the middle of April part of the flotilla had arrived, and Monk
had made an attack on Burntisland. He was repulsed. Cromwell's illness
delayed further operations for some time. At the end of June he recovered.
Major-General Harrison was sent with all the force that could be spared
into Cumberland to check the expected inroad of the Scots, and Cromwell
advanced to threaten the position at Torwood. Early in July he moved
westward to Glasgow with the double object of securing the affections of
the people in that quarter and of drawing Leslie's attention away from the
Forth, while the preparations for the descent on the north bank of the river
were completed. On July th a small party landed at North Ferry, rapidly
intrenched themselves, and Lambert followed with a strong division.
Cromwell had moved back to his old position before Torwood, and as
though a direct attack were still his real object, Monk was ordered to storm
an outpost.
All was now ripe, and at the end of July the long contemplated operation
was commenced. In the precision with which it was carried out we may at
least see Monk's unerring hand. The success was complete. By August rd
Perth was in the possession of the Commonwealth. Leslie was in full career
for the south, and Cromwell and his generals repassing the Forth in hot
pursuit.
Yet some one must be left behind. The centre of interest had suddenly
shifted, but work in plenty remained. Some one must be left in the post of
peril to play Cromwell's part while he was gone; some one who knew how
to strike sharp and hard, and could fix a grip of iron on the country before
the army that was gathering in the Highlands could replace the one that
was gone. Monk was the man, and well he justified the choice.
The force at his command consisted of but four regiments of horse and
three of foot, in all less than six thousand men. With this he attacked
Stirling, and on the th the maiden castle surrendered. For this service he
received the thanks of Parliament, and was voted £ a year in Scotch land
for ever.
But the work was only commenced. By the capture of Stirling he had but
secured an advanced base from which to operate against the north. The
Committee of Estates, to which Charles had entrusted the kingdom before
he left, was sitting at Dundee, and organising, in concert with a number of
clan-chieftains, a new army for the King. Dundee then was Monk's real
objective. No sooner was Stirling in his hands than he hurried forward a
small flying column to stop the supplies of the town. Three or four days
were spent in disposing of prisoners and booty at Stirling and in setting
things in order there, for the most precise strategist of to-day could not be
more careful about his base than Monk. Then the general followed with the
bulk of the foot and the siege-train.
Just before reaching Dundee he was joined by a body of cavalry under two
officers, who were destined to play a prominent part in history. The horse
were commanded by Colonel Alured, a daring cavalry leader with red-hot
political opinions of an advanced socialistic type, an Anabaptist of the
Anabaptists. At the head of the dragoons rode a little fiery man, whom
they all adored. It was the famous Colonel Morgan, a soldier of fortune
after Monk's own heart, who knew nothing of politics and everything of
his profession. They had probably served together the greater part of their
lives, and were now at any rate fast friends with unbounded mutual
admiration. There was no one to whom Monk would rather commit a piece
of difficult work than this little dragoon, and he had arrived in the nick of
time.
For Monk, as we have seen, with his advanced ideas of the military art, the
Intelligence Department was his chiefest care. "The eyes of an army," to use
his own expression, he cherished as his own. Spies as usual had been busy,
and now he learned that on his approach the Government had retired to
the Highlands and was sitting at Alyth, fourteen miles away, at the edge of
the hills, where a force was daily expected to assemble for the relief of
Dundee. Monk at once determined on a surprise so daring that it savours
more of romance than the deliberate expedient of a wary strategist. Morgan
was sent for, and he and Alured were told to take their men, disguised as
far as possible and mixed with Scotch deserters, and attend the enemy's
rendezvous.
Late on the night of the th they marched, and unmolested reached Alyth in
the first hours of the morning. To avoid suspicion they boldly marched to
the farther side of the town, and there quietly halted as though they were a
party of the expected troops. No one interfered, and about three o'clock,
after a short rest, when sleep was the deepest, they suddenly broke into the
astonished town. Hardly a blow was struck. Old Leslie, the commander-in-
chief, was taken in his bed, and the rest of the Government shared his fate;
and as Monk went forth to direct his siege-works Alured and Morgan rode
into camp with three hundred noblemen, lairds, and ministers prisoners in
their train. At one stroke Scotland was as it were beheaded. It was a
bloodless victory, as complete almost as the "crowning mercy" at
Worcester, now on the eve of being fought. "Truly," wrote Monk in his
despatch to Cromwell, "it is a very great mercy which the Lord of Hosts
hath been pleased to bestow upon us, observing the time and season. This
is the Lord's work, and therefore He alone ought to have the praise." But he
concludes by asking for Morgan's promotion. That he could so far have
departed from his ordinary style only shows us how great had been the
influence of Cromwell's coercive personality upon him.
Still Dundee did not know the extent of the disaster. The garrison could not
believe that all hope of relief was at an end, and contemptuously refused
Monk's summons. On the third day the batteries opened. All through the
last night of August they thundered, and in the morning there was a
practicable breach. Monk knew well the garrison was hopelessly
demoralised and would be an easy prey, yet he strove to save bloodshed.
Twice again he offered them quarter, and twice again they refused. Then at
last he gave the word for an assault.
The infantry were very weak from sickness, and the storming parties were
strengthened by dismounted troopers and a naval brigade. These elements
were not likely to decrease the heat of the fight, and added to this the town
was known to contain property of immense value. With incredible fury the
breach was carried in one rush. The supports of horse were through almost
as soon as the footmen, and a desperate struggle ensued in the streets. In a
few minutes it was over and the stormers rushed on wildly through the
town hacking down everything in their way. A number of women, and
even some children who were in the streets, were borne down in the rush.
Soon all that resisted were a party who with the governor had taken refuge
in a tower. Preparations were being made to smoke them out, when they
asked and received quarter. Unhappily, as the governor was being taken
before Monk he was pistolled by a fanatic officer, an outrage which the
general seems to have felt as a blot on his own untarnished reputation as a
soldier. Resistance was now at an end, but Monk seems to have thought it
his duty to give over the town to two days' pillage as a chastisement for its
obstinate refusal of quarter.
The remaining garrisons surrendered on terms in rapid succession, and the
Highland strongholds were one after another reduced by his officers. He
himself took no active part in the operations. The iron constitution on
which he drew so recklessly during his long campaigns at length gave way,
and a few days after the surrender he was laid up in Dundee with a fever.
By January he had sufficiently shaken it off to be able to meet the new
Scotch commissioners who had arrived at Dalkeith from London to
negotiate the Union, but in February he was compelled to go south for the
benefit of his health. It is worthy of note that he started on the journey in
the same coach with Lambert, who was also on the commission, but before
Berwick was passed they agreed to separate, ostensibly because Monk was
too ill to travel fast enough for his rival.
It is said that at this time there was an idea of sending into France ten
thousand of those matchless troops of whom all Europe was talking, as
was afterwards done under Morgan. For Monk was reserved the
superlative honour of commanding them. But the time was not yet ripe,
and instead of figuring as leader of the finest soldiers in the world, for so
every one then considered them, Monk went quietly down to Bath to mend
his shattered health.
 CHAPTER VII
GENERAL-AT-SEA
The waters at Bath completely restored Monk's health, and in July the
Council requested Cromwell to order him back to his duty in Scotland, that
he might report on the state of the country. Monk did not go.
A new act in the drama had begun. With Dunbar, Worcester, and Monk's
successes in Scotland, the Presbyterian party was reduced to impotency.
The Independents were triumphant, and the factors of which that party
was composed began to detach themselves with ominous distinctness. On
the one hand was the Parliament, reactionary in spite of its purging; on the
other the army, radical in spite of its leader. For the purpose of
understanding Monk's relation to them it is unnecessary to enter minutely
into the characteristics of both factions. To place ourselves in sympathy
with a political situation it is necessary not so much to understand the aims
of the several parties which create it, as to grasp the motives which each
party attributes to the other. The great body of politicians are moved more
by distrust of their adversaries than by confidence in themselves. Monk at
any rate, with his soldierly contempt for politics, was incapable of taking a
higher view of the situation than this. Parliament credited the army with a
desire to establish an arbitrary military government. The army suspected
Parliament of an intention to perpetuate itself as a tyrannical oligarchy. The
latter idea Monk could endure, the former was for him intolerable. If it
came to a question of army or Parliament, Cromwell knew that his
incorruptible lieutenant would be obstinately true to his principles and side
with the civil power. It is easy to understand that on the eve of his great
stroke he preferred that his devoted partisan, Major-General Deane, who
was acting in Monk's absence, should continue to command the army in
Scotland.
The outbreak of the Dutch war was made an excuse for keeping the general
in England. In view of the coming struggle it was considered advisable to
make Great Yarmouth a formidable naval port. Monk was the highest
authority on fortification in the service, and the Council had to consent to
his being employed to carry out the necessary work. In this congenial
occupation he remained until November. It was then in contemplation to
appoint two admirals to command the fleet jointly with Blake, according to
the usual practice. Deane, having a considerable naval reputation, was
naturally one, and he was summoned from Scotland, where Colonel
Lilburne, an advanced radical of Anabaptist opinions, succeeded him.
Monk was proposed as the other, but again Cromwell opposed the
appointment. He saw the coming crisis almost within measurable distance,
and naturally wished to see the fleet as well as the army in the right hands.
But this time his opposition was in vain. On the last day of the month Blake
was defeated by a greatly superior force under Tromp. The Thames was in
danger, and four days later Monk and Deane were ordered to be ready to
put to sea in twenty-four hours.
Tromp's victory was, however, too dearly bought for him to pursue Blake,
and after his famous cruise in the Channel, as the broom-myth tells, he
bore away to Rhé to fetch home the Dutch merchant-fleet that was to
assemble there for convoy. All the winter the three generals were busy
fitting out a new fleet, and in February they put to sea to intercept Tromp
and his costly charge. On the th they met, and there ensued one of those
extraordinary engagements which distinguished these wars. For three days
it lasted, and at the end both sides claimed the victory. Tromp practically
saved his huge convoy, while Blake and his partners defeated the Dutch
fleet.
Monk's share in the engagements had been comparatively small, as his
flagship was a hopelessly slow sailer. Out of his love for heavy artillery he
had probably over-gunned it—a common error in the English navy then.
At the age of forty-four it is not easy to suddenly take up a new profession,
and he made no pretence to seamanship. His complete ignorance of
nautical matters became a standing joke. When his ship was coming into
action, and the master cried larboard or starboard, Monk used to reply
with a cheery shout of "Ay, ay, boys, let us board them!" and he never
heard the last of it. When at nightfall on the first day he at length got into
action he refused to retire, though his master urgently showed him the
danger he ran from fire-ships. "Why," he cried, "the very powder of this
ship is enough to blow a fire-ship from it. Charge again!" and away he
went through the opposing squadron once more regardless of every
protest. Blake had borne the brunt of the action, and had been so severely
wounded by an iron splinter that he had to withdraw from active service
and leave the command to his two colleagues.
For the next two months Monk was at Portsmouth busily refitting the fleet
and crying out continually for supplies and men that would not come, and
doing his best to alleviate the sufferings caused by the late battle. No
wonder there were vexatious delays when we think what was going on at
Whitehall. On April st the fleet lay at Spithead all ready for sea except for
the delayed stores, when a despatch with strange news was put into the
admiral's hands. The blow had fallen: the Revolution was complete: the
Rump Parliament was no more. A new Council was sitting at Whitehall,
and Cromwell was virtually dictator. What did the fleet mean to do?
In the quiet dignity of the answer we can see little of Deane's partisanship.
Monk's honest indignation glows from between the lines. The whole
proceeding was detestable to him; but staring him in the face was the one
thing that ever raised him from his narrow views of duty, and that was the
danger of his country. In spite of its insularity there was a genuineness
about his patriotism that even won the admiration of his traducers. He
made his choice, and took care that the answer which went back should
show the reason why. It told in simple language, without a word of
approval, how they had very seriously considered the news, and had
finally resolved that as the nation had entrusted them with its defence it
was their duty to defend it. In striking contrast was the enthusiastic answer
that came back from Lilburne's army in the north. Years afterwards, in a
similar crisis, Monk's acquiescence was thrown in his teeth. "I shall answer
you that," he wrote. "It was never in my conscience to go out of God's way
under the pretence of doing God's work; and you know the variety of times
doth much vary the nature of affairs, and what might then patiently be
submitted unto, we being engaged with a foreign enemy in a bloody war,
cannot be drawn into a precedent at this time after our repentance."
Loyally Monk went on to discharge his country's trust. At the end of April,
despairing of their proper equipment, the two generals put to sea and
joined Vice-Admiral Penn off Arundel. Together they sailed to the Scotch
coast with a fleet of about a hundred sail, and till the end of May cruised in
the North Sea from Aberdeen to Yarmouth watching for Tromp and
waiting for Blake's squadron to join. On the th the Dutch, slightly
outnumbering them, were sighted, and three days later, early in the
morning, the two fleets met.
Monk and Deane were together on board the Resolution, and seem to have
attacked line ahead. The wind was light and variable from north-north-
west to north-east, and the port division under Lawson, Jordan, and
Goodson came into action some time before the rest. The three flagships
pierced the line of De Ruyter's division, but as their squadron refused to
follow, and Tromp bore down with his whole division to De Ruyter's
assistance, for a time they had to engage against overwhelming odds.
Monk and Deane, seeing the danger, crowded all sail and plunged into the
thick of the fight. Side by side the two generals stood upon the deck as they
ranged into action. A furious broadside greeted their approach, and Deane
fell at Monk's feet almost cut in two by a round shot. Horror-stricken the
sailors left their duty to gather round. In a moment Monk had snatched off
his cloak and hidden the shocking sight from view. Sharply he told the
seamen to mind their own business, and then without moving a muscle of
his face went on fighting his ship as if nothing had happened. The action,
however, did not continue much longer. Wise as a serpent, though daring
as a lion, the father of naval tactics did not care to fight unless by his skilful
manœuvres he could secure the advantage of numbers, and about three in
the afternoon, when the whole English fleet had got into action, Tromp
drew off.
Monk followed, and at daybreak found himself in view of the whole Dutch
fleet lying off Ostend, but a dead calm prevailed and he could not move. At
sunrise he signalled all the flag-officers on board the Resolution and
announced to them the irreparable loss of yesterday. By Deane's death the
fleet was left in command of a man who hardly knew one end of a ship
from another. But the old soldier at least could tell how to inspire
confidence. He assembled the officers in council of war and asked for their
guidance. "Your advice," he said, "shall be as binding on me as an Act of
Parliament." It was at once resolved to engage, and that no part of the fleet
might be again isolated by a repetition of yesterday's faint-heartedness, it
was agreed that all the three divisions should attack simultaneously and
endeavour to break up the enemy's line by piercing it in three places.
At noon the wished-for breeze sprang up and a tremendous engagement
ensued. The captains who had disgraced themselves, fired by a stirring
general order from Monk, vied with the rest to retrieve their reputation,
and to such good purpose that the Dutch would not stand by their admiral.
In spite of Tromp's signals and angry shots seventy of his ships sailed out
of the fight. Thus deserted he was compelled to follow. All day the two
fleets stood to the southward close-hauled on a south-westerly breeze, and
kept up a hot running fight. About four in the afternoon the wind
freshened to a gale, veering to west-south-west, and Monk was able to
loose his frigates into the midst of the enemy to reap the harvest of cripples
he had put at their mercy. As evening fell Blake's long-expected squadron
appeared in the offing, and the Dutch sought refuge towards their own
coasts, where at ten o'clock darkness and the shoals stopped further
pursuit.
Such was the famous Flanders Battle, the first in which Monk really
commanded. The Dutch lost thirty-four ships and for the time were driven
from the sea. So well had the English come out of it that without putting in
to refit they were able to follow up the victory by a descent upon Cadsand,
where a vast quantity of stores were captured or destroyed.
For the next two months, as closely as the weather would allow, the two
English admirals blockaded the Dutch coast. Behind their shoals the States
were fitting out two fleets. In the Weelings about Flushing was Tromp, at
the back of Texel was De Witt; and as Blake was again taken so ill that in
July he had to go ashore, on Monk devolved the anxious task of keeping
the two consummate Dutch seamen from uniting.
By the end of the month the enemy were ready for sea and Monk was
rigorously blockading De Witt at Texel. Early on the th a heavy south-
westerly gale compelled him to stand out to sea and beat against it all day.
At daylight next morning, having recovered sufficient sea-room to be out
of danger, he stood away to the south under easy sail, to intercept Tromp
whom he expected out. True enough all the previous day the Dutchman
had been stealing up the coast to feel for De Witt. About noon on the th the
two fleets sighted each other. At the same moment the wind shifted to
north-north-west and gave Monk the weather-gauge.
Tromp immediately went about. Having lost the wind all he cared to do
was to try and draw the English off the Texel. Monk crowded all sail in
pursuit, and managed late in the evening to force his enemy into a
desultory engagement off Egmont, to which darkness quickly put an end.
All night in thick and heavy weather the chase continued to the southward,
but Tromp was too clever for the soldier. In the darkness he doubled back
north-north-east, and thus not only recovered the weather-gauge, but in
the afternoon managed to join with De Witt, who had slipped out of the
Texel as soon as Monk's back was turned.
During the whole of the th a tremendous gale was blowing dead on shore.
Both fleets attempted to engage, but each time were prevented by the
heavy weather. In the morning it cleared. Monk found himself close to the
Dutch coast with the enemy to windward. Unwilling to engage where
Tromp would have the advantage of his knowledge of the shoals, with
harbours of refuge within easy reach, he stood out to sea, and the Dutch
gave chase. They had one hundred and forty sail fresh from the yards,
while Monk had but ninety storm-beaten ships, with crews sadly thinned
and weakened by scurvy, nor had he a single fire-ship to oppose to those of
the enemy. But dangers could never daunt the general. As soon as he had
recovered sufficient sea-room began "the most fierce and cruel fight that
ever was fought." It was already the sixth action of the war, and Monk
meant it to be the last. He ordered that no prizes should be taken or quarter
given. "The air," says the old historian, "was quickly filled with scattered
limbs of men blown up: the sea was dyed with blood."
It was "a very orderly battle" (according to one of the English flag-officers),
in which the old soldier strove with extraordinary skill to win back the
weather-gauge from the greatest seaman of the day. The two fleets were
standing out to sea, line ahead on parallel courses and a southerly wind,
when the action began by Monk suddenly tacking on Tromp with the
intention of breaking his line. Tromp tacked also to parry the attack, but
though he was clever enough to keep the wind with nearly the whole of his
fleet, a few of his ships were cut off and put to flight. Then followed three
determined encounters, in which each fleet tacked on the other, passing
each time closer and closer in the desperate struggle for the weather-gauge.
Every time Monk disabled some of the Dutch, and every time he pierced
their line and scattered the part he weathered. Still Tromp kept the
advantage with the bulk of his force; but it was at a fearful sacrifice. In the
last encounter the ships had fought almost at pike's length. Again and
again two of the Dutch admirals had tried to board the Resolution, and
again and again they had recoiled before the storm of metal that roared
from beneath the exultant soldier's feet. Old hands were awestruck at the
fury of the fight. "The very heavens," says one, "were obscured with smoke;
the air rent with the thundering noise; the sea all in a breach with the shot
that fell; the ships even trembling, and we hearing everywhere the
messengers of death flying about."
Since sunrise the fight had raged. It was now past two o'clock in the
afternoon. Yet again the undaunted soldier of fortune charged; but the
Dutch had had their fill. Their splendid fleet had suffered terribly. Tromp's
flag had been shot away, and he himself was gasping out his heroic life
pierced with a musket ball. Of nine flagships only two were to be seen with
the main body. Vice-Admiral Eversen was sinking, and scattered over the
waters were burning hulks and the wrecks of captures blown up. As Monk
tacked the Dutch spread their crippled wings and ran for Holland. Monk
limped after them till evening, burning, sinking, and destroying. Over a
hundred sail they had stood out proudly, as the sun rose, in pursuit of the
English fleet, "but they were very thin when the sun went down."
As Gravesand steeple rose in sight and the Dutch saw their shoals within
reach, Monk gave up the chase. The victory, complete as it was, had not
been lightly won, and all that night and the following day his triumphant
consorts staggered back to Southwold Bay. The carnage had been fearful.
Eight of Monk's captains lay dead, and eight more were wounded, though
he, with his usual luck, had never a scratch. Killed and wounded
amounted to over a thousand. The Dutch had lost at least three times as
many. Hardly a single English ship was missing. About thirty Dutch were
sunk or taken, and barely half the fleet were together at the last.
The war was practically at an end. Though the intrepid Dutch were soon as
busy refitting as Monk himself, every one knew a decisive action had been
fought. A public thanksgiving was ordered, and honours were showered
on Monk and poor Blake and their officers. Next to Cromwell the soldier of
fortune was now the greatest man in the land. Yet, in spite of his greatness,
and in spite of the ardour with which he threw himself into the work of
refitting the fleet, he found time and conscience to do a little act of humble
duty before he put to sea again.
In the midst of the shouts of triumph was a voice that he loved, perhaps, as
well as all his golden chains and medals, whispering that a child was to be
born to him, and born in sin. Ratsford was dead. So quietly in the midst of
his pressing work he snatched an hour to repair as far as could be the
wrong he had done. Like an honest man, he took the perfumer's widow to
St. George's Church in Southwark, and there he made her his wife.
During the remainder of this year and the beginning of the next Monk was
busily engaged in maintaining the blockade of the Dutch coast, and
attending to the routine business of his place at Whitehall and Chatham.
Indeed he had little time for anything else. In June, while he was in search
of Tromp's fleet, he had been called by the Protector to the Little
Parliament, but his legislative duties sat lightly upon him. No doubt he was
reconciled to the new form of government by the express declaration of the
Council, which almost seems to have been put in for his especial benefit,
that the sword ought to have no share in the civil power. Still he appears to
have attended the sittings but seldom. Once only are we sure he was there,
and that was to receive the thanks of Parliament. His visionary colleagues
were for him contemptible. The war and his magnificent new flagship, the
Swiftsure, were much more to his mind, and he can only have rejoiced
when he saw the power of Parliament suddenly surrendered into
Cromwell's hands.
The new rule had his entire approval. A single person, as we have seen,
was his ideal of government, and especially when that single person was
one well able to apply the "principal and able remedy against civil wars."
The crisis had resolved itself into a situation after his own heart. In the
despotic Protector he saw a warlike prince; in the Dutch war a physic for
him to minister to his country's disease. But he was doomed to
disappointment. The Protector's statecraft was less crude than his
lieutenant's, and in spite of Monk's energetic and even angry protests peace
on comparatively easy terms was signed with Holland on April th, .
 CHAPTER VIII
GOVERNOR OF SCOTLAND
Cromwell had now other work for his most trusted officer. General
Middleton had landed in Scotland to fan the flame which Lord Glencairn
had kindled for the King, and which Morgan had nearly smothered. The
Highlands were in a blaze, the Lowlands were seething in the heat, and
Lilburne showed himself incapable of coping with the growing danger in
spite of the fiery little dragoon's assistance.
Since February the rising had been getting every day more serious, and still
no one was sent to supersede Lilburne. Cromwell at the outset of his reign
felt the Scotch command was the most critical appointment he had to
make. Not only was Scotland the chief field of Royalist action, but the
Parliamentary army there was ultra-Independent, and sullenly disgusted
to see a monarchy practically re-established. A man must go who could
crush the Royalists speedily, and, which was still more important, who
could be trusted with a victorious army of Irreconcilables afterwards. There
was absolutely no one who fulfilled the conditions but Monk. In December
it had been settled that he was to go, but till the Dutch war was over he
could not be spared by the Admiralty. Day by day the news from the north
grew worse, and still the Dutch struggled in Cromwell's grip to avoid the
article for the seclusion of the Stuarts. At last it was done, and on April th,
the very day after the treaty was signed, Monk got his route for Scotland
with the fullest powers.
A fortnight later he reached Dalkeith, and at once threw himself into the
preliminary organisation of that forgotten campaign in which, if ever, the
Highlands were for the first time conquered.
It is a campaign of the highest interest, and well repays the laborious task
of piecing it together from the obscure and confused notices that are extant.
Hitherto Highland warfare had been little more than aimless hunts after an
ever-shifting and disappearing objective. For the first time the rules of
modern strategy were to be applied to it. The latest model for mountain
warfare was the Duc de Rohan's brilliant Valtelline campaign of . It was the
admiration of all Europe, and has even been considered worthy of a
commentary by the Archduke Charles himself. Two such professed
soldiers as Monk and Middleton must have been perfectly familiar with it.
Monk at least had studied the duke's Perfect Captaine with an enthusiasm
which his own Observations too plainly betrays; and the scientific way in
which he now went to work shows that he either invented or had learnt a
thoroughly digested system.
His general idea was to out the Highlands asunder along the line of what is
now the Caledonian Canal, and to fix his enemy within one of two definite
areas, where he could operate against him as he chose. The area to the
north of the line was sufficiently determined by its geographical
conformation, but that to the south had to be firmly marked by strategical
positions. Already a chain of fortresses and strong posts stretching from
Inverness through Stirling to Ayr shut it in on the south and east, and
during the next two months, while Monk was waiting for the grass to grow
sufficiently for him to be able to move his cavalry, the investment was
completed. On the west, from Glencoe to the head of Loch Lomond,
diplomacy secured Argyle's country in a state of armed neutrality, and at
each of the four salient angles of the area was established an independent
base. One was at Inverness, one at Perth, and a third at Kilsyth, between
Stirling and Glasgow, with Leith for its supporting base. The fourth by a
bold stroke was to be planted in the heart of the enemy's country at
Lochaber, with supporting bases at Liverpool and Ayr, whereby he would
complete his quadrilateral and secure the southern end of his dividing line.
From these points he intended to act on double lines of operation, with two
strong columns keeping light touch with one another, and each able at any
moment to act in a new direction by a rapid change of base. One of them he
was to lead himself, while Morgan took command of the other. Their
organisation was a source of the greatest care. As he was not likely to meet
horse in any numbers, Monk boldly eliminated from the foot nearly the
whole of the pikes on which the steadiness of infantry was supposed to
depend, and filled his ranks almost entirely with musketeers.
To the labour of laying this elaborate foundation for the campaign was
added the task of reducing the army to some sense of discipline. Monk had
found it badly demoralised by the incapacity of Lilburne, and the license
which he had allowed to religious controversy. On all this he set his foot,
and at the same time endeavoured to repair the mischief which the wanton
insolence of the sectaries had done, by inaugurating a conciliatory policy
towards the Scots—a policy, however, which he was careful to fortify by a
system of strong patrols in the Lowlands.
At present there was no need to press offensive operations. Middleton was
still in Sutherland, and from Dingwall Morgan was watching him, ready to
fall on him if he attempted to join the Lochaber chiefs. In the middle of
May Monk moved to Stirling to see that all the outlets from the hills were
sufficiently secured to prevent forays in that direction. Having ordered the
construction of redoubts and the staking of fords wherever necessary, he
joined the first column at Kilsyth in order to more deeply mark the south-
west limit of his southern area by operations in the Ben Lomond hills. First,
however, an important step was taken. A column, consisting of two
thousand men and furnished with all necessary materials for establishing
the fourth base, was being secretly organised in Ireland to seize Inverlochy.
The time was now ripe for the attempt, and Colonel Brayne was
despatched to bring it over. This done, Monk commenced his work. The
difficulties of the undertaking at once declared themselves. The moment he
moved, Glencairn, who occupied the Ben Lomond country, began raiding
in his rear and stopped him. But the veteran of the Irish wars had learnt
when to be bold, and without hesitation he flew at his enemy's throat.
Advancing resolutely over the Kilsyth hills and up the headwaters of the
Forth into the heart of the Ben Lomond range, he compelled Glencairn to
concentrate and occupy a strong position at Aberfoyle. Here Monk
attacked him. Again and again he was repulsed. But the discipline of the
"red soldier" told at last, and Glencairn had to give way. The hills were
cleared, every boat on the loch destroyed, and the western boundary of the
southern area completed with an impassable stretch of water from Argyle's
country to the banks of the Clyde.
Meanwhile Middleton had outwitted Morgan. Breaking up his force he had
slipped it piecemeal over the hills and had joined his friends in Lochaber. It
was the signal for active operations. Leaving a small force to cover
Glasgow, and ordering up the Border horse under Colonel Howard in
support, Monk suddenly shifted on to the Perth line and plunged into the
hills. He meant if possible to drive the enemy through the gap he had left
into the Lowlands, where they would fall an easy prey to his horse, or, if
that failed, to force them northward. Moving with startling rapidity he was
soon entangled in the wildest of the enemy's mountains and morasses. It
was a country which till Deane's demonstration two years ago had been
considered inaccessible to Lowland troops. It swarmed with roving bands
of Highlanders; every straggler was a doomed man; the horse could hardly
move, and the whole work of the march was arduous beyond all
experience. But bold as was Monk's project its execution was cautious in
the extreme. Every step of the way he made good. The country was
systematically ravaged and every castle of strategic importance captured,
garrisoned, and turned into an advanced magazine, according to the
somewhat cumbrous and pedantic system which Monk and his
contemporaries were then introducing. To prevent surprise and give time
for properly securing his quarters he never marched after mid-day, nor did
he ever move without flanking parties and a cloud of scouts. He marked
out each camp and placed every picket and sentry himself, and was, in
short, the head and heart alike of his over-worked force.
Indifferent to hunger and sleep himself, he took every care of his men. He
doctored and dosed them with his own hand, and by his elaborate system
of magazines he kept them well supplied with biscuits and cheese. At the
same time he took care his officers should not grumble. When the day's
work was done it was his wont to unbend in frankest good fellowship.
Then while his canteen was unpacked it was his delight to sit on the grass
beside it and pitch joints of cold meat to his officers, who gathered round.
No one could bear the hardships of a campaign better than tough "old
George," and no one knew better how to lighten them.
No wonder the work prospered. On June th Monk had started, and by the
th he had established his first advanced magazine at the foot of Loch Tay.
Here he received intelligence from Morgan, who was operating from
Inverness on the line of the Spey, that Middleton had summoned a
rendezvous of the clans at Loch Ness head, anticipating a move from the
south. Monk at once turned northward and ordered Morgan on to the line
of the lochs, with instructions to close in behind Middleton as soon as he
passed over it. Brayne, he knew, had left Ireland a week ago, and between
the three columns he felt sure of forcing the Royalists into an engagement.
The zeal of the impetuous Morgan spoiled the combination. So rapidly did
he move that he fell in with the Royalist vanguard as it emerged from
Glengarry and flung it violently back into the hills. The result was that as
Monk descended the northern slopes of the Grampians Middleton
retreated to Kintail. Still much had been gained. The surprise from Ireland
had proved a complete success, and right and left Monk was now able to
join hands with Morgan and Brayne along the line of the lochs. Middleton
and his friends were thus shut within the northern area, where Monk could
renew his combined operations on definite lines. Loch Ness head was now
in touch with Inverness by means of a gunboat which had been dragged up
into the dock. Here Morgan was established, while the general advanced
up Glen Moriston to try and drive his enemy northward or into his
lieutenant's arms. In the effort Monk fairly surpassed himself. The country
proved more difficult every step he took: the weather was so violent that
the cattle could not keep the hills; yet from glen to glen Monk and his red
column chased Middleton and his Highland chivalry. Such marching
astounded them. At every stride the Southron trod on their heels, and
twice they had to abandon stores in order to keep out of his reach. But flesh
and blood could not stand such work for long, and at the end of a week
Monk retired to reprovision from Inverness, having laid waste the whole of
the country from which Middleton was drawing his supplies, and set the
"red cock crowing" in the home of every chief who had joined him.
Still Middleton had won the round. He had avoided an action, and but for
the new scheme of which his head was full Monk was as far from his end
as ever. His new idea was to send Morgan by sea to destroy the Royalist
winter-quarters in Caithness, while he himself covered Inverness. It was a
stroke which Middleton would clearly be compelled to parry by an
offensive movement to the south or a march into Caithness. Either would
suit Monk's disposition, and Morgan prepared to embark. The effect was
immediate. Two days later Middleton was seen by the garrison at Blair
Athol, and in two more Morgan was lying in wait at Braemar and Monk in
hot pursuit over the Grampians on the Royalist track. Through the
Drumouchter Pass and Badenoch his recruited column swept, and on into
Athol, ravaging as it went, till Athol was as black and desert as Lochaber
and Kintail. From Breadalbane the chase turned westward, and now so
close did Monk dog the enemy's steps that not a levy could be held, and
their forces began rapidly to shrink from exhaustion.
From Loch Tay through Glen Dochart, from Glen Lochy through
Strathfillan, the pursuit continued to the head of Loch Awe. The Cavalier
chiefs were resolved to force Argyle to take one side or the other, and here
they had caught him in Glenorchy's castle. But the siege was not two days
old when Monk was upon them and raised it. Foiled in their great scheme
on Argyle they doubled back into Perthshire, but still there was no rest.
While he ravaged Glenorchy and Glenstrea Monk detached a brigade to
keep them moving, and Middleton began to see the end was near. What his
enemy's activity left undone the wrangling of his friends was completing,
and harassed past bearing with their bickerings and jealousies, he resolved
to return to the north. Monk knew his intention, as he knew everything;
and Morgan was rapidly shifted to the headwaters of the Spey, with orders
to feel his way through Badenoch and the Drumouchter Pass on the look-
out for Middleton, towards Loch Rannoch, while down Glen Lyon the
general pushed him blindly to his fate. To avoid him, as Monk expected,
Middleton struggled over the hills into Glen Rannoch, and thence,
persuaded by false intelligence that the two English generals were together,
made a rapid move up the Perthshire Glengarry for the Drumouchter Pass.
Beside the little Loch at its foot was a hamlet, where he intended to halt for
the night. Weary and half starved his vanguard reached the spot towards
evening, but only to be received with a volley from Morgan's pickets.
Descending the pass that very day on his way to Glen Rannoch, the little
dragoon had occupied the identical quarters Middleton had intended for
himself. The surprise was complete. Morgan was expecting Middleton,
though not quite so soon. Middleton was only looking behind him where
he believed Morgan to be with Monk. The smart dragoon, always prepared
for anything, immediately hurled his fresh and well-armed troops upon the
weary Scots as they lay helpless between the Loch and the hills, and
scattered them to the four winds.
To rally them in the face of Monk's forces proved impossible. Middleton
fled to Caithness, whither Morgan pursued him, while Monk occupied
himself with Athol and Glencairn. Driving them before him towards the
trap he had so cleverly prepared in the Ben Lomond hills, he compelled
them to disband and leave him to complete his work. Then one after
another he destroyed their winter-quarters in the remote fastnesses about
the loch which Rob Roy was to make so famous, and which had been
hitherto considered entirely inaccessible to Southrons. By the end of
August the work was done, and the general was able to return to Dalkeith.
The back of the insurrection was broken. The Highlands were bound in
chains of fortified posts. The garrisons gave those who stirred not a
moment's peace. Unable to combine, unable even to feed their followers,
one after another the chiefs came in, till at last the Highlands were so quiet
that there was hardly a man left with heart to lift a cow, and he who would
find a stray, it used to be said, need only send a crier round.
To enter into the details of Monk's subsequent administration is impossible
here. Indeed it hardly belongs to his career as a man of action. The art of
governing a conquered country he had always held to be part of a soldier's
education, and he now applied to his province the principles which he had
long ago laid down during his solitude in the Tower. The most important
thing he considered to assure the conquest of a free people was to take
away the desire of revolting, "and to do this," he wrote, "you must not take
away their hopes of recovering their liberties by their good obedience, ...
and therefore you must always begin in a fair way." And well he did it. On
easy terms the chiefs were admitted to make their peace, and security for
good behaviour was taken from them. Every facility was afforded them of
entering foreign services, and those who remained at home were disarmed.
"Assist the weak inhabitants," he said, "and weaken the mighty." Never
perhaps in the history of Scotland had the weak been so strong. They began
to look on the soldiers under Monk's strict discipline as the best friends
they had. The feuds and brigandage which had so long distracted the
country became entirely unknown. Trade began to revive: taxes came in
plentifully; and Monk began to lay the foundation of the rich public
treasure without which he considered no Government was safe.
There being a difficulty about engaging the people in a foreign war, Monk
encouraged the Cavalier chiefs to raise troops for service as mercenaries
abroad. But the King was shrewd enough to privately forbid it, and Monk
had to fall back upon his other rules for the prevention of civil strife. The
first was the perfection of the fortresses, the other the attainment so far as
possible of uniformity of religion. The restrictions which Lilburne had
placed upon the Presbyterians were gradually removed, and the Kirkmen
encouraged at the expense of the sectaries. But while he gave them
complete religious freedom, he was careful to strip the clergy of all
temporal power by forbidding them the use of excommunication and by
suspending the assemblies of the Kirk.
From Dalkeith Monk governed the country in peace, attending to almost
every detail himself. At first it is true that occasional plots disturbed his
serenity, but his method of dealing with conspirators was as successful as it
was original. It is, moreover, replete with a grim humour which gives us a
new insight into his character. Such chiefs as fell under suspicion were
arrested and placed under rigorous confinement. In noisome dungeons
they were visited by Monk's roughest officers, and sometimes by the
terrible general himself. There they were urged to confess, and even
threatened with the torture. Those who yielded were at once released with
a caution and never troubled again. Those who held out firmly were asked
to dinner at Dalkeith, where the sound sense and excellent claret of their
good-natured host soon brought them to reason. By this happy treatment
the shrewd general found out at once whom he could safely ignore and
who were dangerous. The first he knew he had frightened into good
behaviour; of the others he made friends.
Most notable of these was young Cameron of Lochiel, the Ulysses of the
Highlands, the wolf-slayer, the man who had saved his life by tearing out
the throat of one of Brayne's soldiers with his teeth. Evan Dhu was, in fact,
the ideal hero of the clansmen, and though his action had been paralysed
by the Inverlochy garrison, he had been the most dangerous and
indefatigable figure in the late rising. He had been almost the last to come
in, but from the day of his surrender the idol of the clans became Monk's
devoted personal friend. These two men, so utterly different and yet in
much so alike, seem to have conceived for each other an unbounded
admiration. Monk gave the Prince of Robbers, as Charles the Second used
to call him, a share in the administration of Lochaber, and supported him
in his law-feuds, while at the crisis of Monk's career Lochiel attached
himself to his staff and rode with him to London.
There was but one event which seriously broke the harmony of the tranquil
life at Dalkeith, and that was the widespread Republican conspiracy of . As
Cromwell's most trusted officer Monk was one of its principal objects. In
Morgan's absence the appointment of major-general on the governor's staff
was held by Milton's friend, sweet-mannered Colonel Overton. The general
shared the poet's high opinion of his honour, and had persuaded the
Protector that his politics, radical as they were, would never make him
forget his duty. This man accepted the management of the plot in Scotland.
The idea was to assassinate Monk, seize the Government, and march with
the Scotch army to the support of the English Republicans. To this end the
army was widely tampered with, and as a matter of course the proceedings
of the conspirators came to the vigilant general's ears. Quietly he allowed
the plot to mature as if he suspected nothing, and then on the eve of its
execution suddenly changed his guards, pounced upon the conspirators,
and sent them all up to London under arrest.
"I am convinced," he wrote to Cromwell in forwarding some papers of
Overton's which he had subsequently discovered, "if your Highness do but
weigh the letters well, you will find Colonel Overton had a design to
promote the Scots king's business." Whatever was the part which the
Cavaliers played in the plot, these letters certainly contain no evidence of
their complicity. But Monk would believe anything of a soldier who had
been false to his colours, and his comment is amusingly characteristic. It
would seem that he had so little troubled himself with politics as to have
entirely failed to grasp the situation. At this time he had probably got little
beyond the original question of Parliament and King. Of the endless
factions into which his own party was splitting he appears to have had but
little understanding, except in so far as they led to insubordination in the
army. Against a Royalist enemy he had been sent to Scotland, and he saw a
Royalist enemy at the bottom of every trouble.
Indeed it was at this time that he seems to have been first getting into that
nervous and irritable state with regard to the King and his affairs from
which he was never safe till Charles was on his throne. He was perfectly
contented where he was. As the military governor of a conquered
kingdom, he had reached the highest ambition of a soldier of fortune. He
was now getting on for fifty, and desired nothing so much as to quietly
enjoy his position with his wife and children, to whom he was devoted.
Indeed, the death of George, the baby, about this time seems to have upset
him more than all the difficulties of his office together. But his friends
would not leave him in peace.
Eager to propitiate the Scots, he kept open house at Dalkeith, and through
the influence of the Countess of Buccleuch the nobility began to accept his
hospitality. They soon came to have a liking for the kindly general. He
received them indeed so cordially, and seemed so anxious to be on good
terms with them, that there is no doubt some of them began to see in the
simple-minded soldier a possible instrument for the revival of their party.
Early in November, , he had intercepted two autograph letters from the
king, one addressed to "," whom he knew to be Lord Glencairn; the other to
"T," a cypher he did not understand. The letter, however, was of a highly
compromising nature. "T" was told that the King was assured of his
affection, and he was encouraged to be ready when the time was ripe.
According to his usual practice Monk took copies of both the letters and
allowed them to proceed to their destination. The copies he forwarded at
once to Cromwell, assuring him that he would soon know to whom the "T"
letter was delivered, and be able to deal with him as he deserved. To his
intense annoyance it was delivered to himself. Cromwell seems to have
thoroughly enjoyed the joke, but Monk was furious, and vented his anger
by arresting Glencairn, whom he evidently suspected of being at the
bottom of it.
Yet in spite of all he could do the Cavaliers chose to believe that he was a
king's man at heart, and to make him the object of their intrigues. His
uneasiness was increased by his new chaplain Price, who, having obtained
considerable influence over Mrs. Monk, set her on to advocate the martyr's
cause. It must be confessed that the general was a little henpecked at home,
and a little afraid of his wife's sharp tongue; so, like a wise man, he let her
talk treason to her heart's content without reply, and told Price whenever
the subject was mentioned that he had no sympathy with the cause of a
man who had shown himself hopelessly incapable of governing. If the
martyr had been fit to reign, he used to say, he would have taken his
advice and fought the Scots in .
Still they all pretended not to believe him, and his nervousness became
chronic. Cromwell was only amused at his distress. He never forgot the
letter to "T." The joke appealed to the Protector's peculiar sense of humour.
Nearly three years later, when Monk one day returned to Dalkeith, he
found a letter had been mysteriously left with the guard. It proved
apparently to be one of the same tenor as the first, and more furious than
ever he sent a copy of it up to the Secretary of State. "I did not think fit to
trouble his Highness with it," the general wrote, "it being, as I conceive it is,
a knavish trick of some Scotchman or other.... I hope God will enable me as
I make them smart for this roguery and the former report which they made
of me." Of course Thurloe told Cromwell, and the Protector could not resist
adding his well-known "drolling" postscript to his next despatch. "There be
some that tell me," he wrote to Monk shortly before his death, "that there is
a certain cunning fellow in Scotland called George Monk who is said to lie
in wait there to introduce Charles Stuart; I pray you use your diligence to
apprehend him and send him up to me." Clearly he was poking fun at his
lieutenant. The Protector knew well enough he was to be trusted implicitly.
He sent him up all his most disaffected troops, knowing that under Monk's
stern discipline they would soon be brought to their senses. He gave him
full powers to cashier any officer he liked. He abandoned his intention of
reducing the army when Monk said it was not safe. He even left him nearly
two years without a Council to watch him, and only restored it upon
Monk's urgent and repeated entreaties for help in his work.
As part of their intrigues the Cavaliers industriously spread reports that
Cromwell was afraid of his lieutenant. They said the Protector tried to get
him out of Scotland by offering him the command of the great Jamaica
expedition, and that Monk, seeing through his designs, refused. As a
matter of fact Cromwell did want to see his darling project conducted by
the most able and experienced commander in his service, but reluctantly
abandoned the idea in consequence of a confidential report that Scotland
would not be safe out of Monk's hands. So the post was not offered him. If
it had been he would certainly have accepted it. To lead such an enterprise
was the dream of Monk's life. The rumour was revived in because the
general did not attend Cromwell's "other House," to which he had been
called. It was said that he had refused the summons, but it was untrue. The
real explanation of his absence is that there were at the time signs of a
Royalist descent, and he told the Protector he dared not come till some one
was appointed to take his place. No one was appointed, and he remained.
In fact he was an ideal governor. Everything seemed to go smoothly, and
he never bothered except now and then for money that was due. In spite of
the endless questions that must have arisen every day, half his letters to the
Secretary of State at this period contain apologies for having no news. A
great part of the rest consist of information on purely English affairs. The
hard-worked and anxious Protector knew well how priceless is such a
governor, and could laugh securely at what the Cavaliers said when he
knew what a bugbear to his trusty friend were Charles Stuart and all his
works.
But while Cromwell laughed and Monk fumed at the Cavalier tricks we
must cast a glance down into Devonshire, where a web more subtle and
secret than any that had yet been tried was being spun to catch the
incorruptible proconsul. Almost at the end of the world, in his rectory at
Plymtree, sat Nicholas Monk. There all through those dangerous and
unquiet times he had "possessed a sweet and comfortable privacy" after his
own heart. To-day a messenger disturbed him at his books. It was a letter
from cousin John asking him to come and see him. Sir John Grenville was
the son of Sir Bevil by Elizabeth Monk, and nephew to George's old friend
Sir Richard. He was a great man now, and an active figure in Lord
Mordaunt's new group of ardent young Cavaliers who were trying to goad
the old Royalists of the "Sealed Knot" out of the lethargy to which they had
been reduced by fines and failures and distrust of the King and each other.
A little flurried, we may be sure, the quiet parson hurried away, but found
with relief it was no business of state. Only Sir John had a fat living fallen
vacant, and he thought cousin Nicholas might like it. He wanted nothing
for it either, only if he should ever happen to have any business with
cousin George up in Scotland perhaps Nicholas would not mind making
himself useful. Certainly he would not; so in due course he finds himself in
clover at his new living of Kelkhampton, and a distinct step is taken to the
Restoration.
As yet Grenville knew it was useless to approach his cousin. He had taken
the Protector's commission and had promised Cromwell, it was said, to
support his dynasty. So when Oliver died in September, , Richard was duly
proclaimed at Edinburgh; but in spite of Monk's efforts it was without a
note of enthusiasm. The soldiers grumbled when the ceremony was over
that they had to support a man they did not know. "Old George for my
money," said one with applause; "he is fitter for a Protector than Dick
Cromwell!" No doubt Oliver thought so too. He had told Richard always to
follow Monk's advice; and one of the new Protector's first acts was to send
Dr. Clarges, Monk's brother-in-law, and now Commissary-General for the
Irish and Scotch armies, on a special mission to Scotland, to seek the advice
and support of his father's right-hand man.
It was excellent advice that Clarges brought back. True to his simple creed,
Monk told Richard he must break the political power of the army and
gather round him to share in the government the natural leaders of the
people. He showed him exactly how to do it, but Richard was too weak or
too indolent to follow his instructions. His only idea was to offer Monk a
large sum of money to support him by force. Dearly as he loved riches,
Monk refused. He had pledged himself to the Cromwells, and that was
enough. Richard would want all his money himself. Every day the
Republican army, with Lambert and Fleetwood at its head, grew stronger,
and the "new Royalists," as they called the Cromwellians, grew weaker.
Before he had been eight months on the throne Richard gave up the
struggle, dissolved his Parliament, and weakly identified himself with the
army. The inevitable result followed. At the end of May he abdicated in
favour of a military republic.
The leading officers formed themselves into a provisional government, and
took immediate steps to recall the Republican remnant of the Long
Parliament, which since its expulsion by Cromwell had come to be looked
upon as representing the "good old cause" of the Commonwealth. It was at
all events a pretence of constitutionalism, and Monk seized the excuse to
sullenly acquiesce in the new order. "Had Richard not dissolved his
Parliament," he always said, "I would have marched down to support it,"
and in view of his subsequent conduct there is every reason to believe he
meant what he said. But Richard had pusillanimously thrown up the game
before his friend could help him, and Monk was not a man to plunge his
country into civil war in such a hopeless cause. And so when his kinsman
Cornet Monk arrived from Ireland on a special mission from Henry
Cromwell he found he was too late.
The first act of the restored "Rump" was one of the last importance. In their
eagerness to get control over the army they insisted on every officer
receiving his commission from themselves at the hands of the Speaker.
Monk accepted a new commission with the rest, and from that moment he
was as devoted a servant to Parliament as ever he had been to Cromwell;
but, unlike Cromwell, the new Government committed the folly of not
trusting him. The Council of State immediately set to work to fill his army
with their own nominees. Monk protested, and refused to permit the new
men to act without the Speaker's commission. Fortunately public business
was so disturbed in London that most of these commissions never arrived.
To the Government's distrust Monk replied with contempt. His despatches
at this time are curt and peremptory. He obviously detested the new state
of things, and acquiesced in it only because it staved off the evil day he
dreaded when he would be dragged, sword in hand, into the miserable
political struggle which he had hitherto so successfully avoided. He
sullenly did his duty, and that was all. He informed the Government of
Royalist movements as regularly as ever, and engaged as actively in
keeping the country quiet. Still, as though he foresaw the need his country
was soon to have for Scotland's goodwill, he began to relax his hold, and
with complete success. "The last two years of his government," it was said
by a Scotchman, "were so mild and moderate, except with respect to the
clergy, whose petulant and licentious tongues he curbed upon all
occasions, that the nation would not have willingly changed it for any
other but that of their natural prince." Yet his rule was so complete that in
Scotland the great Royalist plot that was now in full maturity could not
even show its head.
 CHAPTER IX
THE ABORTIVE PRONUNCIAMENTO
Monk was now on the eve of the remarkable adventure which was to lift
him from the position of an able officer to the dignity of a great historical
figure. Fifty was then considered a ripe old age, and while most men of his
years were looking round for a resting-place, he was about to begin his
political career.
It was none of his own seeking. Thrifty and business-like to a fault, he had
amassed a considerable fortune, and he began to turn his eyes longingly to
his property in Ireland. At Ballymurn, between Wexford and Enniscorthy,
he had an estate which had been granted to him in satisfaction of arrears of
pay. It was in the midst of the most fertile and prosperous part of the
island, and within easy reach of his old home. Ever since the beginning of ,
with the colonial instinct still strong within him, he had been writing to
Henry Cromwell, the Lord-Deputy of Ireland, that his only ambition now
was to settle down as an Irish planter. All that kept him at his post, he told
him, was his desire to see "your father and my dear friend better settled in
his affairs." With Oliver's death and Richard's fall that motive was gone.
Since Lambert had reappeared upon the scene his relations with head-
quarters had not been pleasant. Each day they grew more strained, and he
longed for retirement more ardently than ever.
Apart from politics his life at Dalkeith was pleasant enough. In the short
intervals of relaxation from business he devoted himself to planting,
gardening, and hunting, of which he was passionately fond. He was a man
of strong domestic affections, and they grew with advancing years. On the
whole his family life was happy. His wife was possessed of many good
qualities. She was devoted to him, and in spite of her sharp tongue he was
very fond of her. The loss of his baby son George was a great and lasting
grief, but Christopher, his first-born, was left. Daughters he had none, but
Mary Monk, the eldest girl of his favourite brother, had come to stay with
him, and even now he was in correspondence with her father about her
marriage and the dowry he was going to provide.
But however attractive grew the prospect of a quiet life in Ireland far away
from the din of politics, retirement was now out of the question. On July th,
, he found it his duty to write the following warning to the Council of State:
"I make bold to acquaint you that I hear that Charles Stuart hath laid a
great design both in England and Ireland, but as yet I hear nothing that he
hath written over to this country concerning that business. I am confident
that if he had I should have heard of it."
By a strange irony almost as he penned the words his cousin, Sir John
Grenville, was in consultation with Lord Mordaunt as to the best method
of making the general a party to their design. It was the widespread
conspiracy for a simultaneous rising of the King's friends in every county
of which the vigilant governor had heard. Fortified with a new commission
from the King, Mordaunt and his beautiful and courageous young wife
had succeeded in hatching a really fine plot in concert with the more
energetic members of the Sealed Knot. King and Cavaliers were to be kept
in the background, and those constitutional Royalists, who as far as
possible had never been in arms for the Crown, were to rise for a free
Parliament and "the known laws of the land."
Mordaunt, in spite of his youth and the ardent enthusiasm which had
goaded the inert Knot into taking up the movement, had a clear head. In
his heart he knew that much more was to be done by gaining the leaders of
the Opposition than by the best planned risings, and for him Monk's
adhesion, or at least his neutrality, was of the first importance. By the
whole of the King's councillors, however, the general, to his honour, was
looked upon as unapproachable. It was in this difficulty that his sanguine
young cousin saw the opportunity for which he had been so long
preparing, and declared himself ready to undertake the task. At his request
he was armed with an effusive letter from Charles to Monk, and a
commission leaving him free to treat, with the sole limit that no more than
a hundred thousand pounds a year was to be promised to the general and
his officers. Grenville lost not a moment, and a few days later poor book-
loving Nicholas was startled in his quiet Cornish rectory by a peremptory
summons to London.
Monk's warning was not the only one which reached the Council. Sir
Richard Willis, the most trusted member of the Knot and an old friend of
Monk's, was revealing everything but the names of the Cavaliers engaged.
The only anxiety of the Government was to conceal its information from
the conspirators. At every point it was ready. Lambert and Fleetwood were
old hands at the work. Their idea apparently was to allow the rising to take
place, tempt the King to land, and then inflict a blow which would at once
crush their adversaries and give themselves an unassailable prestige.
Amongst other precautions Monk was ordered to send two regiments of
horse and two of foot into England, and it is significant that he obeyed
without demur.
At the last moment an officious postmaster spoilt all. In a fit of zeal he
intercepted an important letter. The Royalists got to hear of it, lost their
heads, and the rising was nipped in the bud, or abandoned everywhere but
in Cheshire and Lancashire. There Sir George Booth successfully
established himself, and Lambert marched against him.
Amidst the din and bustle of military preparation Nicholas Monk arrived
in London, and with no little alarm heard from Grenville's lips what was
required of him. Ostensibly for the purpose of settling his daughter's
marriage, and bringing her back to Cornwall, he was to carry the King's
letters to his brother and negotiate the secret treaty. Nicholas flatly refused
to touch the letters. They were far too dangerous. He consented, however,
to carry a verbal message, and was solemnly sworn not to breathe a word
of the very delicate affair to any one but his brother.
The only difficulty was how to reach Dalkeith. Lambert's troops blocked
every road, and it was found necessary to take Clarges into their
confidence. The only objection was that the cunning commissary, who
knew everything, would certainly not believe Nicholas was going on his
daughter's account. He had to be told that the parson's real mission was
from the constitutional gentry of Devon and Cornwall. Some such mission
he really had. Clarges refused to engage in the affair, but consented to
provide Nicholas with a passage on a Government ship to Leith, and
cautioned him against letting any one know his business except Dr.
Barrow, the general's physician, and Dr. Price, his private chaplain.
Meanwhile Monk was being approached from another quarter. Lord
Fairfax, it is said, had undertaken as part of the general movement to raise
the gentlemen of the north, but he was far too good a soldier not to see the
futility of the attempt if Monk chose to oppose it. He would not stir till he
had come to an understanding with the Scots' governor, and to this end
Colonel Atkins, on pretence of visiting relations in Fife, was ordered to go
to Dalkeith. Atkins had commanded a company under Monk in Lord
Leicester's regiment in . They were old brothers-in-arms, and Monk
received him so kindly that the colonel ventured to disclose the intention of
the gentlemen of the north, and ask the general what he would do if they
began to make their levies. He had his answer in a moment. "If they do
appear," said Monk sharply, "I will send a force to suppress them. By the
duty of my place I can do no less."
Such was his reply, but "the duty of my place" was for him no longer the
magic solvent of all ethical difficulties that it had been. During his long
proconsulship "honest George" had developed from the soldier into the
statesman. True he clung still to his cherished first-born as ardently as ever.
"I am not one of those," he had just written to the Speaker, "that seek great
things, having had my education in a commonwealth where soldiers
received and observed commands but gave none.... Obedience is my great
principle, and I have always and ever shall reverence the Parliament's
resolution in civil things as infallible and sacred." That the military power
must be subject to the civil was still his creed, but it was no longer the
whole of it. He began to see that for the rule to hold good the civil power
must be that which was authorised by the Constitution; that it must be the
power to which the Government was entrusted by the country. Since the
deposition of the King and the abdication of the Protector the constitutional
civil power was the Parliament, and the junto of politicians who were
sitting at Westminster was not the Parliament. It was a truth he would
perhaps have been slower to grasp had they treated him better in the
matter of commissions; but they had stupidly forced the situation home to
the hard-witted soldier, and having once embraced the idea he was not
likely to abandon it. Nor was this all. The man of the hour was Lambert, his
old rival, and the very apostle of the doctrines he abhorred. For Lambert
the army was a political body which had won the people their liberties, and
which alone was capable of administering them. His idea of the army was
that it should be an executive corporation as self-contained and
independent as other men at other times have sought to make the Church.
For this Cromwell had discarded him. For this he had come upon the scene
once more, and the civil power was in league with him.
Such was the light in which Monk viewed the situation when on August th
his brother arrived at Dalkeith. The general was as usual up to his eyes in
business. His ante-room was thronged with officers waiting for orders, and
he had to commit Nicholas to the care of Dr. Price. The two parsons soon
fraternised. Nicholas was bursting with his secret. The simple country
rector grew more and more nervous as the time went on. The nearer the
task of broaching the subject to his formidable brother was approached the
less he liked it. At last he could contain himself no longer. Regardless of his
oath and Grenville's cautions, he blurted out his whole secret and begged
Price's assistance. The astute chaplain was aghast at the negotiator's
indiscretion, for not only had he disclosed the western gentlemen's mission
as Clarges had authorised him, but he had let out Sir John Grenville's too.
Fortunately Price was a Royalist, and no harm was done. But he warned
his simple visitor of the atmosphere in which the general was existing. It
was a miasma of distrust and suspicion which none but "honest George"
could have breathed and lived. Every eye was watching for a sign. The
slightest indiscretion might be fatal, and absolute secrecy was a necessity.
At the same time he gave him every encouragement. Mrs. Monk, he said,
was constantly urging her husband to make a move, and he permitted her
to talk the rankest treason every night. In her he would certainly find an
active ally, and he himself would do his best. Finally he told him the best
way to approach the general. The soldier was not without his superstitions,
and Nicholas was advised to pave the way for his disclosures with some
old wives' prophecies about the future greatness of the family which he
had brought out of Devonshire.
Thus prepared he was conducted to his brother. A few officers were still
waiting in the ante-room. One of them at once suspiciously asked Price
what was the meaning of Nicholas's visit. Price put him off with the story
of Mary Monk, but nevertheless Nicholas was more alarmed than ever, and
began to see that conspiring was not the simple affair of tokens and
cyphers which he had thought.
No one was present at the interview between the brothers that evening,
and no one knows exactly what occurred, but it is certain that its effect was
to give George a much more serious view of the Great Design than he had
before. His contempt for Cavalier conspiracies was profound, and
Grenville's message had probably very little effect upon him. He did not
know his young cousin personally, and looked upon him merely as one
more of those enthusiastic young gentlemen whose sportive delight in
hairbrained plots and whose passion for mystery were always leading
them into scrapes and indefinitely postponing the Restoration. But
Nicholas brought out of Devonshire a message from a very different man.
Their kinsman, William Morice, had associated himself with Stukeley and
the other western gentlemen, and Morice's administration of Monk's
Devonshire estates seems to have given the general a profound faith in that
gentleman's practical sagacity. Morice's approval at least assured him that
the Presbyterians were engaged, and that Sir George Booth's rising was not
a mere Cavalier plot. He was already considerably impressed by Lord
Fairfax's adhesion, and now he began to see that whether or not the
movement would end in the Restoration, the country was in earnest about
having a real Parliament elected to settle some permanent form of
government.
Nicholas gave Price such a favourable account of his interview that he
looked upon the general as practically engaged. Still Monk gave no sign.
Morice's advice involved, to say the least, putting pressure on the men
whose commissions he held and whose pay he was taking. It was a serious
obstacle, but everything continued to deepen the impression which Atkins
and Nicholas had begun. Every post brought news that Booth's position
was improving, and no doubt Mrs. Monk did her best when the curtains
were drawn. Next week Colonel Atkins returned. Again he was well
received, and Monk seems to have taken the opportunity of arranging a
regular system of correspondence with Lord Fairfax, but nothing further
appeared.
On Saturday the rd Dr. Gumble, chaplain to the Scotch commission, came
over to Dalkeith, as he often did, to spend Sunday with the general and
preach a sermon for Price. He was a staunch old Commonwealth man, who
disapproved of the protectorate, but he was popular with the officers,
highly esteemed by Monk, and so had kept his place. In him the perplexed
general had a councillor who was above suspicion of Royalism. He took
him into his confidence, put the whole case before him, and asked his
advice. Gumble did not hesitate. He assured him that he had a higher duty
than that which he owed to his paymasters. His country called to him to
rescue her from the miserable plight to which the clique of visionaries and
self-seeking politicians at Westminster had reduced her. It was his duty to
obey the call. To a man of Monk's ardent patriotism such an argument
could not appeal in vain. It was the argument which finally convinced him
it was his duty to move. Once resolved he characteristically acted on the
spot. While he himself went to ascertain the state of the Treasury, Gumble
was despatched to Price's room to inform him he was to draw up a
manifesto; and thence he proceeded to sound such officers as were to be
trusted.
The manifesto took the form of a respectful letter to the Parliament,
reminding them that they had not yet filled up their numbers nor passed
any Electoral Bill, as the very name of Commonwealth required them, and
hinting that the army could not in conscience protect their authority unless
they forthwith remedied their neglect.
On Sunday evening after service those already in the secret assembled in
Price's room to approve the manifesto. It was resolved that it should be
presented to the army for signature, and the general proceeded to take
precautions against a refusal. Captain Jonathan Smith, his adjutant-general,
had been admitted to the secret conclave. Immediately the draft was settled
Monk ordered this officer to ride to the commandants of the neighbouring
garrisons, who were all men of the right stamp, explain to them the step
that was to be taken, and induce them to adopt the necessary measures for
preventing the sectaries giving trouble. The general then left the room. On
the success of Smith's mission all depended. The army was full of
doctrinaire politicians. The Government in London had been careful to
draft as many as possible on to the Scotch establishment. These men
disliked and suspected Monk, and he had to rely upon those who fought
for their pay, by whom he was generally beloved. Smith did not lose a
moment. He had already put on his boots, and was taking leave of the rest
when the door opened and the general came into the room again. To every
one's astonishment he ordered Smith not to go. He had resolved, he said, to
wait the post in. By that time Lambert and Booth must have met, and it
could do no harm to hear the result before they moved.
No one ventured to demur then, but Price presently followed him from his
room. He found him in earnest conversation with his master of the
greyhounds, one Kerr of Gradane, one of Montrose's men, in whom Monk
took an interest that his love of coursing would hardly explain. Price knew
he had some other and more secret designs to back his enterprise, and
afterwards Monk told him he had been ready to commission the whole
Scottish nation to rise. There can be little doubt that through Kerr he was
twisting another string for his bow as strong and trustworthy as the first.
"Old George" was not a man to do things by halves.
Price waited till the conversation was done and Kerr was out of hearing,
and then he began to press the general to allow Smith to start. Monk was
anxious and excited. For the first time in his life his military conscience was
not clear, and Price's importunity irritated him past bearing. Turning on
him fiercely he seized him by the shoulders. "What, Mr. Price," said he,
"will you then bring my neck to the block for the King, and ruin our whole
design by engaging too rashly?"—"Sir," protested the astonished chaplain,
"I never named the King to you either now or at any other time."—"Well,"
replied the general, "I know you have not. But I know you, and have
understood your meaning."
It was on this conversation, as Price relates it, that Monk's biographers rely
to prove their case that he intended the return of the King from the first.
But there can be no doubt that what he said was to get rid of Price by
letting him clearly know he saw through him, and had no intention of
risking his head or spoiling the patriotic enterprise in which he was
engaged for the sake of a Stuart.
At any rate it left Monk in peace. No move was made that night, and early
on Monday morning came the startling news that Lambert had crushed
Booth's rising at a blow. Once more the confederates met, burned the
manifesto, renewed their oaths of secrecy, and thanked Heaven for the
narrow escape they had had.
Monk's feelings vented themselves in anger against his brother and
Grenville. He felt he had been deceived and entrapped into a plot which
had no more bottom than the rest. He angrily told poor Nicholas to go back
to his books and meddle no more in conspiracy. He charged him with a
similar sharp message to his young cousin, and swore if either of them ever
revealed what had passed he would do his best to ruin them both. The
affair seems to have been even a greater shock to Mrs. Monk. Price hints
that she conceived a sudden antipathy for the King's cause, and lived in
terror that her husband would be induced sooner or later to engage in it.
She lost no opportunity of proclaiming that she and her son Kit were for
the Long Parliament and the "good old cause," and she began again to urge
Monk to retire and live in Ireland. The general lent a willing ear. The
cashiering of his officers continued. Lambert and the Rump seemed
determined to pull together, and every one thought the Government had a
new lease of life. Monk knew some attempt would soon be made to
displace him, and as he now had less inclination to retain his post than ever
he resolved to seize the opportunity of tendering his resignation on the
ground of ill-health and long service. He was certainly in earnest. Thrifty
Mrs. Monk bought a number of trunks to pack up the household effects,
and, contrary to his usual custom, the general wrote direct to the Speaker.
Nicholas fortunately warned Clarges that the letter had gone. Clarges
managed to get hold of it, took it himself to Lenthal, and in concert with
him cleverly arranged not to have it presented to the House for some days;
for the commissary had news for his brother-in-law by which he believed
he could induce him to reconsider his determination.
 CHAPTER X
THE NEGLECTED QUANTITY
It is always a temptation to over-estimate the effect of trifling accidents in
history, but certainly few little things have been fraught with weightier
consequences than prudent "old George's" idea of waiting the post in. Had
he made his great move while Rump and army were at one it is hard to say
how long the Revolution might have dragged on its effete existence. It is
indeed possible that he might still have succeeded in closing it, but it could
only have been at the cost of a bloody civil war.
Now things were changed. Intoxicated with their success over the rebels,
Lambert and Fleetwood, with the army-party, in a formal petition had
made demands which it was impossible for the Rump to grant. Sir Arthur
Haslerig, the hot-headed leader of the pure Republicans, had moved a vote
of censure on Lambert, and Clarges was able to inform his brother-in-law
that a breach was imminent. Monk at once instructed him to withdraw his
resignation. He saw his duty clearly before him now, and waited quietly
for news. The petition was forwarded to the Scotch army for signature, and
its authors attempted to gain Monk over to their interest by the offer of
supreme command of the foot, and the rank of general in the standing
army which they meant permanently to establish. His reply was to
absolutely forbid a man under his command to sign the obnoxious
document.
On September th another meeting of the English officers was held at which
demands so extravagant were framed that the moderate men withdrew,
and sent up to Monk imploring him to use his influence to prevent a
breach. He did his best in a letter to Fleetwood. But no one knew better
than he that the attempt was useless, and his brother was hurried off to
London with Mary Monk and a secret message to Clarges. No military
scruples perplexed the old soldier now. His duty to his paymasters and his
duty to his country were one. His commission stood no longer in the way
of his patriotism or his political creed, and he spoke at last with no
uncertain voice; for Commissary Clarges was charged to assure the House
that if they would only stand firm in asserting their authority over the
army he would stand by them, and be ready, should the need arise, to
march into England to their defence.
With this message—the death-warrant of the English Revolution—
Nicholas Monk reached London on October th. Over eleven years ago, in
"the first year of freedom, by God's blessing restored," the chiefs of the
army had met at Windsor to seek their duty from the Lord. In a long
ecstasy of prayer and tears they had sought counsel of their God, and the
answer came—the King must die. From that hour revolution had ridden
triumphant on the shoulders of the army. But its day was done, its work
was accomplished, and the most perfect soldier of them all had risen up to
enforce the simple gospel of obedience. Prayer or no prayer, King or no
King, the soldier's duty was to obey, and not to command.
For two days the House had been considering the new petition from the
army, determined not to grant and afraid to reject it. The debate stood
adjourned till the morrow without hope of a solution to the problem. It was
late in the evening when Nicholas Monk reached Clarges. In the first hours
of the morning the commissary roused the Speaker and Haslerig with his
news. The whole situation was changed as if by magic. No sooner was the
House met than the tidings flew from mouth to mouth, and in rapid
succession a series of votes were passed bidding defiance to Lambert and
the army. "Resolved that if they must leave their soft seats they would first
empty out the feathers," they made it high treason to collect taxes without
their consent, cashiered Lambert, Desborough, and the seven other colonels
who were concerned in the movement, deprived Fleetwood of the
command of the army, and vested it in a commission in which he was
associated with Monk, Haslerig, Ludlow, Morley, Walton, and Overton, all
staunch Parliament men. The following morning Lambert had seized the
approaches of the House. Once more the Rump was the victim of a coup
d'état, and a military committee of safety reigned in its stead.
Monk had foretold the quarrel months ago. On the morning of the th the
news for which he had been waiting reached him at Dalkeith, and with
startling rapidity he set about backing his words. Never had soldier a more
difficult and dangerous task. In any one of lesser calibre the attempt would
be called madness. He was face to face at last with his old rival. He was
about to defy the most brilliant of Cromwell's generals, and before he could
call his strength his own he had to tear from it its toughest fibres. The
London officers had succeeded in making his army a hotbed of the very
opinions he had determined to crush with it. On the whole Scotch
establishment there was hardly a colonel who was above suspicion. Every
garrison and every company were full of the veteran fanatics who had
taught the world the art of revolution, and every man of them in his heart
rejoiced at Lambert's success. With this element free, his army was
Lambert's army. At all cost it must be made powerless, though it was the
very soul of his force. But Monk did not hesitate. Not a moment was to be
lost. In a few hours the news would be all over Scotland and the chance
gone. All the principal garrisons, with the exception of Stirling and
Aberdeen, were in the hands of Lambert's nominees, and the whole
venture turned upon the rapidity with which they could be secured.
Hardly was Clarges's despatch in the general's hands when Captain Smith
was galloping for Edinburgh and Leith to take the first step towards
mastering the garrisons there. The capital was occupied by Monk's own
regiment and Talbot's "Black Colours." Talbot's was far from sound, and in
the general's own there was hardly an officer who was not a rank
Anabaptist. Fortunately, in the absence of the superior officers, Talbot's
was being commanded by its major, Hubblethorne, and Monk's by its
senior captain, Ethelbert Morgan. At Leith was "Wilkes's," also in charge of
its major, Hughes; while in widely scattered quarters in the country round
lay the general's own regiment of horse under Johnson, its senior captain.
These four men were summoned to Dalkeith and at once formed into a
Council of War, together with such well-affected officers as Monk had
managed to have about him in anticipation of the crisis. Their first step was
to stop the post into England, and then far into the night they sat
methodically but rapidly maturing every detail of the move. In the
morning all was in working order. Two of the impromptu Council, who
belonged to the garrisons at Perth and Ayr, were away at dawn to secure
those fortresses. They were only captains, but in his hour of need Monk
had hardly a single field-officer whom he could trust. At the same time
Johnson was despatching orderlies right and left to concentrate the horse:
Hubblethorne and Ethelbert Morgan were away again with secret orders;
and far and wide messengers were spurring to summon the most
dangerous officers to headquarters, while small parties of horse were
leisurely taking up their posts to waylay and arrest them as they came.
By dinner-time a troop of horse arrived at Dalkeith to escort the general to
Edinburgh. He had determined to take the capital in hand himself, and as
soon as he had dined he rode away. Meanwhile his secret orders had been
carried out to the letter. He found his own regiment and Talbot's paraded
in the High Street, and Captain Johnson in waiting with two more troops of
his horse. Satisfied with his inspection the general rode on quietly to his
quarters, and once there proceeded to cashier nearly the whole of the
officers of his own foot. The command was given to Morgan, and Major
Hubblethorne made lieutenant-colonel of the "Black Colours." This done he
returned to the High Street, and placing himself at the head of the two
regiments marched them down to the open space before Greyfriars'
Church. No sooner were they again in line than he ordered the arrest of the
whole of the cashiered officers. Resistance was out of the question. Monk's
own had been paraded without ammunition. The musketeers of the "Black
Colours" wore their bullet-bags and bandoliers; the sulphurous smell of
their matches perfumed the air with menace; at the general's back were his
faithful troops of horse—and his order was obeyed.
Without giving his leaderless regiment a moment to think Monk followed
up the blow with a pithy and soldier-like speech, asking them if they
thought it right for the Scotch army to submit to the insolent
extravagancies of the home forces. "For my own part," he cried, "I think
myself obliged by the duty of my place to keep the military power in
obedience to the civil. Since we have received our pay and commissions
from the Parliament it is our duty to defend them. In this I expect the ready
obedience of you all. But if any do declare their dissent to my resolution,
they shall have liberty to leave the service, and may take their passes to be
gone."
A thundering shout greeted his words. Not a man was there but cried with
wild enthusiasm he would live and die for "old George." Edinburgh was
won, but the day's work was not yet over. As he left the parade-ground a
despatch was put into his hand. It was from his friend Colonel Myers, the
governor of Berwick. The key of the London road was of the first
importance to Monk, and Myers declared he could not hold it against the
numerous Anabaptist officers in his command. Monk immediately ordered
a troop of horse to his assistance; but a new difficulty arose. Berwick was
forty miles away. Not a trooper was in Edinburgh who had not ridden
twenty that day. The roads were deep in mire, and every one declared the
march impossible. It was a word Monk did not often listen to. The march
must be made. The general appealed to Johnson as he only knew how, and
as the night fell the captain and his troop were spurring for the Border
through the Nether Bow Port.
Monk's drastic proceedings at Edinburgh were but a type of what
happened all over Scotland. By the time he had in person secured and
purged Leith and Linlithgow, messengers began to pour into headquarters
to report that everywhere his promptitude had paralysed resistance. Every
garrison was in his hands and every high-road was resounding with the
tramp of the troops he had ordered to concentrate on Edinburgh. There,
too, Colonel Cobbett arrived a prisoner. It was Johnson's offering to his
general. It had been the first act of the Committee of Safety to send up the
colonel post-haste to secure not only Berwick, but the Scotch army as well,
and to arrest Monk if he objected. A few hours before he reached the
Border Johnson's exhausted troop had toiled into Berwick, and Cobbett
arrived to find himself a prisoner.
Monk had now time to breathe. On the th the post was allowed to go, and
with it went three official letters from the general. One was to the Speaker,
laconically informing him that the Scotch army was at the service of the
Parliament if it were still under restraint, and that in accordance with his
new commission he had cashiered such officers as would not recognise its
authority. "I do call God to witness," he concluded, "that the asserting of a
Commonwealth is the only intent of my heart, and I desire if possible to
avoid the shedding of blood, and therefore entreat you that there may be a
good understanding between Parliament and army. But if they will not
obey your commands I will not desert you according to my duty and
promise."
In the same strain he wrote to Fleetwood imploring him to restore the
Parliament. "Otherwise," he says, "I am resolved by the assistance of God,
with this army under my command, to declare for them and prosecute this
just cause to the last drop of my blood.... I do plainly assure your lordship I
was never better satisfied with the justice of any engagement than in this....
I desire your lordship not to be deluded by the specious pretences of any
ambitious person whatever." He speaks pathetically of his shame to see his
country the scorn of Europe, and again calls God to witness he has no other
end than the Restoration of parliamentary authority, "and those good laws
which our ancestors have purchased with so much blood.... And I take
myself so far obliged, being in the Parliament's service, to stand though
alone in this quarrel."
The third letter was to Lambert. He was "the ambitious person" on whom
Monk had his eye; and short and sharp as the letter was, he was careful to
let his old rival know that he suspected him of aiming at a dictatorship. He
repeated his determination to stand by the evicted Parliament; "for, sir," he
concluded, "the nature of England will not endure any arbitrary power,
neither will any true Englishman in the army, so that such a design will be
ruinous and destructive. Therefore I do earnestly entreat you that we may
not be a scorn to all the world and a prey to our enemies, that the
Parliament may be speedily restored to their freedom which they enjoyed
on the th of this instant."
These plain-spoken letters fell like thunderbolts amongst the London
officers. Fleetwood, Lambert, and Desborough met at Whitehall in
consternation. With the short-sighted conceit of second-rate men they had
practically omitted Monk from their calculations. They had mistaken his
modest ambitions for indifference. The Quixotic loyalty which had made
him submit to the insolent orders of the war-office while Parliament was
sitting, they had taken for stupidity. Now with the suddenness of a dream
this despised soldier of fortune, this exalted drill-sergeant, as they thought
him, towered like a giant before them as the three politicians sat together
astounded. Midnight struck, and with the madness of doomed men they
sent for Clarges. The result of the interview with Monk's subtle agent was
that he and Colonel Talbot were ordered to start for Scotland within three
hours to invite Monk to agree to an armistice preliminary to settling their
quarrel by a treaty.
Their action was none too prompt. They knew well enough what to expect
when Monk had once declared. We know the importance he attached to
the first rapid moves of a campaign. Lambert at least was aware of his
methods, and knew he would not waste a moment. Nor did he. No sooner
were the Scotch garrisons safe than a party of horse was sent to secure
Carlisle, and a small mixed column was pushed forward from Berwick to
surprise Newcastle. The attempt on Carlisle failed, through the
incompetency of the officer in command. The Newcastle column came to a
halt at Morpeth. Colonel Lilburne, the man whom Monk had superseded in
Scotland, and who was now in command of the northern district, had
thrown himself with a strong reinforcement into the threatened town.
Determined to avoid a conflict till he was ready, Monk ordered a retreat to
Alnwick.
As it happened, no accident could have been more fortunate for the success
of Monk's designs. Had he taken Newcastle, in a week it would have been
besieged by Lambert and Monk could not have moved to its relief. Owing
to the weather the Scotch army was concentrating with exasperating
slowness, and insubordination was by no means at an end. Wholesale
desertions began to take place. Men were whispering that the general "had
the King in his belly." To stop their mouths he convened a permanent
Council of War and committed to it the whole of his correspondence. He
used the press freely, and printed all his official letters. But difficulties
seemed to grow every day. The armies of England and Ireland refused to
join him, and the fleet followed their example. In the midst of his
perplexities Clarges arrived at Edinburgh, and showed him where his
escape lay. The Treasury in London was empty; Monk's was overflowing.
Lambert must place his troops at free quarters, and pay them with plunder.
It was a mere matter of time for the whole country to turn against him, and
for his army to melt away piecemeal. Immediate action was Lambert's only
game. Every day he must grow weaker, while Monk was ever gathering
new strength as troop after troop and company after company marched
into Edinburgh from the Highlands.
In negotiation Monk saw the delay he needed. His Council of War, being
thoroughly averse to fighting their comrades who had bled for the old
cause, embraced the idea with enthusiasm, and a commission, consisting of
three colonels whom Monk trusted, was appointed to treat with the
Committee of Safety. A warm debate took place over the bases of
negotiation. The Council were inclined to ask for a new Parliament. Monk
insisted on the restoration of his masters, nor would he consent to the
counter-proposition unless it were made contingent on the refusal of the
Rump to sit. Not content with this, he gave the commissioners secret
instructions before they left not to disclose their power to treat for a new
Parliament till the last moment. For he well knew that Fleetwood and
Lambert would never agree to restore the Rump if there was a possibility
of a settlement on any other terms. Having thus very cleverly thrown back
the onus of a civil war on Lambert, while at the same time he had done his
strict duty to his commission and his best to prolong the negotiations,
Monk agreed to an armistice, and allowed the commission to depart.
At York they found Lambert with the head-quarters of the English army.
Professing an authority from the Committee of Safety, he made an effort to
treat with them on the spot. But mindful of their secret instructions they
insisted on the question of the Parliament being first settled, and he was
compelled to suffer them to proceed on their journey.
But even then his evil genius had not done with him. He felt that by
allowing the negotiations to go forward he had removed one of his rival's
difficulties. In a desperate effort to recover the ground he had thus lost he
removed the other. All that Monk now required was a man whom he could
trust to reorganise his army, and reduce it to the obedient machine of his
ideal. The one man in the world to do it was his old comrade Morgan, who
had recently returned from serving with the English contingent in the Low
Countries under Turenne. He was still Major-general on the Scotch
establishment, but had been laid up at York with gout. He was now
recovered, and Monk had written to him to rejoin. The letter had been
intercepted by Lilburne, and Morgan was still at York pretending to
disapprove of the Scotch proceedings. His importance was well
understood. Next to Monk he was considered the finest soldier in the three
kingdoms. After his brilliant capture of Ypres, the great Turenne had
embraced him on the shattered walls and told him with effusion he was
amongst the bravest captains of his time. Yet this was the man that
Lambert, with the fatuity of those whom Heaven has doomed, chose to
send to Monk in order to induce him to lay down his arms.
What happened when the two old comrades met was only to be expected.
Morgan delivered his message with a laugh, but never took back an
answer. That was more than he had promised. He told his friend he had
come to return to his duty, for he was no politician, and felt his best course
was to follow a man whom he knew to be a true lover of his country.
The presence of the fiery little dragoon made itself felt immediately.
Cashiering and remodelling went on briskly, and so great was the
enthusiasm which Morgan inspired that, in spite of the efforts of
incendiaries from London, desertions entirely ceased. Without further
anxiety Monk was able to devote himself to his statecraft. His
correspondence at this time was enormous. Openly or in secret he was in
communication with men of all shades of opinion, from constitutional
Royalists like Lord Fairfax to pronounced Republicans like Haslerig. From
all sides came envoys to expostulate or encourage. From Ireland Cornet
Monk brought a message from the general's old comrades Coote and Jones,
that they had every hope the Irish army would declare for him before long.
The London Independents despatched delegates to mediate. Whatever the
pretence, every one was trying to find out what the silent soldier intended.
The burden of his answer was the same to all, that unless Lambert and his
friends restored the Parliament, "he meant to lay them on their backs." For
Haslerig and the Independents it was too much, for Lord Fairfax and the
men of Booth's insurrection too little. The whole question was, what
Parliament did he mean to restore? Was it the Long Parliament as it existed
before Cromwell purged it of the Presbyterian Royalists, or was it the
Republican Rump that was left when they were gone? The former meant a
constitutional restoration; the latter a continuance of the republic.
But this alternative by no means sums up the political situation with which
Monk suddenly found himself face to face. The complex condition of
parties at this time is only comparable to that which exists in France to-day.
In the place of the Legitimists were the old Cavaliers, in that of the
Orleanists were the Moderate Royalists, who looked to a restoration by
constitutional means. But there was this wide difference. Both monarchical
parties supported the same dynasty, and together they formed the majority
of the kingdom. They included practically the whole of the country
gentlemen and all the Presbyterians of the Covenant. And whatever Monk
might think of the expediency of a restoration, they represented the ideas
which in his heart he regarded with the greatest favour. Next in strength
and in Monk's sympathy was the party which corresponds to the French
Moderate Republicans. It consisted of the old Commonwealth men, with
Haslerig and Vane at their head, and was represented by the Rump, but it
must be always remembered that they repudiated the idea of a president.
For Napoleonists there were the Cromwellians, who, though now an
exhausted and leaderless party, still clung to the principle of a protectorate.
The field which the pure Opportunists occupy was filled by Lambert and
his admirers, who, while they branded Haslerig as a reactionary, coquetted
with the King. Together these two groups formed the right of the Army-
party, which was held together by a vague policy of the supremacy of the
military over the civil power. Its left looked to Fleetwood. Like the extreme
left in France, this faction included men of a great variety of opinions, and
in striking analogy to contemporary political phenomena, its moving
spirits were the Anabaptists and Fifth Monarchy men, the Socialists and
Anarchists of the time.
It is not of course pretended that the parallel is exact, but it is sufficiently
close to bring the situation vividly before us; and when we remember that
as inFrance the parties were constantly combining into new groups, and
further how complicated the whole position was by religious differences, it
will serve as well as a detailed account to picture for us the labyrinth
through which Monk was about to try and thread his way without
violating the sacredness of his commission. No man ever approached a
situation so difficult with so little experience or assistance. "Counsellor I
have none to rely on," he is reported to have said at this time. "Many of my
officers have been false, and that all the rest will prove true is too much
gaiety to hope. But religion, law, liberty, and my own fame are at stake. I
will go on and leave the event to God." No aim more patriotic was ever set
up with more manly devotion. His success was then and still is regarded as
an accident or a miracle. Be that as it may, in the whole roll of history there
can be found no greater moral lesson than the story of the plain and
steadfast purpose with which at last the end was won.
 CHAPTER XI
THE BLOODLESS CAMPAIGN
By the middle of November the Scotch army was thoroughly remodelled
and placed on its war-footing. Certain of the failure of the negotiations and
regardless of the hardships of a winter campaign, on the th Monk began to
move for the front. In his rear all was secure in spite of the denudation of
the garrisons. Their fortifications had been freely dismantled, and by
calling a Convention Parliament under the presidency of Glencairn he had
come to a definite understanding with the Scots. So excellent were the
relations he had established with them by his just and sympathetic
government, severe as it was, that without holding out the slightest hope of
a restoration he had received from them an undertaking that the country
would not only remain quiet, but even assist him with a large force. The
last offer he was prudent enough to refuse, fearing it would bring him
under suspicion of Royalism.
The first halt was at Haddington. Everything had gone well, and the
general was sitting down to supper with his officers amidst the hopeful
excitement that marks the first move to the front. Hardly, however, had
grace been said when some officers from London were announced. They
presented the general with a packet. He tore it open where he sat, read it
through, and then tossing it to his officers abruptly left the room without a
word. With cries of rage they found it was a treaty into which their
commissioners had been cheated and coerced, and which conceded to the
Committee of Safety every point upon which the Scotch army had insisted.
It was a blow heavy enough to crush the stoutest heart, and at daybreak the
general returned to Edinburgh, where the news had already raised a storm
of fury. Officers crowded to head-quarters with despair and anger on their
faces, and eagerly waited till Monk had done his breakfast. At last he
strode into the ante-room and began talking up and down in sullen silence.
Not a word was spoken till his confidant, Dr. Gumble, ventured to accost
him. "What do you think of this agreement?" said the general abruptly. The
doctor replied at once by asking leave to escape into Holland, for whatever
the rest might hope he knew his life was not safe. "What!" cried Monk
angrily, "do you lay the blame on me? If the army will stick to me I will
stick to them." A burst of enthusiasm greeted his words. Every officer
present vowed he would live and die with him, and shout after shout of joy
re-echoed through the city as the news spread through the ranks of the
soldiers.
A confidential council was called in the afternoon, and it was decided
instead of repudiating the treaty to prolong the negotiations. To this end it
was resolved to request a conference at Alnwick to explain doubtful points
in the articles on the ground that they appeared to be inconsistent with the
commissioners' instructions. Next morning a general advance to the Border
was ordered, and by the end of the month the head-quarters were at
Berwick. Another delay was gained, and to prevent the possibility of a
premature collision Monk withdrew his outpost in Northumberland. Every
day some encouraging news added a fresh value to the armistice. Clarges
had returned to London, but before he left Edinburgh Monk had told him
that if he restored the Parliament he should not feel it his duty to prevent
the secluded members resuming their seats. With this the astute
commissary had been able to satisfy Lord Fairfax on his way south, and
was now able to announce that the Yorkshire gentlemen would be ready to
rise for a free Parliament by the middle of January. The old Council of State
had met in secret at the capital, and sent down to Monk a commission as
general of all the forces in England and Scotland. Fleetwood was growing
more suspicious of Lambert every hour, and in his anxiety to come to an
understanding with Monk agreed to the proposed conference. Lambert
was in despair. His army at Newcastle was showing signs of
insubordination. Money was running short. The ranks were full of sectaries
devoted to Fleetwood. He knew that further delay meant ruin, and he
despatched Colonel Zankey to Berwick with fresh proposals on his own
account to hasten the ratification of the treaty. Zankey arrived early in
December, in company with the retreating outpost from Alnwick. In high
spirits at this new sign of discord in the enemy's camp the Council met. A
long bantering discussion ensued. Every argument which Zankey could
urge was made light of, his terms refused, and Monk, well satisfied with
the day's work, went to bed—but not to rest.
At one o'clock in the morning he was aroused with alarming news. A
strong brigade of Lambert's cavalry with two guns had seized Chillingham
Castle, which was but twenty miles from the Border. Furious to think that
the precious armistice was broken, and still more that Lambert should have
taken advantage of the withdrawal of the outposts to cover an advance
with a flag of truce, he ordered Zankey's instant arrest. It was a fearful
night. The darkness was impenetrable and a storm was raging. But at such
a moment nothing mattered to the tough old campaigner. In an hour his
orders for the army were written, and he was galloping away recklessly to
inspect the fords uphill and downhill along the frozen roads, regardless of
the protests of his staff. "It was God's infinite mercy we had not our necks
broke," wrote one of them afterwards. At Norham the storm had increased
to such a fury that he was compelled to take shelter in the castle. By
daylight, however, he had visited every pass over the Tweed, and a little
before noon he reached Coldstream, where he intended to make his head-
quarters. Here was the best ford over the river, and he had ordered a
strong force to muster for its protection. So well had his orders been
obeyed that he found his troops had already consumed everything that
was fit for food or drink in the place. But "old George" was as indifferent to
hunger as he was to fatigue. In dismay his staff saw him sit down in a
small cottage and quietly take out a quid of tobacco. It was for him all that
Captain Bobadil boasted. His staff stole away to hunt for a dinner, and
when they returned the general was still serenely chewing where they had
left him.
Lambert's supposed advance had proved a false alarm. It was but an
unauthorised raid for plunder. But it was enough to show the old strategist
his danger. If Lambert had the sense or power to make a dash over the
Border with his thousands of horse and mounted infantry, Monk was so
weak in those arms that he would be compelled to retreat, and retreat
meant ruin. Everything depended on a strong defensive position, and with
consummate skill he marked one out. The bulk of the little army was
stationed on the right at Kelso, and intrusted to Morgan, who had orders to
exercise it daily in the general's pet formation of mixed files of horse and
foot. From Kelso as far as Berwick every pass was occupied, and the troops
quartered in the neighbouring villages and farmsteads. Yet within four
hours, so nicely was every detail adjusted, the whole force could be
concentrated on a given point. The position was practically impregnable.
The desolate character of the country in its front rendered an attack in force
impossible. Even if Lambert could have induced his pampered army to
move, he could not have fed them for the time a concentration would take
in the fearful weather that prevailed. If he attempted a turning movement
by the Carlisle road Monk would get three days' start in London, and the
Scotch army was too strong to be checked by any force that Lambert could
safely detach from his main body.
To perfect his masterly disposition Monk established himself in the centre
at Coldstream. His quarters were a smoky little thatched cottage with but
one room. His bed was so small that he used it as a pillow, with his legs
and body resting uneasily on benches. Indeed he and his officers suffered
here every hardship that bad lodging, worse food, and intense cold could
inflict; but such was the spirit which the general's example infused that the
only effect of their sufferings was to arouse a cheery spirit of freemasonry
among them. Till their dying day it was their pride to be called
Coldstreamers. They never ceased to bore their friends with Coldstream
stories, nor tired of joking about the chapel in the cowhouse and the beer
that went bad before it got cold.
Severe as were their privations, for the rest of the year they had to bear
them with as much of the general's equanimity as they could attain. As for
him, he never left his quarters for a night except once, to meet the delegates
of the Scots Convention at Berwick for the final settlement of the affairs of
the interior while he was away. For the rest comfort was not wanting. The
colder it grew the more difficult it was for Lambert to move, and if good
liquor was scarce, good news flowed in plenty through the secret channels
which Clarges had laid. In London riots were being suppressed with
bloodshed, and mutiny was threatening at Newcastle. The Fanatics of
Fleetwood's party, of whom the army was full, began to distrust Lambert's
ambition, while Monk's judicious refusal to allow the Scots to arm restored
the confidence of those who had hitherto suspected him of malignancy.
The Irish regiments had not forgotten him; the Parliament's guards were
plainly inclined to its champion; at head-quarters mutinies daily alarmed
the Council; and Fleetwood's only idea of restoring discipline was to fall on
his knees at the head of the disaffected regiments and say his prayers.
Still the negotiations could not be prolonged for ever, ingenious as was the
committee which Monk had appointed to carry them on. It was therefore
an immense relief when tidings came that the governor of Portsmouth had
opened his gates to Haslerig, Morley, and Walton. Monk at once sent to
Lambert to say that as three of his fellow-commissioners had returned to
their duty he could not continue the negotiation without consulting them.
"He has not used me well," said poor Lambert, and refused to grant a pass
to Portsmouth. Monk's messenger had to return, but not empty. He came
bursting with news. Vice-Admiral Lawson had declared for Monk's
programme, and the fleet was threatening to blockade the Thames. In the
same hour from Portpatrick arrived an officer to tell how the general's old
comrades had seized Dublin Castle, and that the Irish army was ready to
assist him actively. In the midst of the thanksgivings for these mercies a
kinsman of Lord Fairfax stole over the hills to announce that the Yorkshire
gentlemen would be ready to fall on Lambert's rear by New Year's Day,
and at the Yorkshire general's request Monk promised to watch Lambert
"as a cat did a mouse," and to advance to their assistance the moment there
was a sign of a movement against them.
Indeed things were going almost too well. Price grew alarmed that the
Rump was going to triumph completely, and though his dangerous
presence was tabooed by Monk he stole into head-quarters in the dead of
night. Rousing the weary soldier from his uneasy couch he implored him
to remember the "old known laws." "Mr. Price," said Monk passionately, "I
know your meaning, and I have known it. By the grace of God I will do it if
ever I can find it in my power; and I do not much doubt but that I shall."
Then seizing both his chaplain's hands he said again, "By God's help I will
do it." It is perfectly clear that Monk's love for his country inspired him
with a desire to see monarchy re-established by a free Parliament as the
only durable settlement, and that at this moment he was very hopeful
about it. It is equally certain he did not intend to restore Charles by force;
and even if a Stuart were in his eyes worth a drop of English blood, even if
he had had any faith in a settlement that was founded in civil war, his
creed was still unshaken, and he meant so far as in him lay to keep the
army from meddling with the civil power. He held the commission of the
Rump, and had signified his intention to be loyal to it by signing a
manifesto of the army by which he bound himself to restore the Parliament
as it was before the late coup d'état.
Price's anxiety was but too well justified. On the last day of the year a
messenger came ploughing through the snow to Coldstream with startling
news. Fleetwood's army had mutinied. "The Lord had spit in his face." He
had given up the game, and the Rump was sitting again at Westminster.
Fortunately it was not the end of the tidings. Fairfax had been compelled to
rise prematurely, owing to the discovery of his plot, and Monk promptly
issued orders for the little army to concentrate on Coldstream. Despatch
after despatch interrupted his preparations. Lilburne's regiment had
deserted to Fairfax, and the whole Irish Brigade had followed its example.
It was clear that Lambert's only chance was a swift back-stroke at Fairfax,
and Monk determined to anticipate the intelligence he hourly expected. As
the first gray beams of the year began to streak the leaden sky they lit up a
memorable picture. Erect in his saddle amidst the trampled snow sat the
warlike figure of the great soldier of fortune, on whose sagacity hung the
destiny of Britain; and past him filed rank after rank the vanguard of his
toil-stained troops as they strode cheerily on to cross the white plain of the
frozen Tweed.
The famous movement had begun. Colonel Knight, by a splendid march
through the snow, reached Morpeth with the vanguard the same evening.
Finding Lambert had fallen back against Fairfax, he continued his advance,
and the following morning surprised and seized Newcastle at break of day.
The general followed with the rest of the army. All told it consisted of but
four weak regiments of horse and six fine ones of foot. It was divided into
two brigades, one under himself and the other under Morgan. The first
night they reached Wooler, and heard officially from the Speaker of the
restoration of the Rump, and unofficially that Lambert, deserted by his
army, had disappeared. The Speaker's letter contained an acknowledgment
of Monk's services, but no orders. He therefore ignored his unofficial
intelligence and continued his advance. On the th he reached Morpeth,
where he was received by the Sheriff of Northumberland. Next day arrived
from London the City Sword-bearer with a petition from the Lord Mayor
and Corporation that he would declare for a full Parliament, as they were
unrepresented in the Rump. A deputation from the Newcastle municipality
invited him to the town, and accordingly he entered it amidst the first of
those ovations which were to mark every step of his memorable march.
Yet in spite of the enthusiasm that his soldierly figure excited whenever it
appeared in the streets, Monk could not congratulate himself on his
position. He had practically failed. Instead of giving his country a free
Parliament he had restored the Rump. For England he saw nothing but
new political troubles, for himself a repetition of the suspicion and
ingratitude he had already experienced. Still he held their commission, and
felt bound to do his duty to them. All else was dark before him. So Dr.
Gumble was sent to London to convey his compliments and humble advice
to the authorities, and as secretly as possible to see what could be made out
of the situation. Nor did he depart further from the path of duty than to
allow an officer to proceed to his old comrades in Ireland, suggesting that
the Irish army should petition for a free Parliament.
From Coldstream, as soon as he heard the Rump was sitting, he had
written to the Speaker for orders. As yet none had arrived, and he
determined, in pursuance of his new authority as commander-in-chief, to
advance to York. There he arrived on the th, to find no trace of Fairfax or
his party. They had disappeared, and the city was in the hands of troops
who had gone over to the Parliament. The rest of Lambert's deserters had
joined the Yorkshire gentlemen, but had sent to the right-about every
Cavalier that had shown himself at the rendezvous. Buckingham himself,
Fairfax's own son-in-law, had had to go in spite of his irreproachable
professions. York had refused to receive any of Fairfax's partisans. Lord
Fairfax himself, sensible of a fiasco, had made a fit of the gout an excuse for
retiring to his own house. However, on Monk's arrival he entered the city
in state to see him. With every argument he urged him to stay where he
was and declare for the King. Monk of course refused, but he could not
prevent his association with Fairfax arousing the old suspicions. No means
was omitted to clear himself. An officer was heard to say that Monk would
at last bring in Charles Stuart, and the old general, in a fit of exasperation,
publicly gave him a sound thrashing for his pains.
Still these suspicions were not without their value. The Rump shared them.
They dare not leave him with Fairfax; they dare not order him to retreat.
There was no course but to tell him to advance, and Monk obeyed with
alacrity. Sending Morgan back to keep Scotland quiet, and leaving Colonel
Fairfax to occupy York, he marched on the th with an army increased, by a
careful selection from Lambert's deserters, to nearly six thousand men. His
progress was a triumph. The peasantry thronged to the highway to stare at
the deliverer as he passed. The church-bells rang. The gentry came in
troops with addresses, urging on him the necessity of a full Parliament.
Silent as a sphinx, the harassed soldier rode on through it all, while all the
world watched him. Every eye, every ear, was strained for a sign; and a
safe platitude or two about his country's welfare and the duty of his place
was all that could be dragged from his impenetrable reserve.
As he advanced his perplexities and his silence increased. On the th
Gumble met him at Mansfield to say that already half the House were his
declared enemies. An oath for the abjuration of the Stuart dynasty had
been imposed upon the new Council of State, of which he had been made a
member. An attempt, however, to order its administration to the House
had led to a determined resistance from the best of the old Commonwealth
men. The House was split into two factions, and Monk's popularity with
the non-abjurers was but adding to the suspicions of the abjurers. At
Nottingham Clarges arrived to confirm and add to Gumble's intelligence.
A deputation, consisting of Scot, the new Secretary of State, and Robinson,
another abjuring member of the Government, was on its way to offer him
the congratulations of the House, but with secret instructions to watch his
every movement and endeavour to entrap him into abjuring. The London
garrison, too, had by no means acquiesced in Fleetwood's surrender, and
was still in a state of sullen hostility. It was clear that the crisis was not yet
at an end, and there was still hope for Monk, that if he could once establish
himself in London and keep things quiet, one party or the other would
force on a general election. The chief difficulty was Fleetwood's army. It
was stronger than Monk's, and out of its entire roll only two foot
regiments, Morley's and Fagg's, could be trusted. Ashley Cooper had a
regiment of horse, but it certainly would not obey him. Fortunately in the
House the non-abjurers were in the majority, and at Clarges's suggestion
Monk used his few remaining hours of liberty to prepare a letter to the
Speaker pointing out the advisability of removing from about the
Parliament the regiments which were as yet hardly cool from rebellion.
On Monday the nd he continued his march, and before Leicester was
reached Scot and Robinson appeared. From that moment he could not call
his soul his own. By day they had him to ride in their coach, by night they
bored holes in the partitions that separated their room from his. They got
up discussions at meals and stood at his elbow while he received the
endless deputations and addresses that were showered in his path. All was
of no avail. The old soldier stuck to the plain rule that had served him so
well through life, and was not to be caught. Finding the situation was
getting beyond him, he patiently resumed his unassailable position of the
obedient and disinterested soldier of fortune. He received the
commissioners as his superior officers. The troops had orders to halt and
present arms whenever their coach passed, and in every way they were
treated with the ceremony reserved for a commander-in-chief. The
commissioners were delighted, and sent glowing accounts to the Speaker.
They even accepted the general's excuse for not at once taking the Oath of
Abjuration. He had understood, he said, that some members of the
Government had refused it, and he felt it was better to wait till he got to
London and could hear both sides.
The deputations from the city and the counties that met him at every town
as he proceeded knew not what to make of it. The general received them
with the utmost civility, and the commissioners railed at their petitions.
The principal points they variously urged were a full and free Parliament, a
dissolution, and the admission of the members secluded in without any
previous oath or engagement. Sometimes the general found himself
compelled to answer them. If the Parliament were not yet free, he told
them, he would endeavour to remove the restraint that remained. The
House had already decided to fill up the vacant places, and then it would
be full. It had agreed to dissolve itself of its own accord, and as for
admitting members to sit without any engagement to the Government,
such a thing was never heard of, and besides, the House had decided not to
readmit them. And he politely expressed his surprise that they thought
him capable of so far forgetting his duty to his commission as to question
the resolution. Thoroughly disheartened the deputations retired to fall into
the hands of enthusiastic staff-officers, who filled them with new wonder.
Monk seems to have told his friends to do their best to remove any bad
impression his reception of the addresses might arouse, and they
interpreted their instructions with some freedom. Lavish promises were
made in the general's name, and every one was told to proceed actively
with the petitioning without paying the slightest attention to what Monk
pretended to think of them.
So the people only shouted more loudly and the bells rang more merrily as
the triumph went on through Harborough, Northampton, Dunstable, till
on the th St. Albans was reached. Here a halt was made to allow the
columns to close up and for the crucial request to be made. For Monk
determined from here to despatch the letter which had been prepared at
Nottingham. Clarges was sent on before to pave the way for its reception. It
was a critical moment. The House had just confirmed Monk's commission
of general. It was a rank then considered so dangerously exalted as to be
hardly ever conferred. Indeed before the Revolution it had seldom been
borne except by the sovereign, and already the quidnuncs began to talk of
his alliance with the Plantagenets. It was the very point upon which the
leaders of the army had finally broken with Parliament, and the first act of
Monk in his new capacity was to request that the whole of Fleetwood's
troops might be removed from the capital to make way for his own.
A violent debate ensued. Haslerig opposed it with all his weight, but so
well organised were the non-abjurers and so favourable had been Scot's
reports that the request was granted. The great difficulty was overcome,
and on February nd Monk moved to Barnet. That night for the first time
the commissioners slept in another house. Apparently they intended to
make one despairing effort on the part of the abjurers to keep Monk from
peacefully occupying the capital. At all events about midnight the
Secretary of State rushed into Monk's quarters in his night-shirt and
slippers crying that the apprentices were out and the garrison in mutiny.
He implored, he commanded Monk to march on the spot and restore order,
but the old general was perfectly unmoved. He grimly told him he would
undertake to be in London early enough in the morning to prevent
mischief, and Scot had to go back to bed. Some considerable disturbance
there had been, but before Monk marched next day it had been easily
suppressed by a few troops of horse and something on account of arrears.
Next night there was high feasting at Westminster. Weeks ago at Holyrood
Monk's butler had promised the staff a bottle of wine at Whitehall on
Candlemas Day. He was a wag whom Charles the First had mock-knighted
one evening at supper with his table-knife in the old days at Oxford. It was
only a day late, and "Sir" Ralph Mort was called on to pay his wager as the
general sat with the Coldstreamers in the "Prince's Apartment" rejoicing at
the success of their move. Everything had gone well. Days before at
Nottingham the details of the occupation had been arranged, and the
troops had quietly marched to their quarters without a hitch. True the
Coldstreamers' reception had not been enthusiastic. In vain had Monk
ridden down Chancery Lane and the Strand at the head of his army, with
trumpeters and led horses and all the pomp of a general in the field. In vain
was his staff swelled by a brilliant crowd of gaily-dressed gentlemen. For
the thoughtful the general's intentions were too dark: for the thoughtless
his troops were too shabby; and the entry was made with the cold precision
of an operation of war.
 CHAPTER XII
ON THE WINGS OF THE STORM
With Monk's success his real difficulties began. His first act was to attend
the Council of State. The Oath of Abjuration was tendered to him and he
refused it. A third of the Council had done the same, and amongst them
irreproachable Republicans. He suggested a conference between the two
parties to settle the point. For the present he certainly could not take it. He
must consult the Coldstreamers. "The officers of my army," he said, and his
words must have sounded strangely like a threat, "are very tender in taking
oaths." So he returned to his apartments to be besieged with callers.
Politicians were there eager for a word on which to work, and astute
foreign ministers at their wits' end what to report to their respective
governments. For every one a discreet answer had to be provided. All
Sunday the game continued with little relief, except a secret information
that Scot's son had been boasting how in a few days the general would be
in the Tower with his head in danger.
Monk wisely took no more notice of the information than to display his
force by lining the way from Whitehall to Westminster with a "triumphant
guard" as on Monday he went down in state to receive the thanks of
Parliament. Scot had told him that a declaration of his devotion to the
House and his dislike of the addresses was expected. It was a trying ordeal,
but his blunt honesty took him through. A chair of state had been placed
for him at the bar, but he refused to sit, as unbecoming a servant of the
Parliament. Standing he received the fulsome vote of thanks, and then
leaning over the back of the chair, he made his modest acknowledgments,
protesting he had done no more than his duty. As though he were making
an official report of matters in which he had no personal concern, he told
them that on his way to town he had observed the country to be very
anxious for a settlement, and that a number of addresses had been
presented to him. The demands they contained and his own
unexceptionable answers were summarised with soldier-like brevity. "But
although I said it not to them," he continued, "I must say (with pardon) to
you; that the less oaths and engagements are imposed (with respect had to
the security of the common cause) the sooner your settlement will be
attained to.... I know all the sober gentry will close with you if they may be
tenderly and gently used. And I am sure you will so use them; as knowing
it to be the common concern to amplify and not lessen our interest, and to
be careful that neither the Cavalier nor the Fanatic party have a share in
your civil or military power." In conclusion he respectfully called attention
to the advisability of confirming the land-grants of the Irish soldiers and
adventurers, and of settling several points for the better and more equable
administration of Scotland.
Nothing could have been done better. The immediate effect of the speech
was an immense increase in Monk's popularity. The conservative
Republicans were delighted at his deferential demeanour; their ladies,
returning from Mrs. Monk's reception at Whitehall, approved her
sweetmeats, and complacently noted how she had helped them to wine
with her own hand; while the country at large read the general's speech as
a threat to the oligarchy which oppressed it. The city was enthusiastic, for
not only did it begin to doubt the sincerity of his devotion to the Rump, but
by his conclusion about Ireland the capitalists saw in him their champion.
And, as we have seen, at such a crisis the capitalists had then the same
peculiar influences which they have exercised under similar conditions in
more modern times.
In fact from this moment the city became the scene on which the drama of
the Restoration was to be played out. A week ago Mordaunt had arrived
on a special mission from Charles to assure the Corporation of his
constitutional intentions should he return, and the city had definitely
turned its face to the King. The situation which the prevailing political
uncertainty had brought about was no longer endurable. Trade was in a
state of complete stagnation. Property was felt to be unsafe. The city was
without a single representative in Parliament. It saw the moment had come
for a decisive step, and two days after Monk's speech, on the ground that
the sitting Parliament was not a representative assembly, the Common
Council resolved to pay no more taxes till the House had filled up its
vacancies.
Monk's principles were immediately put to a severe test. It was late at night
when the vote of defiance became known at Whitehall, but a summons
came for his instant attendance at the Council of State. The hours went by
and he did not return. His friends remembered young Scot's boast, and
gathered in alarm. Ashley Cooper tried to take his seat in the Council-
chamber, but found it locked and guarded. Mrs. Monk hammered on the
door and cried frantically to her husband, but not a sound came back. In
despair she retired to her apartments, and it was past two before she was
relieved by her husband's reappearance. Then it was only for a moment. To
his friends' dismay he briefly told them that at daybreak the city was to be
occupied, and then refusing to listen to any one went to bed. His
paymasters had ordered him to coerce those on whom all his hopes
depended, and he was going to obey.
The movement was punctually carried out, and no sooner were the guards
set and the troops at their quarters than Monk, in accordance with his
instructions, sent for a number of the leading citizens and placed them
under arrest. This done, to the amazement of his officers, he ordered them
to remove the city gates and portcullises, and the post and chains by which
the streets were barricaded. In vain they protested, in vain his most
devoted followers tendered their commissions. His only reply was to order
the subordinate officers to do the work of their superiors. Of so astounding
a piece of obedience no one knew what to think. The common soldiers
were inclined to look upon it as a joke; the officers were in despair. At last a
deputation of the Corporation waited on him to expostulate, and promise
that if he would desist the Common Council would meet early on the
morrow and reconsider its determination.
Monk at once complied, and reported to the Council of State
recommending a lenient course. They replied brutally that they had
dissolved the Common Council, and that he was not only to take down the
gates but to break them in pieces. Again he obeyed. "Now, George," cried
Haslerig when he heard of it, "we have thee for ever, body and soul." On
the morrow, with growing anger, the troops recommenced the hateful
work. They fraternised with the people, and together they railed at the
Rump. Morley, who held the Tower, came and offered to declare against
the men of Westminster if Monk would only give the word. His warmest
friends went to reason with him, but the general sat in his quarters at the
Three Tuns, near Guildhall, grimly chewing his tobacco, and no one dare
speak to him. So extraordinary was his conduct that his officers began to
believe he had some deep design. The orders were carried out to the last
letter; guards were set at all the important points, and in the afternoon the
rest of the army marched back to its quarters about Westminster.
Haslerig and his friends had won an incalculable victory. On Monk hung
the hopes of the country, and they had deliberately struck him a fatal blow
where they knew his spotless sense of honour exposed him without
defence to their attack. His position was indeed desperate, and no sooner
was he alone at Whitehall than Clarges came in to point out the extremity
of his danger. The wanton insult he had put upon the liberties of the great
municipal corporation must turn against him not only every town in the
kingdom, but the whole influence of finance and commerce. It was the
deliberate intention of the Council that it should. Nothing could now save
him but to return immediately to the city and declare for a free Parliament.
Monk would not listen. Clarges in desperation began to urge the folly of
being true to men who did not keep their side of the engagement. He
showed the general how through the whole affair he had been treated with
contempt. Ever since his entry into London the Government had habitually
called him "Commissioner" Monk. They had denied him the very rank they
themselves had conferred upon him, and violated the commission on
which he based his obedience. The general began to waver. He felt the
injustice keenly, and confessed at last that something must be done to
regain the country's esteem. With that he dismissed his kinsman, saying
that he would take till Tuesday to consider what course he should adopt.
It was Friday. By Tuesday the news would be all over the kingdom and he
a ruined man. It was absolutely necessary to do something at once.
Presently Clarges returned with Dr. Barrow, the general's private physician
and judge-advocate, a man who had been of great service throughout. Two
or three officers accompanied them, with whom they had privately agreed
to brave the general's displeasure in one more effort to save him from his
rigid integrity. With the vehemence of despair they poured out proof after
proof of the Rump's iniquitous intentions. Haslerig was in correspondence
with Lambert. Ludlow, whom Monk had accused of treason on Coote's
information, still sat in his place. A tumultuous petition in favour of strict
abjuration had been fomented and received by the House at the hands of
Praise-God Barebones himself, the ringleader of those very fanatics against
whom he had come to act. The Council was even then, it was said,
considering whether they should cashier him on the ground that in leaving
the city he had disobeyed its orders. After all his devotion it was more than
the honest soldier could endure, and reluctantly he consented to march
into the city next day. Having issued his orders accordingly, he told his
little council to prepare some excuse to the Parliament. No excuse could be
found. The general was worn out; for the last two nights he had had no
sleep; unable to resist any longer, he at last allowed a letter to be prepared,
setting out the real reasons of the movement and demanding the House to
keep its word. With that he went to bed, and all through the night the four
councillors that remained were busy with the manifesto.
Early next morning the members came down to the House in the ordinary
course. The guards were all on duty as usual, and the Speaker proceeded to
take the chair. No sooner, however, was business begun than two of
Monk's colonels came in with a long letter signed by the general and
fourteen of his field-officers. In respectful but unequivocal language it
charged them with deliberately seeking to undo all the good that had been
effected by their restoration. It desired them, therefore, to show their good
intentions by settling the qualification of members and issuing writs for the
vacant seats by the next Friday. It reminded them that the date fixed for
their dissolution was at hand, and finally informed them that with the
intention of waiting for their "full and free concurrence to these just desires
of the nation," and of preserving order till it was obtained, the army had
retired into the city.
The House was thrown immediately into a tumult of consternation. At the
very moment when their terrible slave seemed safely bound he had risen
up and snapped his chains like threads. Every kind of proposition was
made to recall him, but eventually Scot and Robinson were ordered to
carry a soft answer into the city. They found Monk with the Lord Mayor,
and in the lowest spirits. His reception had been more than cold; the city
had lost faith in him; he had broken the guiding rule of his life and had lost
faith in himself. His friends urged him to declare at once for a free
Parliament, but hoping against hope that he still might not be forced to use
the military power against the civil, he refused to give a hint of his
intended revolt till he heard the answer of the House. When it came, shifty
and meaningless, he doubted no longer. Without heat he dismissed the
messengers, but his officers insulted them, and the mob hooted them out of
the city. Once more himself, blunt and determined, he stood up in the
Guildhall to address the Council which the Lord Mayor had consented to
call at five o'clock. With manly frankness he told them how he detested the
work he had had to do. If laying down his commission would have
stopped it, he would gladly have done so, but it would only have been put
into unkinder hands. "But what I have to tell you," he concluded, "is that
this morning I have sent to the Parliament to issue out writs within seven
days for the filling up of their House, and when filled to sit no longer than
till May th, that they may give place to a full and free Parliament."
The enthusiasm with which his words were received was indescribable. As
the news spread through the city the people gave way to the wildest
demonstrations of joy. Late as it was the bells were set a-ringing; the
soldiers, who had been shivering all day in their ranks on Finsbury Fields,
were brought in to be fed and fêted like kings. Bonfires were soon blazing
in every street, and anything that could do duty for an effigy of the Rump
was cast into them. To such a pitiable decrepitude had the glorious Long
Parliament lived.
As its doom was cried from end to end of England the same extravagant
scenes were enacted. Associations were everywhere formed to refuse the
payment of taxes till Monk's demands were complied with. Everywhere
men were worshipping the executioner of their doting liberator. His guards
kept watch at the Parliament's gates; from the city his sword was stretched
over it. In spite of himself, in spite of every effort to set a lawful authority
above him, George Monk was uncrowned King of England.
But the sternest of those who had made the renown of the greatest of
Parliaments were still in their places, and it was soon clear that they meant
to leave no stone unturned to dethrone their enemy. Persuasion having
failed they tried what force could do. A new commission for the army was
appointed, so arranged that Monk must always be in the minority. They
distributed arms to the Fanatics; they tampered with his troops; they
industriously spread reports amongst Fleetwood's army that Monk and the
city were in league to restore the King. Monk's complete reply was to seize
the arms of Cavaliers and Fanatics alike and to refuse to allow the city to
mobilise its militia. Then they fell to coaxing again, with no more success.
For Monk began to see a better way of ridding himself of the power which
had fallen on him than by surrendering it on any terms to those who had
so misused it.
Ever since he had established himself at Draper's Hall addresses and
petitions of all kinds had flowed in upon him. It soon appeared that the
great majority of them were in favour of escaping from the deadlock by the
restoration of the secluded members. To this the general had always been
averse. They were pronounced Royalists, who wished to go back to the Isle
of Wight treaty and the status quo of , regardless of the vested interests that
had arisen meanwhile. It meant the resumption of the land-grants which
had been made for the services of those who had shed their blood for the
good old cause, and that in Monk's eyes meant a new civil war. Already
the suspicions which his understanding with the city had aroused were
once more driving the Republicans into the extended arms of Lambert's
militarism, and he seems to have at this time regarded the objections to the
King's return as insuperable. Milton with all his eloquence, and Haslerig
with all the ardour of his democratic faith, were blinding him to everything
but the "good old cause." "From my soul I desire a Commonwealth," he
wrote to Haslerig, and so long as the secluded members showed
themselves irreconcilable to the Republic he would have nothing to do
with them. Now, however, it was suggested to him that they were willing
to come to terms with the sitting members, and he permitted a conference
between the victims and the instigators of Pride's Purge.
The conference was so far satisfactory that the general entered into direct
negotiations with the secluded members on behalf of the army. The chief
points on which he insisted were a clear understanding that nothing was to
be done to change the form of government from a Commonwealth; that the
House should dissolve immediately it had provided for the interim
administration of the country; and that the land-grants should be
confirmed. On the first two points their answer was satisfactory. The last
they rejected on the ground that they had no authority to pass such an act.
Were any proof wanted of the disinterestedness of Monk's conduct at this
time, it is that in spite of his undeniable love of money he gave up the point
on which hung the hard-earned savings of a lifetime. Yet even this risk he
was prepared to run for the good of the country he loved so well. Early on
February st all the secluded members who were in town assembled at
Whitehall. There the general met them and made them a speech setting
forth his view of the situation. He told them that monarchy was not to be
thought of. The old foundations were so broken that they could not be
restored. If the nation found their long struggle was only to end in a
restoration they would never again be induced to rise for the liberties of
Parliament, and the cause of freedom would be lost for ever. Besides a King
meant bishops, and that the country would never endure again. So he
dismissed them to Westminster under the escort of his own lifeguard.
Almost the first act of the reinvigorated Parliament was to name Monk
"Captain-General under Parliament of all the land forces in England,
Scotland, and Ireland." By virtue of this exalted rank he became as fully as
the sovereign of to-day the constitutional head of the nation in arms.
Added to this he was made jointly with Montague general of the fleet, and
when the list of the new Council of State came out his name appeared in
large type across the top like a king's. Haslerig at once saw his opportunity
for a new departure. To destroy Monk's power directly was no longer
possible, but so exalted was his position that could it be forced a little
higher it would become insecure; or if the worst came to the worst, a
protectorate, or even a King George, was better than the accursed Stuart.
This dangerous move on the part of the Commonwealth men soon began to
show itself. A pamphlet had already appeared setting out Monk's royal
descent. Now an insidious motion was made in the House to bestow on
him and his heirs for ever the palace of Hampton Court and all its parks,
and a Bill to give it effect was successfully brought in. But before long a still
better opportunity presented itself to Haslerig. On March th the House, on
the plea of leaving the nation absolutely free, abrogated the "Engagement"
which members had to take to be true and faithful to the Commonwealth
as established without King or House of Lords. Monk was highly annoyed.
He looked upon it as a breach of the conditions on which the secluded
members had been admitted. Jealous of his principles, he had seated them
with a high hand on the express understanding that nothing was to be
done to alter the constitution. Practically the vote went far to make him and
the army responsible for the counter-revolution to which it directly
pointed, and which every day looked more unavoidable. Haslerig saw the
moment had come to play his trump card. With the concurrence of their
party and a number of officers, he, Scot, and some others repaired to
Whitehall, bent on inducing Monk to assume the protectorate. Clarges was
first sounded. He gave no encouragement, and the conspirators left him to
go straight to the lord-general. In alarm lest his brother-in-law's power of
resistance should be unequal to so splendid a temptation, Clarges flew to
the Council which was sitting in a room close by. In answer to an urgent
summons Ashley Cooper came out, and Clarges hurriedly told him his
alarming suspicions of what was going on in the lord-general's apartments.
Meanwhile by every argument Haslerig and his friends were pressing
Monk to take upon himself the civil authority as well as the military. It was
clear, they said, from the late vote that a restoration was intended, and a
restoration meant his death, for like Stanley, who enthroned the Tudors, he
was too great to live. Monk told them to fear nothing. The House merely
wanted to leave its successor entirely free, and as for taking upon himself
the civil authority, the fate of Cromwell's family was a warning to which he
could not be deaf. Haslerig urged that Cromwell was a usurper, while
Monk would be acclaimed by the nation. He himself was prepared to bring
a petition with a hundred thousand signatures. But the lord-general was
obdurate, and dismissing the conspirators he repaired to his place at the
Council. The moment he appeared Ashley Cooper got up and moved that
the room be cleared and the doors locked. Then he charged Monk with
having received some indecent overtures from seditious persons, and
demanded a full disclosure of their nature that the Council might take
steps accordingly. But the kindly old general had no mind to see
proscriptions begin. He had no idea of letting one party shed the blood of
another, and being fully determined to hold the balance true till the
nation's wishes could be weighed, he was not averse to letting the Council
see what volcanic forces he could explode upon them at a word. "There is
not so much danger in agitation as you apprehend," he said when Ashley
Cooper had done. "It is true some have been with me to be resolved in
scruples concerning the present transactions in Parliament, but they went
away from me well satisfied." And the Council had to tamely receive the
rebuke of the fearless look and laconic address which their consciences
were too guilty to resent.
So the incident ended, but not without one important result. As Gumble
had lost the general's ear from being suspected probably of too close an
understanding with his old patron Scot, so now Clarges, who had
succeeded him, was superseded by a new councillor. By the advice of his
brother Nicholas the general invited his kinsman Morice, the secluded
member for Plymouth, to come up and take his seat, and from this time
forward the slow-witted soldier had at his elbow the political sagacity of
this scholarly recluse.
It was indeed fortunate that he had, for he was not yet to be left in peace.
Haslerig immediately returned to the attack with a petition from a number
of officers begging the lord-general to sign a declaration in favour of a
Commonwealth and against a single person, and to get the Parliament to
do the same. In the army lay the great danger to the country. Monk knew
that the only chance of a settlement rested on his ability to keep it in hand
till the great voice of the nation could speak its mind with overwhelming
authority. Sensible of the gravity of the situation, he told the deputation he
would give them an answer in Council of War on the morrow. He was
confronted with a danger as great as any he had yet encountered, and he
met it with his usual address. To the malcontents' arguments his
spokesmen answered that their fears and hopes were alike groundless. The
writs ran in the name of the Commonwealth, and every one who had
served against the Parliament was disqualified. In any case no good could
come of an attempt to put pressure on the House, for it would only
dissolve itself and plunge the nation once more into anarchy. And they
need not hope that the lord-general in that event would assume the
government. They would merely be left a prey to the common enemy.
Monk confirmed all his friends had said in the usual laconic speech with
which he was wont to close such discussions. Still they were not satisfied.
An officer continued to boldly argue that the qualifications were no
safeguard, as the new Parliament alone had power to decide whether they
had been observed. The argument was unanswerable. Monk abruptly cut it
short by saying that the meetings of military councils to meddle with civil
matters were subversive of discipline, and for the future he absolutely
forbade them. The army was still tingling with the blows by which the
terrible disciplinarian had broken it to his will. In various parts of the
country where insubordination had shown itself new ones had been
inflicted to remind them in whose grip they were. The new spirit of
modern discipline which Monk had begotten was already arising, and
Haslerig was once more baffled.
Still he was not defeated, and the last hours of the great Parliament are
obscured in the mists of another intrigue in which the indomitable
Republican played a mysterious part. A resolution had been passed that
the dissolution should take place on or before March th. As the time drew
near signs of a strong disinclination to abide by it began to appear. Monk,
who had retired to St. James's to keep as much in the background as
possible, began to have his suspicions. The original understanding had
been that they were to sit for about a week and do nothing but arrange for
a new Parliament and an interim Government, and to take measures to
keep the military Fanatics quiet. This merely meant that they were to
provide Monk with pay for the army and all that was necessary for the
preservation of order. They chose, however, to interpret it by passing a Bill
for the re-establishment of the militia, and putting it into the hands of their
own men. Not content with this breach of faith, they began busying
themselves with Church matters. In a Presbyterian and Independent
Parliament such questions were not to be settled in an hour. When the
writs came out, moreover, it was found that they had been made returnable
five days later than the specified time. The Militia Bill had gone to the
printers, but had not yet been published. A committee was sent to inquire
into the delay. It was found that the Bill had been tampered with in the
press. Haslerig was suspected of being at the bottom of it. However that
may be, it had the effect he would have wished. Monk's suspicions were
changed to certainties. At St. James's it became clear that the Presbyterians
were manœuvring to gain time, till they had the new militia in readiness to
support them in prolonging their sitting and recalling the King on their
own terms. Pym indeed had so openly advocated this course that the
general had had to send for him privately and warn him to hold his
tongue. It was just what Monk had feared, but though his own sympathies
were in favour of the moderate Presbyterians, he was not going to allow
that party to steal a march on the country any more than the Cavaliers or
Fanatics or Republicans, and he put his foot down at once.
When the House met on the th an ominous letter from the redoubtable
general was in the Speaker's hands. Like naughty children conscious of
their guilt, they voted that it should not be opened for the present lest it
contained a command for them to be gone. The previous day the Bill for
settling Hampton Court upon the general had been thrown out on the third
reading, at the instance of his friends, it was said, but from what ensued it
would seem that at least it was done with unseemly alacrity; and if Monk
did not approve of it, it is certainly strange that it was allowed to proceed
so far. At all events, as the alarming letter lay unopened before them, they
hurriedly voted the lord-general £, and the stewardship of the palace and
all its parks. Then the seal was broken and the general's message read. It
assured them that he would be responsible for the peace of the
Commonwealth with his army, and desired them to stop the reorganisation
of the militia. What more it contained we do not know. The immediate
effect was that the House despatched a committee to St. James's to give
satisfaction to the irate general, and voted to take the question of
dissolution the first thing after dinner.
As soon as the members met again after the mid-day adjournment the
committee reported that they had been to the general, and he was satisfied
with their explanations. But the House had been taught a lesson, and in a
few hours, by its own act, the most renowned Parliament that ever sat was
no more.
 CHAPTER XIII
THE UNCROWNED KING
Monk had now led the country another distinct march along the thorny
path he was clearing with such anxious devotion, and Sir William
Davenant burst out into a long panegyric on the occasion. But at the same
time he reminded the general—
"Yet greater work ensues such as will try
How far three realms may on your strength rely."
The Parliament was gone, but the Council of State remained, and there the
patriotic struggle began again! The Presbyterian section was strong, and
outside it was backed by a powerful combination, at the head of which
were Northumberland, Manchester and the men of the days to which the
Self-Denying Ordinance put an end. These saw that a restoration was
inevitable, and felt that the only salvation of the country lay in a renewal of
the Isle of Wight treaty. Though baulked by Monk's watchfulness in their
attempt to get the King recalled by a Presbyterian Parliament, they did not
despair of outmarching the Cavaliers and Opportunists. Their last chance
was in a restoration through the agency of the Council of State before the
new Parliament could meet, and again and again they pressed Monk to
openly espouse their cause. He only said he was in the service of the
Commonwealth and could not listen. The pressure grew greater, the party
more powerful, and he found it necessary to treat their proposals more
seriously, but still he gave no hope. In despair, at last, they seized upon
some expression he had let fall to send word to the King that they had won
him, and that they were prepared to enter into formal negotiations for a
restoration. A fortnight before the needy voluptuary, weary of his exile,
would have embraced the offer with avidity, but now, to the astonishment
of all concerned, the proposition was coldly, almost contemptuously
received. Something had happened of which they were in entire ignorance,
something so singular as almost to startle us anew into an exaggeration of
the personal influence in history.
Up till now Monk's reputation as a Commonwealth man was practically
without a spot. By honestly doing his duty he had lived down every
suspicion. All but the most sanguine of the Cavalier agents considered him
hopelessly loyal to his trust. Best known of these was his cousin Sir John
Grenville, who, in spite of his notorious malignancy, was free of St. James's
on the ground of his relationship. But he had no better luck than the rest.
Fruitlessly he sought a private interview through his old friend Morice.
Night after night he stayed till every one was gone, but "Good-night,
cousin; 'tis late," was all he got for his pains as the wary old general went
off to bed.
Such was Monk's position when the Portuguese ambassador asked for an
audience. The recent treaty of the Pyrenees had left Portugal at the mercy
of Spain, and she had sent a special envoy to England to seek assistance.
For some time past the envoy had been in negotiation with the Council of
State for a renewal of Cromwell's alliance, but the action of the
Presbyterian leaders seems to have demonstrated to him that its authority
was moribund. The power of Monk and the now inevitable recall of the
King suggested to him a brilliant piece of diplomacy, and he resolved to
flash a dazzling proposal in the eyes of the general. Father Russell, the
secretary to the embassy, seems first to have sounded Morice. But at all
events, amidst the enormous mass of business with which he exhausted his
secretaries, Monk found time for an interview.
The ambassador began by saying that without wishing to pry into the
general's intentions with regard to the King, he thought it only right to tell
him that Charles Stuart ought at once to get out of Spanish territory. He
was then at Brussels, and the envoy assured Monk that the moment the
Spaniards got wind of the national reaction in favour of a restoration they
would kidnap his person, and hold him as a hostage for the retrocession of
Jamaica and Dunkirk. Monk, who already had reason to suspect the
Spaniards of intriguing with the Irreconcilables through the Jesuits, was
much impressed, and the ambassador was encouraged to explain his
solicitude for Charles's safety. In the event of a restoration, he said, his
master was prepared, in return for military assistance against Spain, to
offer the King the hand of the Infanta, and with her a dowry of an unheard-
of sum of money, together with the towns of Tangiers and Bombay. The
advantages of the arrangement it was needless to point out. It would give
to England the command of the Mediterranean and East Indian trade, and
enable her to complete the humiliation of her great rival which the heroes
of the Armada had begun.
To a man of Monk's hot patriotism, who remembered Raleigh, who had
been moulded into manhood while Drake and Grenville and Hawkins
were living memories, the proposal was too dazzling to resist. His passion
for the expansion of England had never been quenched. His faith in it as a
panacea for all political trouble was as strong as ever. Before him stretched
the prospect of a glorious war, in which the fierce ardour of the Fanatic
soldiers would find worthy employ, and serve to lift their country out of
the slough into which they had plunged it to a greatness beyond the
dreams of their fathers. The fires of his youth were rekindled. He may even
have dreamed of ending his career in wiping out the disgrace in which it
had begun, and at the head of the most powerful navy and the finest army
in the world of outshining the greatest of the great Queen's captains.
Whatever was the overmastering cause, the wary strategist suddenly
changed front, cast his scruples to the winds, and the Portuguese
ambassador immediately applied to the Council for a frigate to carry him
and his portentous secret to Lisbon. Monk had determined to communicate
with the King. Charles's danger was great and pressing. At any moment a
precipitate message from the Presbyterians to the Court might give the
Spaniard the signal to act; nor was the anxious general without good
ground to suspect that the French ambassador was intriguing with the
Manchester cabal, and that Mazarin had a chance, if not an intention, of
playing the same game. On the eve of its accomplishment the long-wished-
for settlement was in desperate peril of wreck, and calm and swift as ever
the old soldier set to work single-handed to thwart the designs of the two
most renowned diplomatists in Europe.
Absolute secrecy was essential. The Portuguese negotiations with the
Committee of Safety were continued as if nothing had happened, and the
general looked round for a messenger on whom he could implicitly rely.
Morice could not be spared, and it was clear that Grenville was the only
man. After two ineffectual attempts to induce him to disclose his secret
mission to Morice, Monk was convinced of his discretion, and granted him
an interview. In the dead of night, shortly after the dissolution, he was
introduced into Morice's private apartments at St. James's. The general
appeared from a secret stairway, and Grenville without preface or apology
thrust into his hands the King's letters which his cousin Nicholas had
refused to take up to Scotland. Monk started back, and asked him fiercely
how he dared so play the traitor.
The Cavalier quietly replied that in the service of the King, his master,
danger had grown familiar to him. Overcome with his young kinsman's
coolness, and the memories of all he owed to his house, the old general
unbent at once and cordially embraced him. Then he read the King's letter.
In flattering terms it assured him of Charles's favour, and of his intention to
follow Monk's advice implicitly if he would only espouse his cause.
Grenville added what he had been authorised to promise—a hundred
thousand a year for him and his officers, any title he chose, and the office of
Lord High Constable. Monk replied that what he did was for his country's
good, and that he would not sell his duty or bargain for his allegiance.
Grenville pressed for a written answer, but the wary soldier refused; he
had intercepted too many letters himself. Grenville was told he must take
his reply by word of mouth, and so was dismissed till the morrow.
For some time past the general had had confidential consultations with the
leaders of the various parties, with a view apparently of finding a common
ground on which a settlement might be made when the new Parliament
met. Lenthal, for whose ripe experience Monk seems to have had a high
regard, had suggested as the terms that would be most satisfactory to the
country, a general amnesty, the confirmation of the land-titles, and liberty
of conscience. These the general now determined to make the basis of
negotiation, and when Grenville returned the following evening he found
them incorporated in a pithy memorandum. An urgent appeal to the King
to leave Brussels for some place in Holland was added, and a strict caution
to Grenville that he was not to ask for any reward for the service Monk was
doing. After reading over these instructions to his cousin several times till
he had them by heart, the general threw the paper into the fire. With final
orders not to leave Charles till he was out of Spanish territory, and not
even to treat of a reward, Grenville was dismissed, and left London the
same night. Thus it was that when the letter of the Presbyterians surprised
the exultant exiles in the act of preparing an answer to the general's
message of salvation, the King only laughed, and said, "I perceive that
these people do not know that I and General Monk stand on much better
terms."
Charles at once acted on the general's advice, and after seeing him safely
upon Dutch soil, Grenville on April th hastened back with a dangerous
burden. Besides official letters for the two Houses of Parliament, the
Council, the army, and the city, each containing a copy of the famous
Declaration from Breda, he carried an autograph letter from the King to the
general, together with a commission for him to be Captain-General of the
Three Kingdoms, and a signet and seal for a Secretary of State, to be
delivered to whomsoever the general chose. The letter Monk accepted, but
he had still enough of the true soldier of fortune in him to refuse a
commission incompatible with the one he held. Nor would he take the
seals, but told Grenville to hide himself and his papers till Parliament met,
and then act according to his instructions.
The few Royalists who were in the secret were already in a state of ecstasy.
Mordaunt, who had been working successfully in other quarters, had
written over that nothing could now stop the King's return but an attempt
by Lambert on the Council or Monk. Fortunately Lambert was in the
Tower, but nevertheless the danger was great. As the designs of the
Presbyterians became known the army grew more and more restless.
Agitators began to persuade them they were to be cheated out of land,
arrears, and all the long struggle had won them. Monk saw his regiments
must be still further purged. To effect this Charles Howard of Naworth,
who commanded his bodyguard, together with Ashley Cooper and the old
Coldstreamers, prepared a petition to him that every officer should be
required, in view of the insubordinate spirit that was arising, to sign an
engagement to be true to the Government as it was then constituted. The
precaution was taken none too soon. A few days after Grenville's return a
letter was intercepted disclosing a conspiracy of Anarchists and extreme
Republicans as formidable as any with which Cromwell had had to
contend. It was written from Wales by Desborough, the most formidable of
the Fanatics, to a partisan in the city. The idea involved the destruction of
Charles and his brothers as well as of Monk, and early in May the Fanatics
were to rise in Wales, seize all the towns on the Marches, and set up the
Long Parliament at Shrewsbury. By this masterly move they hoped to
attract the Presbyterians, whom they had been careful to make jealous of
the Cavaliers. Already it appeared they had the support of the Jesuits, who,
as Monk knew very well, were always ready to join hands with
Independency. Till all was ready the army was to be kept in a state of
ferment and distrust of its leaders, and the new House was to have "bones
to pick," so as to prevent the possibility of any decided step being taken
towards the King's recall. Vane was to lead the insurrection, and Haslerig's
support was expected. Already the city had quarrelled with the
Presbyterian leaders. Other signs of the conspirators' work appeared, and
Monk and the Council were taking their precautions when suddenly the
danger was doubled. On April th (or th), after Colonel Howard had
presented the officers' petition to the general, like a thunderclap came the
news that Lambert had escaped from the Tower.
It was at such a moment that Monk was greatest. Small as was his opinion
of his rival as a soldier, he knew Lambert was looked upon by the
malcontents of the army as their champion. It was a name to conjure with,
and the Fanatics had got the one thing wanting, a man the soldiers would
follow. Monk acted with all his old energy. Arrests were made right and
left. The new Engagement was presented to all the regiments, and every
officer who refused to sign was cashiered. Morgan was reinforced in
Scotland and the city militia mobilised. Still the work had only begun.
Lambert, after narrowly escaping arrest in the city, got away into the
country. The expected desertions began, and Monk ordered the
Engagement to be signed by rank and file as well as officers. Whole troops
and companies refused, and whole troops and companies were disarmed
and broken. As fast as one regiment was sound it was despatched to
remodel another; but hardly was the operation complete than intelligence
came that Lambert had appeared in arms in the western Midlands.
Instantly Colonels Howard and Ingoldsby—daring Dick Ingoldsby,
Cromwell's favourite sabreur, "who could neither pray nor preach"—were
hurried with two flying columns to the scene of action; but that was not all.
Monk was not a man to do things by halves. The events of the next week it
was impossible to foretell; he could only prepare for the worst. By the
elections the country had already declared for the King, and, determined at
all costs to save it from Lambert and the Fanatics, Monk sent for Sir John
Grenville. He told him that if the rising were not immediately crushed the
army might revolt at any time. "In that case," he continued, "I shall publish
my commission from the King, and raise all the royal party of the three
nations." Sir John was instructed to hold himself in readiness to convey the
necessary orders to the leading Cavaliers, and that night his brother
Barnard was speeding towards Holland with the general's warning to the
King.
Monk's heroic remedy was destined to be untried. His energy had once
more saved the country from civil war. On Easter Tuesday, six days after
the alarm was given, a grand review of the mobilised trained-bands was
held in Hyde Park. From ten thousand throats the great Royalist reaction
found voice. Many cheered for the King openly; the auxiliaries drank his
health on their knees; George Monk was the darling of the hour. As though
nothing should be wanting from his triumph, when the enthusiasm was at
its highest a party of travel-stained horse was seen moving along the
outskirts of the park. Right under the gallows at Tyburn they passed, and a
new shout rent the air; for in their midst rode Lambert with swordless
scabbard.
His attempt was premature, and had been crushed at a blow. Pistol in
hand, Dick Ingoldsby had ridden him down as he galloped from the field;
but the great conspiracy was practically untouched. Desborough's agents
redoubled their activity. Monk's officers, sensible of the danger, came to
beg him to proclaim the King at once before Parliament met, and so win the
whole glory for himself and the army. But even the stirring scene in the
park could not shake his splendid self-control. He quietly reminded them
of their oft-expressed determination to keep the military power in
obedience to the civil, and of the Engagement they had so recently signed.
What they proposed, he said, was treason, and so he dismissed them.
In spite of the danger which still threatened from the Parliamentary delays,
which he knew the Fanatics were fostering, he was determined to proceed
in a constitutional manner, and he arranged with his cousin, Charles's
accredited agent, the exact method of procedure. Parliament met quietly on
the th. Monk took his seat for Devon, having elected to sit for his native
county in preference to Cambridge University by which he had been also
returned. The Commons next day passed the general a vote of thanks for
his unparalleled services in having conquered the enemies of Church and
State without so much as "a bloody nose." The few Presbyterian Lords who
had met uninvited and unresisted did the same, and Monk in his
acknowledgment bluntly begged them to look forward and not backward
in transacting affairs, a hint they were careful to take. While this was going
on in Parliament Sir John Grenville presented himself at the Council-
chamber and asked to see the lord-general. Monk came out and received
from his cousin's hands as from a stranger an official letter addressed "To
our trusty and well-beloved General Monk, to be by him communicated to
the President and Council of State, and to the officers of the armies under
his command." Monk at once ordered his guards to detain the messenger
and returned to the Council-chamber. There he broke the seal and handed
the letter unread to the president. The surprise was complete. No one but
Morice had an idea of what had been going on. Still it was clear that the
letter came from Charles, and after some debate it was resolved that
without being read it should be presented to Parliament on May st, the day
they had fixed for the business of the settlement of the nation. Meanwhile
Grenville was to be placed under arrest, but the general interposed, saying
that although a stranger he was a near kinsman of his own, and that he
would be responsible for his appearance at the bar.
But it was not intended that Grenville should wait for the summons. So
soon as the Houses met he attended, and sprung upon them the official
letters he had for each. In the Commons Morice was on his feet before the
House could recover its breath, and moved that the constitutional
government of the country was by King, Lords, and Commons. The motion
was carried in a rush of enthusiasm, and Monk asked leave to
communicate the King's despatch to the army. It was granted. Similar votes
were passed in the Lords, and the Commonwealth was constitutionally at
an end. At a subsequent sitting, however, the House came a little more to
its senses. Sir Matthew Hale rose to move for a committee to inquire what
terms had been offered to the late King. Monk saw, or thought he saw, the
cloven hoof of the Sectaries. Here was one of the "bones to pick" which he
knew they meant to provide. He rose to his feet immediately and solemnly
warned the House not to presume on the apparent quiet of the country.
Incendiaries, he said, were on the watch for a place to raise a flame: he had
full information, which it was not expedient to make public; but he could
not answer for the army or undertake to preserve order if the King were
not sent for at once. There is no reason to doubt not only that he believed
what he said, but that it was really true, and that the Sectaries and
Republicans were fast loosening his grip on the troops. Relying on
Charles's promises to himself, he saw no danger in his unconditional
return, for, as he went on to point out to the House, without troops or
money the King would be at their mercy. He concluded by moving that
commissioners should be immediately sent to invite Charles to England;
"And the blood be on the head of him," he cried, "who delays the
settlement."
His words were greeted with a thunder of applause. The old
constitutionalists saw that Monk's appeal was irresistible, and in the
excitement of the moment vote after vote was passed that went beyond the
most extravagant hopes of the most sanguine Cavalier. The Revolution was
at an end, and the lord-general's lady proceeded to herald the new era by
frankly turning to her old trade and purchasing a stock of linen at
wholesale prices on the King's account for Whitehall.
The rapid transformation that followed is a matter of history. Both France
and Spain saw the victim of their long intrigues suddenly snatched from
their grasp, and each made desperate efforts to coax him back into its
power. All their blandishments were in vain. Monk had succeeded in his
resolve that if the King came back it should be without entangling the
country in any engagements with foreign powers. Mazarin and De Haro
had been completely outwitted by the dull soldier, and the cardinal died of
vexation, it used to be said, in the following year.
Early on May th Monk was roused at Canterbury with the news that the
fleet, which was bringing home the King, was in sight. There he had just
arrived, the idol of the swarms of gentlemen that were flocking to Dover to
welcome Charles and push their fortunes. He was worshipped and
tormented as the fountain of honour. In his pocket he had a long list of
importunate friends and enemies whom he had good-naturedly promised
to recommend for places in the Government. His bodyguard was filled
with noblemen. The very roads threatened to be blocked with the
multitude of high-born supplicants, till the old disciplinarian, shocked at
the indecency of the scramble, imperiously enrolled them into regiments
and insisted on some order being observed.
Monk was "the sole pillar of the King's confidence," and so soon as the fleet
reached Dover Roads Charles sent an express to say that he would not land
till he came to him. No sooner was the summons received than he was on
horseback again hastening to Dover. The critical moment had come. Every
one then agreed that it was Monk who had restored the King, but how and
why no one could exactly tell. As the boat containing the royal party
touched the beach they crowded round to see the meeting of the two
uncrowned kings, hoping that Monk's demeanour would lift the mist in
which the future was wrapped and show them who was going to wield the
sceptre. Charles himself was as nervous and anxious as the rest. This
formidable figure that had arisen so suddenly and with such mystery, this
man of darkness who had done as it were single-handed what for years
had defied the efforts of his own most trusted councillors, and who yet
forbade the very mention of reward, the perplexed King could only fear.
On the beach they met, and to every one's surprise the soldierly figure sank
upon its knee and kissed the royal hand as deferentially as though it were
the king who had made the general. Startled into an unwonted display of
emotion Charles raised him, and embracing him with genuine fervour
called him his father. Both were too moved for many words. Without more
ado, amidst the shouts of the people and the thunder of the guns from forts
and fleet, the two walked side by side to the royal coach. There the soldier
of fortune took his place with the King and his brothers; and the Duke of
Buckingham was clever enough, to every one's annoyance, to get
possession of the boot uninvited.
The transports of delight which marked the whole progress to Canterbury
were like a dream to Charles, so little could he understand it all. His first
sensation, when he had time to realise his position quietly, was one of
disgust at the indecency with which petitions for places had been
showered upon him the moment he landed. It was impossible to satisfy
them all, and the throne before him bid fair to be a bed of thorns; but far
worse was yet to come. Hardly was he alone when the terrible general
came into his room. Monk was no courtier, and his Court manners were
already exhausted. It was a visit of business, and his way of doing business
was aggressively direct. Without any preface or apology he went straight
to the point, and in his blunt rough way told the King he could not do him
better service than to recommend him councillors who would be acceptable
to the people. With that he handed in his list of names. Charles nervously
thrust it into his pocket, thanked the general, and dismissed him.
Clarendon was sent for, and together they read the alarming
memorandum. It contained the names of but two Cavaliers. Charles was
aghast. What did it mean? Was this the solution of Monk's extraordinary
conduct? Did he intend to be mayor of the palace to a roi fainéant?
Clarendon knew as well as Monk the great revolutionary forces that were
straining unseen beneath all the enthusiasm. He knew they were only kept
under by an army which sympathised with them in its heart. The fleet was
still riding off Dover; Monk had only to hold up his finger, and in a few
hours the King would be on his travels again. The chancellor determined to
get Morice to find out what the general intended. In an hour he came back.
The general, he reported, was extremely pained that he had caused the
King any uneasiness. He held the royal commission, and was there to
receive orders, not to give them. The paper was merely a list of persons he
had promised to recommend. The King was at perfect liberty to accept or
reject them, only there were a few whom he heartily wished he could make
use of.
The episode was ended; the King breathed again, but he never forgot the
fright. Till the veteran passed away Charles never ceased to fear his power
and love the hand that used him so gently. Ashley Cooper, whom Monk
specially recommended, was sworn a Privy Councillor on the spot,
together with the general himself, Morice, and the Earl of Southampton;
but the King committed himself no further. Morice was also given the seals
which Monk had refused to confer in spite of a heavy bribe, and the
general himself received the Garter at the hands of the Dukes of York and
Gloucester. He was offered the choice of any of the great offices of State,
and he characteristically chose that of Master of the Horse. It had little or
nothing to do with politics, and the patronage was extensive.
So the play was ended, and in a blaze of triumph such as England had
never known the King entered London in the midst of a magnificent
procession. Immediately behind him rode the lord-general beside the
obtrusive Duke of Buckingham. Never before or since has a subject
occupied such a position and arrogated less to himself. The ovation with
which the King and his deliverer were received was deafening. Charles
was perfectly dazed. He could hardly speak to his faithful Parliament as
Lords and Commons met him jostling one another in a disorderly and
excited mob. He recognised no one, and was so exhausted with the din that
he could not attend the Thanksgiving in the Abbey. So as though the note
of incapacity must be struck at the outset, he turned aside and took refuge
in Whitehall. Still the glory of the conqueror was none the less, nor his
satisfaction less complete. He could lay his head on his pillow that night
with the happy consciousness that the burden of empire was lifted from his
shoulders, that his country was at peace again, and still more, which was
dearest of all to his great heart, that the triumph had been won without the
cost of a single life.
 CHAPTER XIV
THE FATHER OF HIS COUNTRY
To follow Monk's career after the Restoration in detail would here be out of
place. It adds but little to our knowledge of the man and labours under the
ban of anti-climax. To the student of history and government it is full of
interest, yet so unobtrusive was his work that it is now hard to trace
beneath the shifting strife of politicians. When men asked what after all this
dull workday soldier had done that the country should idolise him as it
did, Secretary Nicholas, who knew, was wont to say that even if he had not
put Charles upon his throne, he would still have deserved all the bounties
the King had bestowed upon him for his services after the Restoration.
It is a remark profoundly true. His finest work goes unrecorded. To
suppose that the whole nation acquiesced at once in the Restoration is
almost as great an error as to think that it was conquered by William at
Hastings. As yet Monk had but stolen a march on the Irreconcilables.
Numbers of ardent spirits belonging to the Anabaptists, the Fifth
Monarchy men, and the fighting section of the Quakers, together with a
large body of extreme Independents and Presbyterians, were only waiting
for an opportunity to tear the arch-malignant from his throne again. They
comprised all the fiery earnestness of the nation, they breathed the
exaggerated spirit of all that has made us what we are; and when we see
Mrs. Hutchinson at her heroic colonel's side as he lay rotting in a living
grave; when we think of Harrison's wife buying his blood-stained clothes
of the executioner, and, unable to believe that God had suffered her saint to
die with his work unended, watching over them till he should come
again,—the heart of Monk's profoundest admirer must bleed that they fell
under such a hand as his.
And the kindly heart of the old general bled for them, too. Of all the libels
that pursued him from the mouths of those who envied him the royal
favour, or suffered from the success of his patriotic policy, none is greater
than that which accused him of betraying his friends and persecuting his
enemies. Neither one nor the other is true. From the moment his victory
was assured he busied himself unflinchingly in saving the vanquished
from the hands of those who mistook animosity for zeal. It was he who
cried "Hold!" when the Convention tried to enlarge the list of exceptions to
the amnesty; it was he who stayed the vengeance of the Cavalier
Parliament by coming down to the House with the words of the King in his
mouth. Privately he worked as nobly. Numbers of men were preserved
upon some evidence the general had in their favour. Lambert, Fleetwood,
Lenthal, Milton, and the Cromwells all found in him a friend at Court.
Haslerig's fears he had laughed away with a promise to save him for
twopence. His persistent opponent got off scot free, and the letter is still
extant in which the twopence was sent. Most wanton of all are those who
accuse him of indecency in sitting on the Regicide Commission, forgetting
that the man who knew enough to hang half the kingdom could only
escape from the witness-box by a seat on the bench. It were better to
remember that he sat there with seven other adherents of the Revolution of
every shade of opinion, and to credit the King with a desire to make the
commission a representative one, and Monk with the intention of seeing
fair play to the men who were down.
The darkest cloud upon his memory is his alleged conduct in reference to
Argyle's trial. The charge against him is that, when the evidence proved
inconclusive, Monk produced some private correspondence upon which
the marquis was immediately convicted. The story has hitherto rested on
the testimony of Burnet, a notorious libeller of the general's, and Baillie,
who, like the rest of the Presbyterians, could never forgive him for foiling
their attempt to force upon the country a covenanted King. No evidence
could be more tainted, and it is not surprising that the story has always
been doubted, seeing how inconsistent it is with the character of a man
"who could not hate an enemy beyond the necessity of war." Injudicious
advocates have even denied the fact altogether, but a bundle of Argyle's
letters, including some to Monk and one to his secretary, was certainly
produced at the last moment, and at once sealed the prisoner's fate. In
consequence of Charles's resolution not to go behind the Scotch amnesty of
, the chief point in Argyle's indictment was that he had adhered to the
King's enemies, or, in other words, that he had opposed the last Highland
insurrection. The leaders of it were at once his judges and his prosecutors,
and they were determined to have their revenge. The case closed and still
there was no real evidence, when just as the Court was deliberating its
judgment a messenger thundered at the door with the fatal packet from
London. Regardless of all law the case was reopened, the letters read, and
Argyle condemned.
The question of Monk's share in the infamous proceeding rests on the
contents of those letters. They have now been found, and they acquit him
for ever. Only two are to him, and they contain no evidence whatever
beyond what had been already obtained in abundance. They are confined
to little more than civilities. The one to Clarke, Monk's secretary, encloses a
letter from Glencairn, and expresses Argyle's intention of keeping his own
country neutral. The other three are to Lilburne, and they prove in the
clearest manner that Argyle was not only giving the English general
information of the Royalist movements, but was doing his best to prevent
assistance going to the insurgents. These three letters are not endorsed as
having been "admitted" by the prisoner, and could any doubt remain that it
was these on which he was convicted, it would be removed by the
subsequent petition of Archibald the tenth Earl. For in thatdocument he
recites that the fatal letters bore no "signature" that the marquis "had
owned them." The letters to Monk and Clarke are all endorsed with
Argyle'sadmission.
Thus we may finally dismiss this wholly uncorroborated libel about
deliberately producing confidential letters. The compromising documents
are State Papers. That Monk knew enough to cost Argyle his life ten times
over is certain. It is equally certain that he did not tell what he knew. The
tardy production of the documents and the official nature of their contents
point to the natural explanation of their appearance—a last despairing
search in the archives of the Council of State by the men who were thirsting
for the great Covenanter's blood, and hungering for his estates.
The libel has not even the excuse of provocation. Monk did not desert the
Presbyterians. He never, indeed, belonged to their party. He professed
their ecclesiastical opinions, but never embraced their political creed. Nor
did he fail to stand by them in the hour of need. For not only did he give
the leaders certificates of their services to the Restoration, but when it was
found impossible to prevent the passing of the Bill of Uniformity, the "man
that was all made of mercy" joined with his old political opponent Lord
Manchester in urging the King not to enforce it in all its rigour. Nor did
Charles finally make surrender to the persecuting spirit of the Anglican
majority in Parliament till Monk was lying in state.
Still it is not to be wondered at that such stories pursued him. The very
loftiness of his station was enough to breed them in men less fortunate.
Besides his Garter, his Mastership of the Horse, and his exalted
commission, he was raised to the peerage by the title of Duke of Albemarle,
Earl of Torrington, and Baron Monk of Potheridge, Beauchamp, and Tees.
For a while he was also Lord Lieutenant of Ireland. He was made a
gentleman of the Bedchamber, and as though that did not place him near
enough to the person of the grateful King, by his patent as Captain-General
he was granted the extraordinary privilege of entering the presence at any
hour unannounced, and remaining there till he was told to go. The King
never ceased to treat him as a father. Indeed Charles's unswerving
devotion to his deliverer is enough to redeem his character from the
sweeping charge of baseness that is sometimes made against it. As a
member of the inner committee of the Privy Council, the parent of all
cabinets, Monk must have constantly had to lecture and thwart his master,
but never once did he give a sign that the old duke's favour was declining.
By the King he was regarded as a father, and by the country as no less.
"The body of the people," said the Bishop of Exeter in his funeral sermon,
"loved and honoured him, nay (God forgive them), they believed and
trusted in him." There was never an awkward job to be done, or failure to
be rectified, or panic to be allayed, but the Duke of Albemarle was sent for
like an old family doctor. Was there a powerful minister to be dismissed,
the Duke had to break the news to him; the Treasury accounts got into
confusion, and the Duke was put on to the commission to set them straight;
the plague drove Court and Parliamentfrom the capital, and he was left
behind sitting in Whitehall with his life in his hand, seeing every one who
presented himself day after day at a time when brother would hardly
speak to brother, or husband to wife, and through the whole of that terrible
period he managed in his own person army, navy, treasury, and police.
The Duke of York failed as an admiral, and "old George" was asked if he
would mind taking command. The great fire destroyed half London, and
threw the country into a panic, and the King, in terror of a new revolution,
had to beg "the sole pillar of the state" to come up from the fleet and restore
confidence. The people openly said it never would have happened if the
general had been there; and when the Dutch sailed into the Thames men
seemed to think he had only to go down to Chatham for the enemy to
scatter like chaff.
As the country recovered from its fever of royalism, and began to look back
first without disgust, then with regret to the days of Oliver, it saw in the
Protector's old general the personification of all the glories of the
Commonwealth. He stood out in startling contrast to the butterfly throng
amongst whom he had his place, and the courtiers felt it. Every one
laughed at the stupid old soldier for his homeliness, his mean
establishment, his vulgar wife, and the dulness and lethargy which grew
on him with his disease. But every one feared him also. Every request he
pressed was granted as a matter of course. Even the King did not dare or
care to give him a command, but always sounded him through Morice to
ascertain whether he were willing to do what was wanted.
To detail his endless services is here impossible. His greatest work was
undoubtedly the disbanding of the great revolutionary army. Some sixty
thousand men had to be loosed upon a country seething with the fanatical
opinions which the army had made its own, and of which, in spite of
Monk's purging, it still was full. Statesmen knew it was the great danger
the restored monarchy had to face. To Monk the task was committed; and
he did it not only peaceably, but so well that the disbanded soldiers,
instead of being so many germs of disaffection, earned themselves, through
the facilities the general was careful to provide for their employment, the
reputation of being the best citizens in the State.
Another debt which the nation owed to George Monk, whether for good or
ill it is hard to say, was entirely due to the confidence his unblemished
career had inspired. The Revolution had taken fire in the heat of a quarrel
as to which estate of the realm was to control the army. That that dispute
did not recur to mar the harmony of the Restoration, and even to render it
impossible, was due to the simple fact that the nation trusted "honest
George." As soon as it was known that he held the royal commission of
Captain-General not a word was uttered on the question. In his hands the
country knew that it was safe.
Thus it was that he became the Father of the British Army. It was he who,
in the few regiments that were kept on foot to overawe the Sectaries,
started its glorious traditions. It was he who gave it its unequalled note of
duty and devotion. It was he who once and for ever pronounced that it
must be a thing apart from politics, and taught it that a soldier's greatest
glory is to obey. In every characteristic of which it is proudest, or for which
we love it best, glitters the stamp of its first commander's personality.
Whether we see its officers rising in the hour of peril above the personal
jealousies which have ruined so many of our neighbours' enterprises, or
admire its dogged obstinacy, its cheerful discipline, and its chivalrous
impatience of party strife; or whether we glory in the strange contempt it
has ever shown for its enemies, making a pastime of war,—we have but to
turn to see each finest trait reflected as in a mirror in the life of the man
who gave it breath. Strange, indeed, it is that a body in which esprit de
corps has reached its noblest development should have forgotten as it has
the hero who begot it, and guided its first halting steps along the splendid
path it was to tread.
And yet the cause is plain enough. Like the rest of the great characters of
the English Revolution, Monk has till recently been only visible through
the literature of the Restoration. The navy was then the fashion, and Monk
was only known to the historians of the time as an admiral. That aspect of
him obscured every other. Society patronised the navy; it even divided
itself into two cliques on the subject, the partisans of the general and the
partisans of Lord Sandwich. Montague's party included nearly all the
Court, and unfortunately his two talented placemen Pepys and Evelyn,
whose testimony wherever their patron's rival is concerned is so tainted
with gratitude as to be almost worthless. Yet from them he is chiefly
judged, though they manifestly will never say a good word for him if they
can help it; and the Clerk of the Check at least is never more happy than
when he is pouring lively contempt upon his seamanship, his duchess, and
his dinners.
Monk, however, was secure in the favour of the King and the nation, and,
as has been said, it was to him they turned in their trouble after the
unsatisfactory naval campaign of . The two admirals had come out of it far
from well. Both the Duke of York and Lord Sandwich were accused of
cowardice, and Monk had charged his rival with something very like
embezzling prize-money. In recognition of their services the prince was
told he could not be allowed to expose his life again, and the peer was sent
out of the way as ambassador to Madrid. It was, in fact, resolved to
supersede them by Prince Rupert and the lord-general. The only question
was, would the great man condescend to accept the appointment? After
sounding Morice the King with considerable trepidation determined to try.
In the autumn Monk was suddenly summoned to Oxford from his post of
danger at Whitehall, which with heroic devotion he had never left since the
plague broke out. In three days he was back again, and with a throb of
delight the country heard that the Duke of Albemarle was to command the
fleet next year. Though longing for rest and enfeebled with disease, he had
accepted the divided command without a murmur. The only condition he
made was that his wife should not know of it till the last moment, for he
was sure she would be furious with him for going to sea again. But the
appointment was too popular to be kept a secret. The country was
confident that nothing could withstand the Duke of Albemarle. The news
spread like fire, and the fond old general had some bad half-hours before
he sailed in the spring.
On June st, while separated from Rupert, he met the Dutch fleet under De
Ruyter, outnumbering him nearly two to one. A council of war was called,
but the old general's antipathy for cowardice had grown to be almost a
monomania. He "hated a coward as ill as a toad," and every officer there
knew that the barest suggestion that savoured of prudence would cost him
his ship. Of course he attacked, and against such an enemy the issue was a
foregone conclusion. After a three days' fight his fleet was cut to pieces.
The wonder is that it was not annihilated. It was only by a brilliant display
of all his old mastery of naval tactics that he got its shattered remains into
the Thames.
On the evening of the third day Rupert joined him, and on the morrow he
staggered out once more in the prince's company. Astonished as the Dutch
had been at the reckless daring of Monk with his fleet of wrecks, they
thought it impossible for him again to put to sea, and had gone back to
Holland to refit. About eight o'clock they were sighted to windward, and at
once fell into line and lay to to wait for the English. Monk was for attacking
immediately. Up till now he had modestly given way to Rupert's greater
nautical experience, but now the prince wanted to slacken sail to let the
Blue division close up as it was far astern. Monk flew into a passion, but as
even he could not call the daring prince a coward, he had reluctantly to
admit that he was prudent. While the gay young Duke of Buckingham,
who, not to be out of the fashion, had joined the fleet as a volunteer, was
laughing to see Rupert for once in his life on the side of caution, the furious
old general was caught quietly loading a little pocket-pistol. It was a
curious weapon for a sea-fight, and Monk had been heard to say that
whatever happened he did not mean to be taken. It could only be intended
to blow up the ship as a last resource. "And therefore," says Buckingham,
"Mr. Saville and I in a laughing way most mutinously resolved to throw
him overboard in case we should ever find him going down to the powder-
room."
The action which ensued was indecisive, but the advantage on the four
days was certainly with the Dutch. Still the old general would never admit
it. He always maintained he had inflicted greater loss on De Ruyter than he
had suffered himself. He did not dream he was beaten. He accused the
greater part of his officers, certainly with some reason, of cowardice, and
even of treachery. Not above twenty of them, he used to say, had behaved
like men; and in unshaken contempt of his brave enemy he set to work
desperately to refit and begin again more furious and confident than ever.
The Dutch were out first, and lay in triumph in the mouth of the Thames
with a hundred sail. By incredible exertions Monk and Rupert had a like
number ready before the end of July, and dropped down the river to meet
the enemy. The Dutch retired to their own coasts and the English gave
chase. Early on the morning of the th the enemy were sighted to leeward.
They at once took the crescent formation to await the attack. The English
came on in grand order. Every ship took up its position in splendid style,
and by ten o'clock the whole line was hotly engaged. Monk and Rupert on
the Royal Charles, formerly theNaseby, singled out De Ruyter, but even the
boldness with which the Dutch admiral accepted the engagement could not
in the least reduce Monk's contempt. The old general stood unmoved on
the quarter-deck chewing his tobacco as the Dutch flagship ranged
alongside. "Now," said he, "will this fellow come and give me two
broadsides, and then he shall run." Two broadsides were exchanged, but
De Ruyter did not run, nor yet at the third or fourth. For two hours the
kings of the fleets fought hand to hand in Homeric strife, till the Royal
Charles was a perfect wreck aloft and had to fall astern. "Methinks, sir,"
said an officer to the Duke, "De Ruyter hath given us more than two
broadsides." The old soldier only turned his quid to say, "Well, but you
shall find him run by and by." And so he did at last. Jordan had taken the
generals' place, and in half an hour they had bent new tackle enough to
engage again. But before De Ruyter gave way he had once more reduced
the Royal Charles to such a state that her boats had to tow her out of the
line and the generals shifted their flags to the Royal James.
De Ruyter brought off his shattered fleet in such masterly style that little
was reaped from the victory. An attempt was made on the following day to
renew the action and complete the enemy's destruction. But the wind was
gone. The light airs that prevailed were useless to the English ships, while
they enabled the Dutch, which were of shallower draught, to reach the
refuge of their own shoals and estuaries. However, the English kept the
sea, and a few days later were able to land on the island of Schelling, sack
the town of Brandaris, and burn a fleet of one hundred and fifty
merchantmen that lay in the river. By this one exploit damage to the extent
of over a million was done to the Dutch, and the Duke was applauded once
more to the echo by his exulting country. All August he cruised in the
Channel, making prizes, cutting out merchantmen, and preventing a
junction between the French and the Dutch; nor did he return till just in
time to receive the King's anxious suggestion that he should come to
London to allay the panic which the great fire had created. He was left free
to come or not as he liked, and much against his will he came to his
master's side. The effect of his presence was immediate, and Lord
Arlington considered that by his prompt return he had given the King his
throne a second time.
Disgusted as Monk was with the whole war and its indecisive actions; with
the weather that always interposed just as he was going to crush his
despised foes; with his young gentleman captains who only played at
fighting, and knew nothing of the sea but its slang; with the old
Commonwealth officers that would not do their duty against the great
Protestant Republic, there was yet worse in store for the old patriot.
An empty treasury suggested a change of front for the next year's
campaign. The Dutch clearly meant to bleed the King to death with
indecisive engagements. In order to rapidly and inexpensively bring the
enemy to terms, it was moved in the Council to put the country in a state of
defence, lay up the line-of-battle ships, and prey on the Dutch commerce
with privateer cruisers. Charles was against the idea, and he was strongly
supported by Monk and three others. Negotiations for peace were on foot,
and the old general had no notion of treating except sword in hand. But the
majority prevailed. The naval ports were directed to be fortified and the
dismantled ships protected by booms. The idea was well enough, and had
it only been carried out the Dutch might speedily have been brought to
their knees; but although twice in the depth of winter the King went in
person to inspect the progress of the works for the defence of the Thames
and Medway, next to nothing was done. Disorder, insolvency, and
corruption paralysed every effort, and after insulting the Scotch coasts, De
Ruyter on Sunday June th, , suddenly appeared off the Thames and
threatened London itself.
A perfect panic prevailed. The banks stopped payment, the beacons were
fired, and once more every eye was turned on the Duke of Albemarle. He
was hard at work preparing to meet a descent on the threatened counties.
Two days before, on the first alarm, Lord Oxford had been sent off to
mobilise the militia in Essex, and Lord Middleton to do the same in Kent,
while a bridge of boats was being got ready about Tilbury that the horse of
either county might be rapidly moved to the support of the other. With the
river he had nothing to do. It was under the Duke of York and the
Admiralty, and Pett, one of the commissioners, was in special charge of
Chatham and the Medway. At daybreak, however, on Monday morning
the Dutch were seen at anchor at the Nore. A little later they began to move
up the river, and at noon the King sent for Monk.
In four hours he was on his way to Chatham with the Guards to save the
fleet and dock-yard, and at his heels half the young bloods in London were
trailing pikes. As a soldier the lord-general's name had never been so much
as breathed upon, and in a burst of enthusiasm a rabble "of idle lords and
gentlemen, with their pistols and fooleries," started to their feet to follow
the pattern of soldiership, the old Captain-Lieutenant of "Vere's," their
fathers' father-in-arms. By night he reached Gravesend. It was practically
defenceless. The batteries were unarmed and unmanned, and he decided to
halt the train of artillery that was following him at the weak point till
further orders. There was time for little more. His rest was disturbed with
the sound of a furious cannonade from the direction of Sheerness, and at
daylight he hurried on to Chatham.
Here, thanks to Monk's perfect organisation and his officers' high capacity,
Lord Middleton was able to report the mobilisation of Kent complete, and
the Duke to write off a letter to the King full of cheery confidence as to the
result of any attempt of the Dutch to land. But that was the end; the rest of
the news was too desperate to tell. Sheerness had fallen, and practically
nothing had been done for the defence of Chatham. There was no
ammunition, not a gun was mounted, the dock-yard hands had not been
paid for months, and in desperation nearly the whole of them had
deserted. In the face of stringent orders, the finest ships in the navy were
still lying out unprotected in the tideway; most of the officials were away
busily transporting their effects in the boats that had been provided for the
defence of the fleet, and Pett was panic-stricken. The only obstacle to the
enemy's attack was a chain which had been stretched across the river
below Upnor, but not a gun had been planted for its protection. There was
not even a gun-boat ready to prevent the Dutch removing it.
Monk instantly sent back to Gravesend to order on the artillery, and then
hurried to the chain to throw up flanking batteries. It was soon discovered
that there were not enough tools for the working-parties. More were sent
for, and answer came that they could not be delivered without proper
requisitions. Stickler as Monk was for orderly routine, he was no man to
see his country strangled with red tape. With a sufficient force he marched
to the stores, broke them open, and seized everything he wanted.
His next care was to arm and man Upnor Castle opposite Chatham; and to
gain time till the works were complete he ordered ships to be sunk in the
channels below the chain. To Pett and the most skilful pilots the work was
committed, and Monk went to superintend the progress of the batteries.
Five ships were sunk, and then, that no precaution might be omitted,
Admiral Sir Edward Spragg was ordered to sound the channels in person
to make sure they were blocked. By this time the tide was making fast and
the Dutch were advancing on the flow. At the last moment Spragg
returned to say he had found a deep channel quite clear. It was too late to
stop it. Not a gun was yet in its place. In the extremity of the danger the
veteran's old Quixotic spirit was rekindled and set every heart on fire. By
the chain lay two guardships which had been stationed there for its
protection, together with the Monmouth, which had just been fitted out to
join the northern cruising squadron. Unable to witness in inactivity the
insult which his old despised enemies were about to put on his country, he
determined to man them with his troops. In person he went on board the
cruiser, resolved to die in defence of his old flagship the Royal Charles,
which lay a little above helpless and dismantled, or at least determined not
to survive his country's disgrace. And with him went down into the mouth
of death fifty of the flower of England's dissolute Court, transformed for an
hour to heroes by the magic of the one stout old heart which knew not how
to flinch.
It would have been a worthy end could he and England's honour have
fallen side by side. But it was not to be. The newly discovered channel had
not been betrayed. The Dutch could not find it, and ere they had cleared a
way through the sunken ships the tide was spent. A respite was won, but
no rest. Sleepless and untiring the lord-general worked on. Two ships were
placed in readiness to sink within the chain, and a large Dutch prize was
ordered to block the fair-way between them. Pett was told to get the Royal
Charles above the dock by the evening tide, and Monk devoted himself to
the batteries.
On Wednesday at break of day he was still hard at work. The redoubts
were well forward, but the Royal Charles had not been moved. The big
Dutch prize was being worked to its place, but it was only to be clumsily
stranded on a shoal, and in spite of all Monk's efforts there was still
nothing but the chain to protect the hulks and the dock-yard as the tide
turned.
At ten the Dutch, having cleared the channel in the night, came boldly on
with tide and wind, and after a hard struggle seized the guardships that
Monk had manned. It was a moment of fearful anxiety as they prepared to
charge the boom. A fire-ship led the way. It stuck on the top of it. A larger
one followed, and with a crash the chain gave way. Then through the very
channel that the Dutch prize should have blocked the enemy came on. In a
few minutes two more guardships were on fire, and the grand old Naseby
which had been launched twelve years ago, "with Oliver on horseback in
the prow trampling six nations under foot;" which with changed name had
proudly borne the King from exile to a throne; which not a year ago had
wrung from Europe a cry of admiration while Monk's own flag was
floating in tatters at its masthead,—was a prize in the hands of the Dutch.
"This was all I observed of the enemies' action on Wednesday," wrote the
broken-hearted general with pathetic brevity when he reported to
Parliament. He turned away—but not to grieve. Resistance and revenge
were still his only thoughts. The other three great first-rates he sunk at their
moorings, and then the artillery arrived. On the ebb the Dutch fell back
with their prize, and all that day and the next morning the work of defence
went on. "Courage mounted with occasion." Monk's spirit was upon them,
and the fine lords and gentlemen toiled like cattle. They strained at the
drag-ropes, they staggered under burdens, and when the hour was come
they took their stand with ladle and linstock to work the guns.
When on Thursday at noon the Dutch came on once more fifty guns,
besides those which had arrived from Gravesend, were in position, and a
furious fire was opened on them. The Dutch stood on in spite of it, and
engaged Upnor Castle and the batteries with the coolest effrontery.
Between the broadsides English deserters on board the enemy were heard
jeering at the Government that had cheated them of their pay, and under
cover of the intrepid attack the fire-ships passed on to where the three great
ships were sunk. They were still an easy prey. Their upper works still
towered above the water. Not a boat was to be found to stop the progress
of the fire-ships. Helpless but defiant still, the old terror of the Dutch drew
down to the shore, and taking his stand, cane in hand, with his Guards at
his back, where the fire was hottest, watched the humbling of the flag
which he and Blake and Oliver had raised so high. The fire-ships had soon
done their work: the three finest ships that were left to England were a
mass of flames; and no ball had come to end the bitterness of the old
general's shame.
The Dutch retired with the ebb, and Monk, whom since the morning the
anxious King had been summoning to his side to allay the panic in the
capital, went up to town. He had saved the dock-yard and two-thirds of
the fleet, but it did little to soothe his indignation, and he reached
Whitehall at two o'clock next morning storming at those who had rejected
his advice to fit out the fleet and treat sword in hand. On his arrival a
report was circulated that he had been made Lord High Constable, and the
immediate effect seems to have been a restoration of confidence. Something
like order and definite purpose was infused into the work of blocking the
Thames, and the Dutch thought fit to try and surprise other ports. But
everywhere they found to their cost that they had no longer the Board of
Admiralty to deal with. The hand of the lord-general was at every point,
and wherever they attempted to land they were at once repulsed with loss.
They returned to the Nore, but it was only to find that their old enemy had
now set his mark there also. Thames and Medway bristled with guns and
defensive works, and no further offensive operation was attempted till
peace was signed.
Whatever was the fact, the country believed that old George had saved it
from invasion and the miseries to which it had been exposed by Charles's
treacherous councillors. The Monmouth incident was sung in ballads, and
the general was compared to his immortal kinsman the great Sir Richard
Grenville. Parliament met in a rage. Ravenous for a scapegoat, they went
into committee on the late miscarriages, and the first result was a vote of
thanks to the lord-general.
It was but little consolation to the old man. The disgrace at Chatham had
been a terrible blow to him, and his tremendous exertions had told upon
his shattered constitution. In despair he saw Charles return to the lap of his
mistresses, indolent and profligate and careless as ever; and he fell back
into the lethargy from which he had roused himself at his country's call.
For some time it had been growing on him as his terrible disease advanced
with secret strides. The following year dropsy declared itself, but still he
clung to his post and occupied himself incessantly with the duties of his
office. In the autumn, however, it became so bad, and was so complicated
by an affection of the heart and lungs, that he was compelled to retire to
Newhall, his seat in Essex, for rest and change of air. The old rumour that
he had been poisoned was revived, and caused great anger among the
people; for in him shone the only ray of hope, the only spark of honesty
amidst the night of treachery and corruption in which the country seemed
lost.
During the winter he grew worse, but still neglected all precautions. His
extraordinary constitution had bred in him a contempt for medicine and an
insuperable impatience of the restraints which medical treatment entailed.
At last, however, being almost unable to breathe, he was induced to try
some pills invented by an old soldier of his who had set up as a doctor.
Strangely enough he experienced immediate relief, and by the end of the
summer he returned to Whitehall thinking himself entirely cured. Once
more he threw himself into the business of State with something of his old
ardour, till with winter came a relapse to warn men that his end was near.
Every one flocked to the Cockpit to pay his respects to the renowned
invalid and to look once more upon the embodiment of the iron age that
was past. Parliament was sitting, and the great strife between the Houses
over Skinner's case was at its height. Lords and Commons called on their
way from Westminster, and forgetful even then of all but his country's
peace, the stout old general, as he sat up in his chair wearily gasping for
breath, implored them to come to a good understanding. Sir John
Grenville, now Earl of Bath, was assiduous in his attendance, and Gilbert
Sheldon, the aged Archbishop of Canterbury, who all through the plague
had stood unflinching by the general's side, prayed with him constantly.
Even the laughter-loving King tore himself almost daily from the society of
Lady Castlemaine to endure for a little while the distressing sight.
Though to the last Monk could not quite believe that his disease had
mastered him, yet he viewed the prospect of his approaching death with
the same quiet resolution with which he had looked it in the face a
hundred times before. He thought he still might live to staunch the
bleeding wounds of his country and see its King a man again. But if he
might not raise it, he at least could leave it with little regret now it was
sunk so low. For years his own life had been a pattern of temperance and
chastity, and the unblushing sin with which his great achievement had
deluged the country was the source of real and poignant grief to him.
But one desire really bound him to life, and that was to see his son married.
Christopher was now a gallant of about eighteen years old, and ever since
his father was first taken ill a marriage had been in course of arrangement
between him and Lady Elizabeth Cavendish, granddaughter of the Duke of
Newcastle. Now at the eleventh hour the business was completed, and on
December th the young couple were brought to the general's chamber.
There beside his chair, as he sat gasping for life, they were married, and the
last faint effort of the arms that had lifted a king on to his throne was to
take the silly girl he had chosen and place her feebly in the arms of the
beloved son she was destined to ruin. It was a tragic wedding indeed, and
with it the doom of the ancient house of Monk was sealed. No child blessed
the ill-omened union, and the extravagance of the half-witted bride soon
drove the young duke to those evil courses which dragged him to his
untimely end. The last of his race, he brought his father's name and titles in
dishonour to the ground. With the crown of the Stuarts fell the coronet of
Albemarle. For by strange irony, as William of Orange was on the eve of
sailing to dethrone the dynasty which the first duke had so triumphantly
restored, the last duke was dying in Jamaica a broken gambler and a sot.
Happily ignorant of what he did, the dying father resigned himself to the
end which was now inevitable. At four o'clock on New Year's morning, , he
insisted on being removed to his sitting-room. Just ten years ago in the
fulness of his strength he had risen from his uneasy couch at Coldstream to
order his vanguard to cross the Tweed on their eventful march. Now as
then, it was freezing bitterly, and no fire was alight. Gumble hurried to his
side. He saw death in the smile which greeted him, and hastened to read
the service for the Visitation of the Sick. Later in the day the Sacrament was
administered, and the world knew the great man was in extremity. All
Sunday they flocked to take their leave of him in such numbers that it was
impossible to keep the room clear for a minute. It was the anniversary of
the great day of his life, the Second of January, when he himself at the head
of his army had crossed the Rubicon of the English Revolution, and like
Cromwell's, his victories seemed to cluster round his head even as Death
laid his hand upon it.
All night he lingered clinging to life. Erect in his chair, as the people loved
to remember, he defied even Death to make him bend, and at the last
received him sitting like a king. To the end he maintained that he would
live if only the bitter frost would loose its grip, and till dawn he obstinately
held his enemy at bay. Then as the sun rose warm and bright and the frost
began to break, the faithful Coldstreamers, who were watching in the silent
chamber, heard "a single small groan," and the brave spirit of their chief
was free at last.
With his George and Garter they hurried to the King. He received the news
with genuine feeling as one that had lost a father. All that he owed to the
stout heart that was still seemed to rush upon him like a loud warning
from Heaven, and for a moment to rouse the magnanimity in which Monk
had always believed. As though he could never reward enough the
ungrudging service of his most faithful subject, he immediately despatched
his Garter to Christopher, and announced that he should personally
arrange the funeral. It was conducted in almost royal magnificence. After
lying in state for some weeks in his armour as Captain-General, with his
golden truncheon in his hand, his body was escorted to Westminster by the
King in person in the midst of a procession which for splendour had only
been rivalled at his own coronation, and there in Henry the Seventh's
chapel it was laid with the bones of kings. And that no touch might be
omitted to mark the exalted pedestal the majestic figure should occupy, the
humblest of the great ones who were permitted to grace his last parade was
the man on whom his cloak was to fall, the greatest of English generals,
Ensign John Churchill.
But there it all ended. No monument rose to mark the spot where the hero
lay. The King was too poor, the new duke too profligate, and the homely
duchess died with broken heart while her lord still lay in state. Nor have
any been found since save distant kinsmen even to show posterity where
he lies. Neither the splendid regiment he founded, nor the army he
inspired, nor the country to whom at so slight a cost he restored the
priceless boon of monarchy, have thought him worthy of the tribute that
has been lavished on so many not more deserving. So the memory of the
man the King delighted to honour has fallen a victim to the execration of
the visionaries he crushed, to the reproaches of the Puritans he restrained,
to the rancour of the unjust stewards he exposed, to the abjectness of the
servile historiographers with whom half his career was a subject tabooed,
and to the jibes of the profligates with whom he would not sin.
For a biographer to sum up a character so lovable and so misunderstood is
almost impossible without falling into exaggeration. It is better that his
story should close with a tribute dropped unwittingly from the most
unwilling hand that could have penned it. On October th, , for the last time
the House awarded the sturdy old patriot their thanks for his service;
"Which is a strange act," wrote Pepys; "but, I know not how, the blockhead
Albemarle hath strange luck to be loved, though he be (and every man
must know it) the heaviest man in the world, but stout and honest to his
country."
In the sermon that was delivered at his funeral in Westminster Abbey we
have the opinion of a great dignitary of the Church who was fully alive to
his faults.
Careful as he was that he should pronounce no idle panegyric, he blessed
him altogether, "He was the best father in the world," said the Bishop of
Exeter.
"He was certainly the best husband in the world, and he received the
requital of faithfulness and love. They twain were loving in their lives and
in death they were not divided.... He was the favourite of Parliament, the
darling of the Houses. They confided in him. They loved and revered him."
And of the King's affection he had as high a testimony to give.
Such abiding popularity as his is a thing not lightly won. It is not for long
that a great nation will honour a man unworthy of its devotion. Through
ten years of doubt and danger and shifting party-strife he was the idol of
the people of England, and if it is asked why we should endorse the verdict
of his contemporaries, the answer is plain; he wound up the English
Revolution. At the high tide of profit he struck a balance and closed the
account.
Elsewhere, under stars less fortunate than our own, no liquidator has
arisen to do the work which only a man of Monk's inflexible integrity and
splendid self-control can accomplish, and there we have seen Revolution
drag on a bankrupt existence with ever accumulating loss. From that Monk
saved us. It was what Cromwell strove to do and failed, for the hour was
not yet ripe. With an exactness which it is impossible to account for or
ignore Monk marked the hour when it came, gripped it with confident
decision, and the fate of the sovereign who tried to set at nought the
English Revolution proves the dull soldier was right.