ditch, as they were consulting about the manner of putting their enterprize into execution. Their arms and ammunition were like wise seized, together with a standard, displaying a lion couchant, with the motto, Who shall rouse him up? and several copies of a printed declaration, intended to be distributed among the people. On this occasion, Cromwell resorted to no greater severity than imprisonment; but those who had embarked in another plot, which was shortly afterwards discovered, with the avowed design of restoring the race of the Stuarts,' were treated with far more harshness; and the two principal of them, Dr. Hewet, and Sir Henry Slingsby, were sent to the scaffold.+ During these transactions, the glory of the English name was strenuously upheld by Cromwell in all his negociations and treaties with foreign states; nor was the result of most of his warlike expeditions to foreign countries less fortunate than those which he had directed in person at home. Having formed an alliance with Louis the Fourteenth against the Spaniards, he assisted the former with a body of 6000 choice troops, whom he had placed under the command of his ambassador, Sir William Lockhart, and Major General Morgan. After some less important services, these forces commenced the siege of Dunkirk, in conjunction with the French army under Marshall Turenne; and the operations were partly superintended by Louis in person, and his favourite minister, Cardinal Mazarine. On the approach, however, of the Spanish General, Don John of Austria, the Prince of Conde, the Prince de Ligny, and the Dukes of York and Glocester, with 30,000 men, the King and the Cardinal retired to Calais; and the French, in a council of war, resolved to abandon the siege, in case the enemy should advance to the attack. At this council neither Lockhart Ludlow's Mem. p. 230. + Dr. Hewet would certainly have been pardoned, if it had not been for his own pertinacity in denying the jurisdiction of the High Court of Justice, which had been appointed to try the conspirators conformably to an Act of the late Parliament passed for the security of his Highness's Person. Lockhart nor Morgan was present; but at the succeeding one, their united efforts, conjoined with the assertion, that if the siege was raised, the alliance with England would be broken the same hour,' occasioned a new resolution to be taken; and the main body of the French army was drawn out to await the approach of the Spaniards. The English, however, were impatient to engage; and having with some difficulty surmounted the disadvantage of the ground, they attacked the Spanish van with such fury, that it was forced to fall back upon the main army, which was also defeated after a desperate resistance, by the trivial aid of a body of cavalry that had been dispatched by the French to assist their allies." At the end of the pursuit, Marshall Turenne, with above one hundred officers, came up to the English, alighted from their horses, and embracing the officers, said, They never saw a more glorious action in their lives; and that they were so transported with the sight of it, that they had not power to move, or do any thing."* Even the Spanish Generals themselves gave full testimony to the intrepidity of the English; " for Don John exclaimed, that he was beaten by wild beasts rather than men;' and the great Conde declared, that he had never seen so gallant an action as that day's performance by the English was."† In the following month, Life of O. Crom. p. 374. Noble's Crom Vol. II. p. 251. "The French Monarch," says this gentleman, who derived his information from Lockhart's family, "conscious of the importance of the place, knowing how dangerous it would be in the hands of England when at war with France, and desirous himself to possess it, endeavoured to evade the treaty; and when Turenne took possession with a body of French troops, the King of France and the Cardinal at the same time entered the town, amusing themselves with the idea of having obtained so precious a morsel from Spain at the expense of the blood and treasure of England, and giving nothing but idle apologies to Lockhart, who, in the most pointed manner, expressed the violation of the treaty, and the resentment his mas ter must feel for his wrongs. Oliver, however, disappointed all their gay prospects; for knowing the duplicity of the Cardinal, and how little reliance . month, Dunkirk surrendered by capitulation, and was almost immediately delivered up to Lockhart, agreeably to the treaty, by which the Protector had engaged in the French interest; yet this was not done without the exertion of the most decided firmness both by Cromwell, and by his Ambassador and General. But the time was now hastening, when the vital spirit of the Protector was about to quit its mortal tenement. He found that the assumption of sovereignty had not added to his happiness; for though his power and greatness seemed to be better established than ever, yet he never had that serenity of mind after his refusal of the Crown, that he had before usually enjoyed. His apprehension of personal danger became far greater than formerly, inasmuch as the plots and conspiracies against him increased; and he grew very suspicious, and difficult of access, and was reliance ought to be placed upon his word, he had opened a secret correspondence with the French Secretary of the Council of War, who, for a bribe, disclosed the resolutions of the cabinet, which, when Cromwell knew, he instantly dispatched a messenger to Sir William, with written instructions for his conduct; and the Ambassador-General immediately, in compliance with them, posted his army upon an eminence detached from the French, and in such a manner that they could not be surprised; then taking his watch in his hand, he repaired to the Cardinal, and demanded, in a peremptory manner, 'a written order for the delivery of Dunkirk, which, if it was not complied with, he had directions to acquaint him, that his master looked upon the terms of the treaty as violated, and consequently made null; and in that case, he should retire to his camp, and dispatch an express to Don John, the Spanish General, to acquaint him that he was ready, and prepared to join his forces to his, to act in conjunction against the arms of France." The Cardinal thought this only an high mode of expressing himself, and asked my Lord Ambassador in banter, whether his Excellence had slept well the preceding evening, or whether he was yet entirely awake?' The Ambassador assured him of both; and coldly drew out his instruc tions in the hand writing of the Protector. The astonished Cardinal, who knew Oliver's decisive manner of acting, began now to listen with the utmost attention; and endeavoured, but in vain, to soften the pe remptory was more rarely seen abroad. The death of Elizabeth, his second and favorite daughter, which happened within a month of his own, greatly affected him; and, by co-operating with severe bodily infirmities, proved the more immediate cause of his dissolution. In her last hours, she is said, by Lord Clarendon, to have remptory demand of the Ambassador, who, with extreme coolness, replied, that he should be obliged religiously to obey the injunctions of his master. The Cardinal, perceiving his firmness, was obliged to comply, and give up the place within the allotted time. The French troops, therefore, again evacuated the town; and Sir William and his forces took possession in the name of his Highness the Protector; he himself having the honor to receive the keys in person from Louis the Fourteenth." Ibid. Welwood relates this transaction somewhat differently, though still most highly to the honor of the Protector's firmness. He says, that "Cromwell sent one morning for the French Ambassador to Whitehall, and upbraided him publicly for his master's designed breach of promise, in giving secret orders to the French General to keep possession of Dunkirk, in case it was taken, contrary to the treaty between them. The Ambassador protested that he knew nothing of the matter, as indeed he did not, and begged leave to assure him, that there was no such thing thought of. Upon which Cromwell pulling a paper out of his pocket, 'Here (says he) is a copy of the Cardinal's order; and I desire you to dispatch immediately an express, to let him know, that I am not to be imposed upon; and that if he deliver not up the keys of the town of Dunkirk within an hour after it shall be taken, I'll come in person, und demand them at the gates of Paris." Mem. p. 112. *Life of O. Crom. p. 378. + In Thurloe's State Papers is a letter to Henry Cromwell, Lord Deputy of Ireland, from his brother-in-law, Fleetwood, who says, that the Protector's illness was contracted by the long sickness of my Lady Elizabeth, which made great impressions upon him:' aud in ano❤ ther letter to the same person, from Dr. Thomas Clarges, dated September 1, 1658, the latter remarks, his Highness was much distem pered by his late grief and melancholy, besides his other infirmities, which have bitterly reproached her father for those guilty acts which his ambition occasioned, and particularly for the death of Dr. Hewet, with whom she had long lived in habits of strict friendship, and for whose pardon she had importuned with the utmost earnestness. This account is corroborated by Dugdale; and, indeed, most of the historians of that time agree in the statement of the rapid decay of Cromwell after his daughter's decease. For some time he seems not to have entertained any ideas of his approaching end; and this disposition of mind was strengthened by the enthusiasm of his chaplains, who even "kept a solemn Thanksgiving for his recovery at Hampton Court, where he then lay." Almost iumediately afterwards, he was removed to Whitehall, where gra dually growing worse, he expired about three in the afternoon, on the third of September, anno 1658, the day which he had long considered as the most auspicious of his life, it being that on which he had gained his two famous victories of Dunbar and Worcester. He was buried in that sepulchre of our Monarchs, Henry the Seventh's Whitelocke, speaking of the Lady which were a double tertian ague. Elizabeth, says, "she was a lady of excellent parts, dear to her pas rents, and civil to all persons, and courtly and friendly to all gentlemen of her acquaintance: her death did much grieve her father.” Alem. p. 675. * Dug. Short View, p. 457. Burnet says that Tillotson (afterwards Bishop T. who married Cromwell's niece) told him that, "a week after Cromwell's death, he being by accident at Whitehall, and hearing that there was to be a fast that day in the household, he out of curiosity went into the presence chamber where it was held. On the one side of a ¡able, Richard, with the rest of Cromwell's family, were placed, and six of the preachers were on the other side, of whom Goodwin was one. There he heard a good deal of strange stuff, enough to disgust a man for ever of that enthusiastic boldness. God was, as it were, reproached with Cromwell's services, and challenged for taking him away so soon. Goodwin, who had pretended to assure them, in a prayer, that he was not to die, which was but a very few minutes before he expired, had now the impudence to say to God, Thou has deceived us, and we were deceived." Hist. Vol. I. p. 82. |