their other two associates, in sight of the whole army; and to break the combination, eleven regiments were ordered for Ireland; upon which great numbers deserted, and marched into Oxfordshire; but generals Fairfax and Cromwell, having overtaken them at Abingdon, held them in treaty till colonel Reynolds came up, and after some few skirmishes dispersed them.

The Scots threatened the commonwealth with a formidable invasion, for upon the death of king Charles I. they proclaimed the prince of Wales king of Scotland, and sent commissioners to the Hague, to invite him into that kingdom, provided he would renounce Popery and Prelacy, and take the solemn league and covenant. To prevent the effects of this treaty, and cultivate a good understanding with the Dutch, the parliament sent Dr. Dorislaus,* an eminent civilian, concerned in the late king's trial, agent to the States-General; but the very first night after his arrival, May 3, 1649, he was murdered in his own chamber by twelve desperate cavaliers in disguise, who rushed in upon him while he was at supper, and with their drawn swords killed him on the spot. Both the parliament and states of Holland resented this base action‡ so highly, that the young king thought proper to remove into France; from whence he went to the Isle of Jersey, and towards the latter end of the year fixed at Breda; where the Scots commissioners concluded a treaty with him, upon the foot

*This person was a native of Holland, and doctor of the civil law at Leyden. On his coming to England he was patronised by Fulk lord Brook, who appointed him to read lectures on history in Cambridge. But, as in the opening of his course he decried monarchy, he was silenced; he then resided some time near to Maldon in Essex, where he had married an English woman. He was afterward, a judge advocate first, in the king's army, and then in the army of the parliament, and at length one of the judges of the court of admiralty. The parliament ordered 250l. for his funeral; settled on his son 200l. per annum for his life, and gave 500l. a piece to his daughters. Wood's Athenæ Oxon. vol. 2. p. 228; and Whitelocke's Memorials, p. 390.-ED.

+ Whitelocke, p. 386.

Dr. Grey cannot easily believe that the murder of Dr. Dorislaus was resented by the states of Holland; because they had bravely remonstrated by their two ambassadors against the king's death: he cannot, therefore, be easily induced to think, that, after this, they could resent the death of one of his execrable murde.eis. But Dr. Grey does not consider what was due in this case to the honour of their own police, and to the reputation and weight of their own laws. Mr. Neal is justified in his representations by Whitelocke, who says, " that letters from the Hague reported, that the States caused earnest inquisition to be made after the murderers of Dr. Dorislaus; promised one thousand guilders to him who should bring any of them; and published it death to any who should harbour any one of them." Memorials, P. 390.-Ep.

of which he ventured his royal person into that kingdom the ensuing year.

But to strike terror into the cavaliers, the parliament erected another high court of justice, and sentenced to death three illustrious noblemen, for the part they had acted in the last civil war; duke Hamilton, the earl of Holland, and lord Capel, who were all executed March 9, in the Palaceyard at Westminster: duke Hamilton declared himself a Presbyterian; and the earl of Holland was attended by two ministers of the same persuasion; but lord Capel was a thorough loyalist, and went off the stage with the courage and bravery of a Roman.

But the chief scene of great exploits this year was in Ireland, which Cromwell, a bold and enterprising commander, had been appointed to reduce; for this purpose he was made lord-lieutenant for three years, and having taken leave of the parliament, sailed from Milford-baven about the middle of August, with an army of fourteen thousand men of resolute principles, who before the embarkation observed a day of fasting and prayer; in which, Mr. Whitelocke remarks, after three ministers had prayed, lieutenant-general Cromwell himself, and the colonels Gough and Harrison, expounded some parts of Scripture excellently well, and pertinently to the occasion. The army was under a severe discipline; not an oath was to be heard throughout the whole camp, the soldiers spending their leisure hours in reading their Bibles, in singing psalms, and religious conferences.

Almost all Ireland was in the hands of the royalists and Roman Catholics, except Dublin and Londonderry; the former of these places had been lately besieged by the duke of Ormond with twenty thousand men,* but the garrison

* Dr. Grey controverts Mr. Neal's account of the number of the duke of Ormond's army, on the authority of lord Clarendon and Mr. Carte: the former says, that Jones: sallied out with a body of six thousand foot and one thousand nine hundred horse, and that the army encamped at Rathmines was not so strong in horse and foot: the latter, that Jones's forces amounted to only four thousand foot and one thousand two hundred horse, which was a body nearly equal to the whole Irish army, if it had been all engaged. These authorities are set against Mr. Neal. On the other hand, Whitelocke informs us that, previously to this defeat, letters from Ireland represented the duke of Ormond as approaching Dublin with twelve thousand foot and two thousand four hundred horse; and letters from Chester reported him forty thousand strong before Dublin. Ludlow says, that his forces were double in number to those of Jones. Borlase says, that Jones with very few forces, comparatively, fell on the besiegers, killed four thousand, and took two thousand five hundred and seventeen prisoners. The plunder of the field, we are told, was so rich, that the camp was like a fair, presenting for sale cloth, silk, and all manner of clothes. The parliament settled 1000l.

5

being recruited with three regiments from England, the governor, colonel James, surprised the besiegers, and after a vigorous sally stormed their camp, and routed the whole army, which dispersed itself into Drogheda, and other fortified places. Cromwell upon his arrival was received with the acclamations of a vast concourse of people, to whom he addressed himself from a rising ground, with hat in hand, in a soldierlike manner, telling them "he was come to cut down and destroy the barbarous and blood-thirsty Irish, with all their adherents; but that all who were for the Protestant religion, and the liberties of their country, should find suitable encouragement from the parliament of England and himself, in proportion to their merits." Having refreshed his forces he marched directly to Drogheda, which was garrisoned with two thousand five hundred foot and three hundred horse, and was therefore thought capable of holding out a month; but the general neglecting the common forms of approach, battered the walls with his cannon, and having made two accessible breaches, like an impetuous conqueror, entered the town in person at the head of colonel Ewer's regiment of foot, and put all the garrison to the sword. From thence he marched to Wexford, which he took likewise by storm, and after the example of Drogheda, put the garrison to the sword; the general declaring, that he would sacrifice all the Irish Papists to the ghosts of the English Protestants whom they had massacred in cold blood. The conquest of these places struck such a terror

per annum in land on Jones, for his services. Whitelocke's Memoirs, p. 393. 401.404. Ludlow's Memoirs, p. 101, 4to. ed. And Harris's Life of Cromwell, p. 228.-ED. * Dr. Grey spends here more than ten pages in detailing, from lord Clarendon, various acts of oppression, cruelty, and murder, perpetrated by individuals of Cromwell's army; to shew that they were not less barbarous and blood-thirsty than the inhuman wretches concerned in the Irish massacre. Such deeds, undoubtedly, shock humanity; and ought to shock every party. But the guilt lieth originally at the door of those who were the first aggressors; whose conduct furnished the precedent and provoked retaliation.-En.

+ Great reproach, on this account, has fallen on the name of Cromwell. He reconciled himself to the execution of such severe orders, for putting to the sword and giving no quarter, by considering them as necessary to prevent the effusion of blood for the future, and as the instrument of the righteous judgment of God upon those barbarous wretches who had imbrued their hands in so much innocent blood. If ever such measures are justifiable," it is in such a case as this (observes Dr. Harris), where the known disposition and behaviour of the sufferers are remarkably barbarous, inhuman, and cruel." Such horror, we are told, had the barbarities committed by the Irish, in the beginning of the Rebellion and during the course of the war impressed on every English breast, that even the humane and gentle Fairfax expressed in warm and severe terms his disapprobation at granting them quarter. Harris's Life of Cromwell, p. 229; and Macaulay's History of England, vol. 5. p. 15, note, 8vo. ed. ED.

into the rest, that they surrendered upon the first summons; the name of Cromwell carrying victory on its wings before himself appeared, the whole country was reduced by the middle of May, except Limerick, Galway, and one or two other places, which Ireton took the following summer. Lord Inchequin deserted the remains of the royal army, and Ormond fled into France. Lieutenant-general Cromwell being called home to march against the Scots, arrived at London about the middle of May, and was received by the parliament and city with distinguished respect and honour, as a soldier who had gained more laurels, and done more wonders in nine months, than any age or history could parallel.

It is a remarkable account the lieutenant-general gives in one of his letters, of the behaviour of the army after their arrival in Ireland; "Their diligence, courage, and behaviour, are such (says he) through the providence of God, and strict care of the chief officers, that never men did obey orders more cheerfully, nor go upon duty more courageously. Never did greater harmony and resolution appear to prosecute this cause of God, than in this army. Such a consent of heart and hands; such a sympathy of affections, not only in carnal but in spiritual bonds, which tie faster than chains of adamant! I have often observed a wonderful consent of the officers and soldiers upon the grounds of doing service to God, and how miraculously they have succeeded. The mind of man being satisfied, and fixed on God, and that his undertaking is for God's glory, it gives the greatest courage to those men, and prosperity to their actions."*

To put the affairs of Ireland together: the Roman Catholics charged the ill success of their affairs upon the duke of Ormond, and sent him word, "that they were determined not to submit any longer to his commands, it not being fit that a Catholic army should be under the direction of a Protestant general; but that if he would depart the kingdom, they would undertake of themselves to drive Ireton out of Dublin." After this they offered the kingdom to the duke of Lorrain, a bigoted Papist, who was wise enough, to decline the offer, and then quarrelling among themselves

*Whitelocke, p. 434.

Dr. Grey insinuates here a reflection on Mr. Neal's veracity; by remarking that he produces no authority for the assertion. But that Ireland was offered to the

they were soon driven out of all the strong holds of the kingdom, and forced to submit to the mercy of the conqueror. All who had borne arms in the late insurrection, were shipped away into France, Spain, or Flanders, never to return on pain of death. Those who had a hand in murdering the Protestants at the time of the massacre, were brought from several parts of the country, and after conviction upon a fair trial were executed. The rest of the natives, who were called Tories, were shut up in the most inland counties and their lands given partly in payment to the soldiers who settled there, and the rest to the first adventurers.* Lord Clarendon relates it thus: "Near one hundred thousand of them were transported into foreign parts, for the service of the kings of France and Spain; double that number were consumed by the plague, famine, and other severities exercised upon them in their own country; the remainder were by Cromwell transplanted into the most inland, barren, desolate, and mountainous part of the province of Connaught, and it was lawful for any man to kill any of the Irish, that were found out of the bounds appointed them within that circuit. Such a proportion of land was allotted to every man, as the protector thought competent for them; upon which they were to give formal releases of all their titles to their lands in any other provinces; if they refused to give such releases, they were still deprived, and left to starve within the limits prescribed them; out of which they durst not withdraw; so that very few refused to sign those releases, or other acts, which were demanded. It was a considerable time before these Irish could raise any thing out of their lands to support their lives; but necessity was the spring of industry." Thus they lived under all the infamy of a conquered nation till the restoration of king Charles II. a just judgment of God for their barbarous and unheard-of cruelties to the Irish Protestants!

To return to England: The body of the Presbyterians acted in concert with the Scots, for restoring the king's family upon the foot of the covenant; several of their ministers carried on a private correspondence with the chiefs of that nation, and instead of taking the engagement to

guardianship of the duke of Lorrain has been since mentioned, as an incontrovertible fact, by Dr. Harris and Mrs. Macaulay,-ED.

* Carrington's Life of Cromwell, p. 155. Clarendon, p. 153.