the Marquess of Ormond the Earl of Glamorgan the Lord Digby and others of great concernment and mentioning preparations for Irish Rebels hither which so inraged the Countrey people that they put to the Sword thirty Irish taken by them in that Vessel at Padstow 10. Difference of Opinion between the Houses about the Earl of Derby the Lord Pawlet Sir John Byron and Sir Jo. Strangways whom the Lords thought fit not to except from Pardon Col. Rainsborough sent to command the Forces before Banbury had power of Martial Law given him Letters informed that Sir William Brereton entred Litchfield with the loss of three men slain and some wounded that he killed six of the enemy and beat the rest into the Close being a thousand horse and soot A Sally out of Newarke with four hundred horse and a thousand foot upon the Scots Guards the Bridge being down none of the rest of the Army could come to assist them and the Newarkers were double the number to the Scots in that place but after a little time some got over to them and the Newarkers retreated having killed one Captain two Lieutenants and eight Soldiers and about twenty wounded and few of their own party left behind them 11. The accounts of the Committee of Excise brought in and a Vote passed to continue the Excise in such hands as both houses shall think fit and order for advancing of eighty four thousand pound upon the Excise for the Army Divers other orders about the Excise and one for two thousand pound for Abbington Garrison Letters informed that the Army advanced from Bodman towards Truro but by reason of bad weather put into Quarters that a party of 800 Horse and Dragoons was sent under Col. Rich to fall upon the enemies Quarters which they did near St. Columbe being the Princes Regiment consisting of about eight hundred they of the Van Charged Rich's men but were quickly put to the rout and pursued three or four miles Rich's men took about an hundred Prisoners most of them Reformado's whereof M. G. Perâ— was one twenty nine of the Princes Guard and a hundred Horse this so allarm'd the Enemy that they left their head Quarter for a Mile and drew all their Horse to a rendezvous upon a down at eleven a clock at night where they stood in the rain till the next morning A Trumpet came with an Answer from the Lord Hopton to Sir Tho. Fairfax's Summons implying a willingness to end the business of the West without more blood-shed but desires to know whether the King and Parliament be not near to a conclusion of a Peace that he being intrusted may be careful of the Kings Honour and a Treaty is entertained and in the mean time Sir Tho. Fairfax's Army advanced The Letters taken in the Trish Ship mentioned the Commitment of the Earl of Glamorgan to be to colour that business and that a Peace was concluded with the Irish Rebells and that ten thousand of them were ready to come into England to assist the King 12. The day of thanksgiving for the late successes in the West Letters from Abbington certified that they had several allarms from Oxford and the last Lords day at six in the Morning a great party of Horse and Foot came near to Abbington Town who took the Allarm and were in a posture to receive them That the Cannon played upon them half an hour from the Town and did good execution that the Oxford Party notwithstanding their words that they would gain the Town or leave their bones there yet they ran away and the Horse could not be perswaded to stay but taking up about ten of their Fellows dead bodies they all retreated to Oxford That the Soldiers wanted no Courage but Money and are put to watch almost every night 13. The Assembly of Divines desired by some of their brethren sent to the House That Mr. Patrick Young might be incouraged in the Printing of the Greek Testament much expected and desired by the Learned especially beyond Seas and an Ordinance was read for Printing and Publishing the Old Testament of the Sepâ—uagint Translation wherein Mr. Young had formerly taken pains and had in his hand as Library-keeper of St Jame's an Original Tecta Bible of that Translation Orders for Money for Soldiers Wives and Widows and to the train of Artillery The Petitions of London Westminster and Middlesex touching the setling of the Militia and the differences thereupon referred to a Committee to be composed A Party from Oxford plundring Basing-stoke and the pressed men going to Sir Thomas Fairfax mutinied at Farnham their Conductor Col. Ven being very imperious and not pleasing to them but it was soon appeased Foy was delivered up to Sir T. Fairfax and thirteen pieces of Ordnance in it 14. An Ordinance past both Houses for setling and regulating the Heralds Office to effect which Whitelocke laboured and was one of the Committee for that end but opposed by many inclining to leveling Order for a Pass for the Earl of Northampton and twenty Officers with him to go beyond Sea provided they take the Negative Oath Votes that the Great Seal should be in the hands of Commissioners Members of both Houses and in the present Commissioners for six Months longer Both Houses agreed to the Ordinance for setling Presbyterian Government Letters informed that Sir Tho. Fairfax and the Lord Hopton agreed upon these Articles That the Lord Hoptons Army should presently be disbanded and his Horse Arms and Ammunition Artillery Bag and Baggage delivered up to Sir Tho. Fairfax Officers to have their Horses and Troopers twenty shillings a man Strangers to have Passages to go beyond Sea and English to go to their homes A hundred and twenty Musqueteers Armed came out of Pendennis Castle and yielded themselves to Sir T. F. That the Lord Hopton surrendred to Sir Tho. Fairfax near three thousand horse 16. Votes touching the Affairs of Ireland and the Commission to be granted to the Lord L'isle appointed Governor there Care for Money for Major General Massies Forces Reference to a Committee to consider what places of benefit are held by any Members of the House and to report it Conference about the propositions for Peace Harwarden Castle was surrendred to Major General Mitton and he besieged Holt Castle A Party from Hereford and Monmouth surprised sixty Horse in the Stables of Gotherick Castle burnt the Stables and Besieged the Castle A Party from Worcester came within a Mile of Evesham plundered and took away some Country men Prisoners but were pursued by a Party from Evesham the Prisoners and Plunder rescued and eighteen of their Horse taken 17. The House being informed that the Prince was in Silley and in some streights for want of Provisions they agreed that a Letter should be written to him in a loving and tender way from both Houses of Parliament to invite him to come in to the Parliament and to reside in such place and have such
them that they might not be burdensom to the Countrey The Houses approved the Letter to be sent from the City to the Army they sate late this night and ordered to sit again to morrow though Sunday 13. After the Evening Sermon the House sate and had a Letter from their Commissioners at St. Albans That Sir Tho. Widdrington and Col. White had acquainted the General with the additional instructions 14. Both Houses named a Committee to draw up a Declaration what they had done and intended to do for the ease of the People and for the Soldiery and for settlement of Peace and that a Committee was appointed to consider what place is fit for the King to come unto for the applications of both Kingdoms to be made to him for setling Peace Upon a Petition of divers Officers Order for a Declaration that hereafter none should presume on pain of Death to meet in a tumultuous way as they had lately done and the Militia to send a considerable Guard to the House Captain Falconbridge and Captain White ordered to bring the trained bands of Westminster for guards to the House A Committee of both Houses to draw a Declaration what the Army hath demanded and what the Houses have offered The Commons being informed that divers of the Parliaments old Officers and Soldiers were in the Hall and Palace they sent to them to withdraw Letters from Ireland that some of the Rebels were returned out of Scotland into Vlster That the Parliaments Commissioners and Col. Jones with some Forces were landed at Dublyn That the Lord Inchequin sent a Party to surprize some Castle near Waterford the Rebels Sallied out and were beaten back about a hundred of them slain and wounded many Prisoners and much Cattle taken 15. Order of both Houses that the General be required to deliver the Person of the King to such Persons as both Houses shall appoint to be placed at Richmond under such manner as they shall think fit to the intent that the Propositions agreed upon by both Kingdoms may be speedily presented to his Majesty for the setling a safe and well grounded Peace That the Persons to whom the King shall be delivered shall be the Commissioners now with him or any three of them That the Guards to receive Orders from the Commissioners shall be Col. Rossiter and his Regiment Order for Col. Birch to have the publique Faith for four thousand nine hundred pound upon his Accounts Officers whose accounts are not stated to have one months pay for Subsistence Order for the Committee of Indemnity to discharge those that are or shall be under restraint for any thing done tempore loco belli A Months Pay to Col. Graves his Forces Letters from the Commissioners in the Army informed that the Votes concerning those that would come away from the Army did much distast them The Results from the Army were 1. The Heads of a Charge against divers Members of the House of Commons which they delivered in to be speeded by the Parliament and when they should be admitted would appoint fit Persons on their and the Kingdoms behalf to prosecute and make good the same 2. If the Parliament shall admit these things at the desire of the Army and proceed for a general satisfaction therein then they desire 1. That the Persons Impeached may be suspended else they can expect no good issue if the same persons who have appeared most active in the late proceedings to the prejudice and provocation of the Army and hazarding the Peace of the Kingdom shall continue in the same Power and Judges of these things 2. For a Months Pay and a resolution thereupon in two days 3. That those of the Army may have as much Pay as they who have ingaged for Ireland or come away from the Army 4. That none who have so deserted the Army may have any more Pay till the rest of the Army be first satisfied in their Arrears 5. That during the transactions of this business the Parliament would not suffer as some have designed any new Forces to be raised in this Kingdom or to be brought out of any other Kingdom hither or any thing else to be done that may carry the Face of a new War or may indanger the settlement of the Liberties and Peace of this Kingdom 6. That the Parliament would be pleased without any delay to put these things into a speedy way of resolution and dispatch the present condition of the Kingdom and Army and of the King not admitting delayes 16. A Charge came to the Houses from Sir Tho. Fairfax and the Officers and Soldiers of the Army against eleven Members of the House of Commons whereby they are charged with obstructing the business of Ireland to have been Actors against the Army and against the laws and Liberties of the Subject and Obstructors of Justice The Members Charged were Denzill Hollis Esquire Sir Philip Stapleton Sir William Lewis Sir John Clot-worthy Sir William Waller Sr. Jo. Maynard M. G. Massey Mr. Recorder Glyn Col. Walter Long Col. Edward Harley and Mr. Anthony Nichols After reading of the Charge the Members severally made some defence thereunto and desired it might be put into a speedy way of tryal A Declaration of the Army was sent from the Commissioners vindicating their proceedings and their desires for the setling and securing their own and the Kingdoms common rest freedom peace and safety The Commissioners of the City returned from the Army with expressions of Love and the Common Council voted to send a Letter to the Army with leave from the Houses that according to their desire no Forces shall be raised against them and that they will move the Parliament for Money to pay the Army and that they may withdraw further from the City The Army further desired of the Parliament 1. That the Houses may be speedily purged of such as ought not to sit there 2. That those persons who have abused the Parliament and Army and indangered the Kingdom may speedily be disabled from doing the like 3. That some time may be set for the continuance of this and future Parliaments and new Elections made successively according to the Bill for Triennial Parliaments 4. That Provision be made that future Parliaments may not be dissolved at the Kings pleasure without their consent but continue the set time 5. That the right of the People to represent to the Parliament their grievances by Petition may be vindicated 6. That the large Powers given to Committees or deputy Lieutenants during the War as appear not necessary to be continued may be taken away and such as are necessary may be put into a regulated way and left to as little Arbitrariness as the nature and necessity thereof will bear 7. They wish that the Kingdom may be righted and satisfied in point of Accounts and other things wherein the Common-wealth may be conceived to have been wronged 8. That publick Justice being satisfied by some few Examples
as a Prisoner That C. Popham one of the Admirals of the Parliaments Fleet was come to London with an Account to the Parliament of the Proceedings of the Fleet. 25 Letters of many Subscriptions to the Ingagement about Exeter That the Scots were busy in raising Forces near Carlisle but the Countrey being backward to take Arms the Officers took Money and excused the Men. A Confirmation that the Parliaments Fleet near Lisbon had sunk the Admiral of the Portugal Brazile Fleet taken the Vice-Admiral and divers other of their Ships of a great value Ordered by the Parliament That all the Books of the Laws be put into English And that all Writs Process and returns thereof and all Patents Commissions Indictments Judgments Records and all Rules and Proceedings in Courts of Justice shall be in the English tongue onely and not in Latine or French or any other Language than English And that the same be writ in an ordinary legible hand and not in any Court hand And that it be referred to a Committee to draw up an Act upon this Vote Referred to the same Committee to consider of all Salaries and Fees of Judges and other Officers and what Offices or Fees are fit to be taken away and to consider of delays and unnecessary charges in proceedings of the Laws and to present a Bill to the House for redress thereof And the Committee to meet dayly upon this business till it be dispatcht 26 Letters of some Prizes taken by the Parliaments Ships near Pendennis Castle That Sir William Godolphins Son was raising Forces for the King though his Father received much Favour from the Parliament 28 Letters that the General had 2000 men dayly at work about the Fortifications of Leith and went on with the Mines before Edenburgh Castle though the Enemy shot great and small Shot constantly at them and yet they lost but five or six men That the King was slipt away from the Scots with the Duke of Bucks and three or four more in his Company towards the E. of Seaforth and others of the Royal Party who were about 2000 as was before certifyed but was brought back again That the General marched with seven Regiments of Foot and nine of Horse to Linlithgow and sent a Trumpet to the Estates of Scotland to give Security and to treat for stopping the effusion of more Christian Blood That he took in a Garrison with 40 men who laid down their Arms. That he gave strict Command to his Army not to offer violence to any of the Scots who were not in Arms which was duely observed That he marched to Glascow where he stayed three or four days and marched on to Levingston-House the weather extream wet and the Souldiers divers times â—ain to Quarter in the open Fields That the Court at St. Johns Town were in great Distractions and the Highlanders fell upon the Kirk Party and killed a Major a Lieutenant and some others 29 Vote that the Committee for regulating the Proceedings in Law do peruse the Freeholders in every County and consider of a way for the impartial Returns of Juries and of more indifferent Proceedings in Causes Order for an Act to take away all Saints days and other days in Term not Juridical and making them Court Days and for making the 5th of November no Court day A Committee to consider how to regulate abuses and misdemeanours of Keepers of Prisons Order for the Members of the House to bring in by a day the names of fit Persons to be Sheriffs in the several Counties An Act for raising 120000 l. per mensen for maintenance of the Forces in England Scotland and Ireland read the first time An Act passed for settling Convoys for securing the Trade of the Nation 20 Letters of several Prizes brought into Plymouth 31 Letters that the General sent a Letter to the Committee of Estates by a Trumpet who was not permitted to carry it further than Sterling where the Governonr took it of the Trumpet and promised to send it by a Messenger of his own to St. Johns Town where the Committee then was That the General marched to Glascow the compleatest Town they had been in and one of their choicest Universities That when he entred the Town many Scots appeared to see him march but no violence was offered to any of them the General having given a strict Command for that purpose And none of the Souldiers entred til he and his Followers were first in their Quarters That Captain Covel of the General his Regiment of Horse was cashiered for holding some Blasphemous Opinions That on the Lords day a Scots Minister in his Pulpit at Glascow railed foully against the General and his Army and though many Souldiers heard it yet no violence was offered to him That C. Ker and C. Straughan were willing to a Treaty of Accomodation but sent word to the General That they could not effect it being hindered by the Lord Wareston and Sir John Chiesesly who were sent to them for that end by the Committee of Estates That the General marched from Glascow fourteen Miles and Quartered in a poor Cottage That Captain Pitson was taken Prisoner by the Enemy That C. Vanrusk with a Party of Dutchmen fell upon some Straglers of the Army and murdered them That the General returned to Edenburgh That some Recruits came from London to the Army but near half of them ran away in their March and listed themselves in the Garrisons of New-Castle and other Garrisons by the way Novemb. 1650. 1 Letters Of some Dutch Ships loaden with Figs from Portugal staid at Pendennis till the pleasure of the Councel of State were known That the Commissioners provided Red Coats for all the Souldiers 2 Letters That Prince Rupert was gone to Marseilles and intended from thence to go to the Barbadocs and to get men there and in the Islands and so to go for Scotland That there were great Divisions betwixt the Kirks Party and the Committee of Estates That a Lieutenant with a Trumpet came with Letters to the G. from the Committee of Estates Letters That the Mine went on against Edenburgh Castle And That two Mortar-Pieces were brought thither from Hull That the General sent a Party who took in a strong House near Dalkeith and some Arms in it That C. Ker and C. Straughan had sent new Letters about an Accommodation and had declared against the Interest of the King and Lords That some of the Royal Party fell upon the Kirk-Party and killed and took 120 of them and other great Divisions were amongst them whilst the English Army was in their bowels That at Carlisle on the Lords Day in the Great Church the Governor's Chaplain preached in the Morning and an Officer of the Army in the Afternoon 5 The Day of the Gunpowder-Treason Celebrated A further Act passed prohibiting Trade with the Scots by any Foreign Nation Referred to the Committee of the Navy to
the Town for a Winter quarter Twyford and Okingham were plundered by the King's Forces and then the poor inhabitants could not prevail with the insolent Souldiers but that they burned many of their Houses affirming they had orders for it from the King 's chief Commanders At Aulton Sir William Waller surprized 100 of the King's Forces under Colonel Bennet Some of the Irish landed at Bristol to serve the King under the command of Sir Charles Vavasour Colonel Henry Bulstrode being above sixty years of age yet underwent the hardships and hazards of war in this cause and was a discreet and stout Governour of Aylesbury in his own Countrey After him succeeded Colonel Alderidge whom the Lord Byron sought by promises of reward and preferment to corrupt to betray the Town to the King's Forces but Alderidge preserved his fidelity and prevented the design The Commissioners to goe into Scotland were named the Earl of Rutland Sir Henry Vane Junior Mr. Hatcher Sir William Armyn and Mr. Darley The Prisoners having great liberty and many private consultations by the favour of the Gaolers the House made an order against it upon pein of an Escape in the Gaoler that should permit it They also took care for the relief of sick and maimed Souldiers and of the Widows and Orphans of those who were slain in the Parliaments service Mr. Chute and Mr. Hern were assigned to be of Counsell with the Archbishop in his Trial to be shortly had in the Lords House The Earl of Warwick was made Governour in chief of all the English Plantations in America and a Committee to assist him The Lord Willoughby of Parham took in Bulling-brooke Castle in Lincolnshire The King's Forces at Reading sent a Party to beat up the Parliaments Quarters at Henly who thought themselves too secure and their Guards were not placed about Midnight the King's forces came up a narrow Lane in the Town towards the Cross where four or five Pieces of Ordance were planted but none there with them save one half drunken Gunner He seeing the King's forces advancing towards him cried out Tom and Jack and other names as if there had been many about him and when he discerned the King's Souldiers to come near him he made a shift to fire a Gun that stood just against them which in that narrow Lane did so great execution both upon Men and Horse that in a great terrour they faced about brought off their dead carrying their bodies back to Reading but left many Horses and much blood in the Lane and in the way to Reading The House appointed a Committee of some Members and others to look into the Accounts of the Kingdom for publick satisfaction therein Some bickerings were between the forces under Major General Skippon and Colonel Harvey and the King's forces in Northamptonshire wherein as is usual fortune was variable Many inveighed sharply against a Warrant of Prince Rupert's commanding provisions and labourers to be sent to him Vpon your utmost perils as the total plundering and burning of your Houses with what other mischief the licenced and hungry Souldiers can inflict upon you An Ordinance passed for associating Hampshire Sussex Surrey and Kent and Sir William Waller to be their Major General Mr. Pierpoint asked leave of the House of Commons to go beyond Seas but they were so desirous of his assistance being a Gentleman of great wisedom and integrity that they gave him a friendly denial The Speaker Lenthall was made Master of the Rolls Nov. 8. and Mr. Selden Keeper of the Records in the Tower Sir William Waller sate down before Basing-house The Commissioners for the Great Seal were agreed upon the Earls of Rutland and Bullingbrooke for the Lords House and Mr. St. John Sergeant Wilde Mr. Browne and Mr. Prideaux for the Commons and the same authority given to them as the Lord Keeper had and all Acts passed under the Great Seal at Oxford made void The Irish forces which came over with Vavasour refused to fight against their fellow Protestants the Parliament but joyned with General Essex his Army The Archbishop was brought to his Trial in the Lords House Nov. the 13. where he made a short Speech and desired that his Counsel might be heard who were Mr. Chute and Mr. Herne and Mr. Hale who having spoken to the points in Law the Lords adjourned Upon the news of the Cessation of Arms in Ireland many of the Earl of Newcastle's Army laid down their Arms and offered composition to the Parliament The Houses agreed that Committees should onely sit three times in the Week and the Houses to sit onely the other three Days Several of the English Regiments were sent for out of Ireland to assist the King here and since the Cessation the Irish Rebels committed many cruel murthers there The Earl of Holland returned from Oxford and examined here said that after he heard of the Cessation in Ireland his Conscience would not give him leave to stay any longer with them at Oxford The young Earl of Caernarvon came from Oxford into the Parliament and was by them committed to the care of his Grandfather the Earl of Pembroke A Paper was communicated to both Houses which was sent from the Prince Harecourt to the Earl of Northumberland by way of general Proposals for an accommodation between the King and Parliament and that in the name of the French King whose Embassadour he was Buisie Mr. Pryn prosecuted Colonel Nathaniel Fiennes for the surrender of Bristol but it was referred to the Council of War The King's Forces besieging Plymouth took one of their Out-works Sir William Waller drew off his Forces from Basing-house not willing to put them upon a Winter siege Sir William Brereton and Sir Thomas Middleton took in Holt Castle and other places in Shropshire for the Parliament Colonel Rigby with the Lancashire Forces routed a party of the King 's beyond them in number near Thurland Castle killed many and took 400 Prisoners and Arms and their Commander in chief which was the more discoursed of because Rigby was a Lawyer The Garrison of Poole made several attempts upon the King's forces in Dorsetshire killed and took divers of them and 1500 of their Horse and lost not one of the Garrison Divers of the Militia of London made Propositions to the House of Commons touching the Recruits of the Armies c. the Houses ordered them to search for any Officers of the Armies who had deserted their Colours and lay skulking in London to apprehend them and send them to the General to be punished by Martial Law Some small bickerings past between Sir William Willer's forces and the King 's near Farnham The King sent to his subjects in Scotland to forbid their taking of the Covenant or joyning with the Parliament of England but the States of Scotland returned in answer to the King the Reasons of their undertaking those lawfull actions and humbly advise the King to take the Covenant
himself The Scots generally took it except Hamilton and some three other Lords and the Estates ordered it to be taken by all men on pein of confiscation whereof they gave notice by their Letters to the Parliament of England The Houses in answer to the Prince de Harecourt declared their good acceptance of the affection of the King and Queen regent of France in their offer of a mediation of a Peace and that as soon as the Prince should make it appear that the Propositions were by authority from the King and Queen regent of France the Parliament will give such an answer as may stand with the interest of both Kingdoms and with the Solemn League and Covenant A Party from the Garrison of Poole under Captain Laye went by Water to Warham seven miles from them whereof the enemy having an alarm laid Ambuscadoes in the Hedges in the way from the landing place to the Town but Laye commanded his men it being in the Night to keep their Matches close so that the enemy could not see where to shoot at them But the Party of Poole entred Warham in two places and came into the midst of the Town where their Garrison was drawn up together who after one good volley of shot threw down their Arms and fled away Those of Poole took about 200 Prisoners much arms cloth and provisions and so returned The King's Officers having caused divers of the Parliament to be hanged for Spies as one poor man by Prince Rupert's order upon the great Elm near the Bell in Henly and many others Now the Council of War at Essex-house condemned two for Spies who brought a Proclamation and Letters from Oxford to London which were taken about them and they were both hang'd The Judges and Officers were commanded by the Parliament not to adjourn the Term by colour of any Writs or Proclamations from Oxford without order of the Parliament The Commons pressed the Lords for dispatch of the business of the Great Seal and the Earl of Rutland named for one of the Commissioners desired to be excused as not understanding the Law nor the Oath to be taken by them The Castle of Flint was besieged by Sir William Brereton and Sir Thomas Middleton the Governour of it for the King held it out till all provisions even to Horses failing him he then rendred it upon honourable terms Then the Parliament forces took in Mostynhouse belonging to Colonel Mostyn the Governour of Flint and in Mostyn they took 4 pieces of Ordnance and some Arms. This Colonel Mostyn was a Gentleman of good parts and mettle of a very ancient family large possessions and great interest in that Countrey so that in twelve hours he raised 1500 men for the King and was well beloved there living very nobly Ships were sent to relieve Plymouth and secure Milford Haven and to watch the coming over of any of the Irish Rebels The Earl of Rutland was excused from being one of the Commissioners of the Great Seal and the Earl of Kent named in his place Some of Sir Ralph Hopton's forces drove a party of Sir William Waller's Horse into Farnham but Waller drew his party into the Castle they being inferiour in number to Sir Ralph Hopton's party The Great Seal was carried up by the Speaker of the House of Commons the whole House attending him and delivered to the Speaker of the Lords House who in the presence of both Houses delivered it to the Commissioners and they all took their Oaths and then carried it to Mr. Brown's House the Clerk of the Parliament where it was put into a Chest with three different Locks not to be opened but when three of the Commissioners were present The Earl of Warwick was voted Lord High Admiral of England and an Ordinance passed that all who would set forth Private Men of War should have all Ships and Goods they could take which were employed against the Parliament or for supply of the Irish Rebels Sir Peter Osborn Governour of Jersey delivered it up to Sir John Pennington for the King A Regiment of the Irish Forces landed about Mostyn in Flintshire for the King's service Colonel Hastings marching to relieve Fulbury Castle held for the King was by the way set upon by the Moore-landers who routed his Troups killed 100 of them took about 150 Horse 100 Arms and many Prisoners The Commons thought not fit to treat further with Monsieur de Harecourt untill he shewed that he was Embassadour extraordinary from France and that he would direct his Papers to one of the Speakers The Estates of Scotland by Letters informed the Parliament of England of a French Agent who had been with them to propound their desisting from giving any assistance to the Parliament of England but the Scots justified to him their proceedings The Scots declared the Lords Hamilton Morton Roxborough and Lonmerick to be publick enemies and seised their Estates because they came not in to take the Covenant The King's Forces took Arundel Castle and fortified there Divers Forces from Ireland landed in Wales and the Lord Byron went to joyn with them Sir Walter Earle was made Lieutenant of the Ordnance in the place of Mr. Pym deceased The Garrison at Plymouth gave a brush to the King's forces besieging them Sir William Waller set upon the Lord Craford's forces in Aulton routed them and took about a thousand Prisoners Arms and rich Booties Colonel Morley beat back the Lord Hopton's forces advancing to take Lewys in Sussex Mr. Walter Long was by the House appointed Register of the Chancery Dr. Burges by motion from the Militia of London is made Lecturer at Pauls with 400 l. per annum salary out of Deans and Chapters lands A Letter of thanks was sent to Sir William Waller from the House for his good service at Aulton Mr. Lenthall Speaker was sworn Master of the Rolls before the Lords and he and the Commissioners of the Great Seal took the Oaths of Supremacy and Allegeance in the Lords house they also took the Oath for observation of the Act for the Triennial Parliament The Rebels in Ireland proposed to the Council there 1. To have confirmed to them the free exercise of their Religion 2. That all Laws there against Papists may be repealed 3. That all Lands there belonging to Religion Houses may be restored 4. That their Popish Bishops and Hierarchy may be confirmed 5. That the English Protestants may pay tithes to the Popish Priests These things were after the cessation of Arms in Ireland Colonel Norton in Hampshire routed four Troups of Colonel Bennet's Horse and took about 200 of them The Earls of Northumberland Pembroke Salisbury and divers Members of the House of Commons were indicted of High Treason at Salisbury for assisting the Parliament before Judge Heath Banks Forster and Glanvile but they could not perswade the Jury to find the Bill The Commons ordered a Committee to draw up an Impeachment of
fifteen hundred common Souldiers six Pieces of Ordnance four Canoniers twenty seven Waggons loaded There were slain in the Fight two Lieutenant Colonels four Captains and five hundred men an hundred and twenty Irish women with long Knives and they report that on the Parliaments side were slain not above twenty men and of them not one Officer From Gloucester Colonel Massey set upon Sir Henry Talbot's Quarters and surprized him three Captains three Lieutenants three Irish Reformadoes a Serjeant-Major sixty common Souldiers and much Arms Ammunition and Provision going for Worcester The Commons ordered publick thanks to be given in all Churches for these Victories and for the Assistance of the Scots come into the Parliament Sir Edward Deering came from Oxford into the Parliament and upon his Examination said That since the Cessation in Ireland and seeing so many Papists and Irish Rebels in the King's Army and the Anti-Parliament set up at Oxford and the King's Counsels wholly governed by the Popish party his Conscience would not permit him to stay longer with them but he came to throw himself upon the mercy of the Parliament and according to their Declaration to compound for his Delinquency To which he was admitted and order given for all others that would come in after him who was the first Massey retook Malmesbury and the Lieutenant Governour and took three hundred Ossicers and Souldiers and their Arms in that Town The Commissioners of the Seal gave the Covenant to the Lawyers and Officers and so many came to take it that they were fain to appoint another day for it The Dutch Ambassadour went from London to Oxford first to Treat with his Majesty Mr. Rowse a Member of the House of Commons was by them made Provost of Eaton College The Commons expelled several other of their Members who had deserted the Parliament General Essex advised with his Friends about an Answer to the Letters which came from the Anti-Parliament at Oxford and his Answer was in a Letter to the Earl of Forth the King's General to this effect That he received the Letter and Parchment from his Lordship but it having no address to nor acknowledgment of the Parliament he could not communicate it to them That in maintenance of the Parliament and Privileges thereof they all resolve to spend their blood as the foundation of our Laws and Liberties and he sends to Forth the National Covenant The Parliament appointed seven Lords and fourteen Commons to be a joynt Council with the Scots Commissioners but the fewness of the number distasted many who were left out The Commons took order for ransoming of the English Captives at Algiers Some differences or rather unkindness was apprehended between the Lord Willoughby of Parham and the Earl of Manchester who carrying Matters as a General the Lord Willoughby could the less brook it knowing himself not to be puisne to him but all was well reconciled The Lord Fairfax took In Birlington Bay and about a hundred Horses and Arms. Sir Thomas Fairfax pulled up the Bridges leading to Chester and regained three or four Garrisons from the Enemy and took about five hundred men Arms and Provisions The Estates of the Earl of Clare and of divers others were ordered to be sequestred An Exhortation of the Assembly of Divines touching the taking of the Covenant was approved The Commons allowed five pounds a Week to Sir John Hotham and as much to Sir Alexander Carew and three pounds a Week to Mr. Hotham for their Maintenance in Prison Prince Rupert by strickt Warrants under pain of Fire and Sword forbids any Provisions to be carried to Gloucester by which means the City was streightned Massey's Brother with a Party of the Gloucester Horse going to beat up the Enemies quarters was engaged with the main body of their Horse and forced to hasten his Retreat with the loss of seventeen of his men The Scots took Coquet Island and about two hundred men with their Arms seven Pieces of Ordnance and Provisions and rescued and restored to the Owners a great Herd of Cattel taken away by the King's Forces Colonel Grey the Lord Grey's Brother came in to them with a Regiment of Horse and took the Covenant and the Inhabitants of Northumberland and Westmerland came in great numbers to them they sent a Summons to Newcastle Sir Thomas Fairfax took in Crew-house and Darison house and the Lord Brereton he took Prisoner with many others The Swedes had great successes in Germany Another Letter of the Lord Goring's was intercepted and He ordered to be Impeached of High Treason The Timber upon the Lands of the Lord Tennet and of other Delinquents was ordered to be cut down for the use of the Navy The Commons ordered to sit every day in the Forenoon in the House in the Afternoon in Committees and every Member that came not before Prayers ended in the Morning to pay one Shilling to the Poor and for every Motion made after Twelve a Clock to pay five Shillings The Earl of Westmerland and divers other Delinquents came in to the Parliament desiring the benefit of the Declaration of both Kingdoms for Composition The Council at Oxford prohibited any to have this Declaration in his Custody upon pain of Felony and that if any went from Oxford without leave of the Governour they should be proceeded against by Martial Law as Traytors Sir William Brereton reported to the House of Commons that the Irish and other Forces under the Lord Byron commit great Spoils and Cruelties where they come what they cannot devour they set on fire commit horrid Rapes and Insolencies that more of the Irish Rebels are expected to land in those parts and Prince Rupert to come and joyn with them That he sends forth his Warrants to bring in Provisions on pain of death and that fifteen hundred more of the Rebels are to be landed in Scotland to interrupt the Scots advance into England The Marquess of Ormond the new Lieutenant of Ireland forbids the taking of the Covenant upon this and his being the chief Promoter of the Cessation there and of sending Forces from thence to the King the Commons vote To impeach him as a Traytor against the three Kingdoms and disable him of his Lieutenancy and of all Command in Ireland Twenty thousand English and Scots in the North of Ireland have vowed to live and die together in opposition to the Cessation A Trumpet came from Oxford to the Lord General with Letters from the Earl of Forth by the King's Command for a new Overture of Peace desiring a safe Conduct for Mr. Fanshaw and Mr. Offeley to come to Westminster with Propositions from the King The General acquainted the Parliament with these Letters but because they did not acknowledge the Parliament they would not read them but referred them to the Committee of both Kingdoms Sir William Constable in Yorkshire routed three Regiments of Newcastle's Horse took three hundred of them
the High Sheriff of Wilts Colonel Ludlow getting some horse drove them out of the Town A recruit coming to Hopton Ludlow retreated and lost about 20 of his men then a relief coming from Colonel Norton to Ludlow he again set upon the Enemy and forced them to fly and took about 20 of them prisoners Upon information from Mr. Strickland the Parliaments Agent in the low Countries they voted some English Merchants there who had assisted the King in his affairs against the Parliament that is Webster Bainham Manning Ford and Yard to be Incendiaries and Enemies to the State The Dutch Ambassadours were solemnly received in the Lords House and afterwards in the House of Commons where Chairs were set for them They first were carried into the Inner Court of Wardes Chamber prepared for them as a withdrawing room from whence they were conducted by the Serjeant at Arms with his Mace and two Members of the House sent to accompany the Ambassadours into the House When they came in the Speaker and all the Members stood up in their places uncovered and the Ambassadours saluted them as they passed by then they sate down in their Chairs and the Members sate down likewise and when the Ambassadours were covered the Speaker and House were covered also They made a short speech of the affection of their Masters to these Kingdomes and their desire to mediate an accord between the King and his Parliament and after their Speech ended they returned with the same ceremonies as at the coming thither During the time of their being in the House there lay upon the table in their view 48 Colours taken from the King's Forces in the Battel of Marston-Moore Major General Brown with his whole Brigade came and joyned with the Forces before Greenland-house and continued the batteries upon which Colonel Hawkins the Governour of Greenland sent out for a treaty and rendred the Fort to Major General Brown upon these Articles 1. The House and Fort of Greenland-house with all the Ammunition Ordnance and Provision therein be delivered up to Major General Brown in the same condition it 's now in 2. That all Officers shall quietly march forth of the said house with their horses and swords the Common Souldiers and Canoniers with their Arms and Colours viz. swords pikes and musquets 3. That the said Major General do afford them a Convoy of horse to Nettlebed to return again within six hours without any molestation of the forces so convoyed 4. That the said Major General shall cause to be provided for the said Officers and Souldiers two teems and carts to carry away their baggage and such provisions as is necessary for their journey to Wallingford which carts and horses are to be returned so soon as they come thither 5. That all prisoners taken on either side be forthwith discharged They left in the house 5 pieces of Ordnance 30 barrels of Powder great store of Bullet and Match a good quantity of Cheese Bisket Fish Malt Flower Bear Oats Pease and great plenty of housholdstuff Prince Rupert after his defeat at Marston-moore joyned with the bordering forces of the King in Cumberland and Westmorland and the Parliaments three Generals sent out a party of 3000 horse and foot of their several Armies to follow him With the rest of their forces they sate down again before York The Parliament thought fit to set a rate upon Coals for the relief of the poor of London The Lord of Rochborough was impeached of high Treason upon a Letter under the King's hand taken in the battel among the Earl of New-castle's papers The Parliament in a kind temper upon their good success ordered the Sequestrations of the Estates of the Earles of Bedford Holland and Clare to be taken off The Town of Blandford had by the Lord General been used kindly yet when he was gone they apprehended a Messenger of his and sent him to the King's Garrison at Wareham and contriv'd to betray a party of 100 horse sent thither by Waller of whom they sent notice to Wareham Upon this Major Sydenham and other Parliament Commanders came to the Town seized upon the cheif Commanders and permitted their Souldiers to plunder this perfidious Town Prince Maurice his Major came in to the Lord General at Tiverton and Collonel Blake took in the strong Town of Taunton-Deane for the Parliament to whom the Townsmen were well affected The Earl of Denbigh took in Cholmeley-house and store of Arms and Ammunition in it By Ordinances divers high Sheriffs were appointed and the Lord Roberts was made Lieutenant of Exon and Devonshire and the Earl of Pembroke of Somersetshire Sir Richard Norton a Commissioner of Array in Hampshire was ordered to be sent for by the Committee Plymouth were well pleased with their new Governor Colonel Carre Mr. Dutton Mr. Lowe and Mr. Constantine former Members of the Parliament who had deserted them and were of the Antiparliament at Oxford were Committed to several Prisons Letters were produced under Sir John Hotham's hand among the Papers of the Earl of Newcastle taken at Marston-moore by which Hotham expresseth his affection to the Earl and thereupon the Commons called for the Ordinance for Martial Law and it being agreed upon was sent up to the Lords Papers sent to the Houses from the Spanish Ambassador touching Graveling were referred to the Committee of both Kingdomes The General by Letters informed the Parliament that Barnstable Taunton and Tiverton with all the East part of Devonshire were in his power and that 4000 of the Countrey proffered their service to the Parliament at Chard 3000 more at Collampton and 2000 more brought in since by Colonel Ware and that Barnstable freely entertained his forces That a few of the Malignants are come in to him that the Queen was come back to Exon that Hopton was recruited with 500 men but most of them ran away again The three Parliament Generals before York prepared to storm the City and thereupon Sir Thomas Glenham the Governor sent out a Trumpet for a parley which was admitted The Lord Inchequin drew out of Wareham 240 horse and dragoons and marched towards Dorchester to plunder and burn it but making some pause before the Town gave opportunity to Major Sydenhain to come to their relief who beat back Inchequin took 160 of his men prisoners with 60 horse and good store of their gotten plunder Sir Robert Pye and Colonel Blake at the taking of Taunton Castle had of the Enemies 11 peices of Ordnance and store of Arms and Ammunition with much provision and housholdstuff And intercepted Letters boast that Bonesiers were made at Oxford for the defeat that Prince Rupert gave the three Generals of the Parliament at Marston-moore and that Hopton had basted Colonel Popham The Archbishop was again brought to his Tryall and urged against him That he denyed the Pope to be Antichrist and did chide Dr. Hall for giving the Holy Father those Epithetes of
brought to the Parliament declaring his Affections for Peace and concluding that God had given him a late Victory and therefore he desires them to consider of his long rejected Message from Evesham which was for peace but not till this time brought to the Parliament The Parliament appointed a day to take this into consideration and ordered all Officers and Souldiers to repair to their Colours on pain to be proceeded against by the Commissioners for Martial Law Mr. Hoyle was put into Sir Peter Osborn's Office and Mr. Salway into Sir Thomas Fanshaw's place in the Exchequer and several Judges went into the Counties which were quiet to keep Assizes and to execute the Commissions of Oyer and Terminer Colonel Cromwell was sent with two thousand horse to meet Prince Rupert coming to relieve Bandury but Colonel Massey had before prevented the Prince's coming The Irish Rebels that landed in Scotland were beaten into the Mountains by the Earl of Argyle and L. Gourdon Upon debate of the King's Letter it was held not to be a sufficient acknowledgment of the Parliament and therefore laid by Yet the House went on to compleat the Propositions for Peace and a day was appointed for the bringing in the Names of such Delinquents as should be excepted from pardon Divers Ministers of London presented a Petition to the Parliament for dispatch of the Directory of Worship and settling of pure Discipline and Government according to the word of God and complained of the Schisms in the Church The Petitioners had thanks from the House and the Committee of Lords and Commons appointed to confer with the Assembly to endeavour to reconcile some Differences among them and to find out a way how tender Consciences may be born withall so far as may stand with the peace of the Kingdom and the word of God The Assembly named 23 Ministers to give Ordination who were passed The Commons considered of the Propositions for peace the L. Macquire and Macmahon who escaped out of the Tower were again apprehended by the Lieutenant of the Tower and Sir John Clotworthy and upon a Report from a Committee of Lawyers it was ordered That they should be tried by a Commission of Oyer and Terminer and not by Martial Law The French Agent lay at the same house where Macquire and Macmahon were taken and had a chief hand in their escape and opposed the Officers searching in that house for papers c. because he lodged there But a Committee of both Houses were appointed to search there and did so notwithstanding the Agent 's pretences A Committee of Lawyers was appointed to meet daily about the Tryal of the Archbishop till the same should be dispatcht The Parliament ordered all the Forces of the Earl of Manchester and of Sir William Waller to joyn together and advance into the West The Ordinance passed for the Militia in Worcestershire About eighty of the Leicester horse in convoy of some Carriers were set upon by 120 of Colonel Hastings his men but the 80 routed and dispersed the 120 killed 8 and took 60 of them prisoners and store of Arms. By Letters from Sir Thomas Middleton it was certified That he having taken Mountgomery Castle was forced to retreat upon the coming of the King's Forces thither who again besieged the Castle with five thousand men and Middleton being joyned with Brereton Sir John Meldrum and Sir William Fairfax in all about three thousand they marched to relieve the Castle and were fought with by the Enemy who came up gallantly a good while to push of Pike and worsted the Parliament Horse Which so encouraged the King's Forces that they shouted and cryed The Day is ours the Day is ours at which the Parliament Forces were so enraged that they came on again with a fresh Charge and wholly routed and put them to flight took prisoners Major General Broughton Colonel Sir Thomas Tilsley Lieutenant Colonel Bludwell Major Williams nine Captains many inferiour Officers and fifteen hundred common Souldiers Of the King's part were slain about three hundred and about five hundred wounded Of the Parliament part were slain Sir William Fairfax with eleven wounds and Major Fitz Symons and about forty common Souldiers and about sixty wounded the Lord Byron who commanded the King's Forces hardly escaped by the goodness of his horse Upon Letters from my Lord Roberts both Houses took care for Supplies for Plymouth and their other Western Garrisons The King came to Exeter and gave order to remove all superfluous persons forth of the Town and for the Country to bring in thither all their provisions About forty prisoners of quality were brought from Plymouth to London and committed to Lambeth-house After the Siege was raised before Plymouth and the King gone to Exeter yet the Cornish-men continued near the Town to stop provisions coming to them by Land but were driven away again Many of the prisoners taken at Mountgomery being willing to take the Covenant and to serve against the Rebels in Ireland the Parliament to avoid the inconvenience of many prisoners consented thereunto and gave order for their transportation The Commons came near to a conclusion of their Debate touching the Propositions for peace Orders were sent to the Earl of Manchester and Sir William Waller to advance together with all expedition to prevent the King's return back to Oxford and took care for Supplies for them and for the Lord General The Parliament sent thanks to Sir Thomas Middleton Sir William Brereton and Sir John Meldrum for their good service at Mountgomery and which was more acceptable took order for Supplies for them the Lord Cherbury and Sir John Price came in to the Parliament Massey fell upon a party of the King 's between Bristoll and Monmouth took their Commander in chief and ten others and a hundred and sixty common Souldiers two hundred Arms and two pieces of Ordnance The King's Forces besieged Barnstable which rendred to them upon conditions which they afterwards broke pillaged the Parliament's Souldiers plundred the Town executed the Major and imprisoned many of the Inhabitants Colonel Ludlow took eighty of the King's Commissioners of Array in Somersetshire and Captain Savile took twenty of Prince Rupert's men prisoners Sir Thomas Fairfax recovered of his Wound and Sir H. Cholmly offered to surrender Scarborough Castle to the Parliament but now upon the news of the King's Victory in the West he revictuals it again and is again wholly for the King whereupon the Lord Fairfax sent Sir William Constable with a strong party to besiege the Castle Colonel Ware revolted from the Lord General in the West to the King and another Colonel quitted his Post and the Matters of that nature were referred to a Committee to be examined A Day was set apart by the Commons for receiving private Petitions At Basing-house the Besiegers took an Outwork a Captain and twenty eight Souldiers who defended it At Banbury they made a Breach and some of the
turned their Musquets against their fellows This so discouraged Argyle's men that they gave back and retreated which Montross perceiving fell on with great resolution upon them routed the whole body of Argyle's men killed divers and took many of them Prisioners A party of about 150 of the King 's from Skipton beat up Colonel Brandling's quarters at Heightley surprized the Guards came into the Town and took near a hundred prisoners 60 horse and other booty As they returned Colonel Lambert's men fell upon them rescued their friends and the booty took Captain Hugh's who commanded the King's party killed his Lieutenant and about 15 of his men and took about 20 of them prisoners pursuing the rest to Skipton Samon one of Lambert's Captains and about eight of his Souldiers were killed Sir John Meldrum got the Power of the Harbour at Scarborough and appointed to storm the Town 18. Orders about the Navy and new Commissioners of the Customs A Letter from Prince Rupert to the Lord General for release of some persons imprisoned contrary to Articles was referred to the Committee of both Kingdoms to have right done Sir Thomas Fairfax came privately to Town and a Committee was appointed to consider of raising Moneys and Recruits for his speedy taking of the Field About 700 of the mutinous Troops being come near London care was taken to prevent Surrey Kent and the adjacent Counties from any inconveniences by them Tobias Basely formerly a Porter condemned by the Council of War for a Spy and betraying Carriers was hanged in Smithfield Prince Griffith petitioned that since he was in custody he was poysoned and had but a few days to live Whereupon two Doctors were approved by the House to visit him 19. Four Members of the Commons House were sent by them for Sir Thomas Fairfax to bring him to the House where a Chair was set for him but he modestly refused to sit down The Speaker told him somewhat of Agamemnon and of the old Romans which I have forgotten then he informed him of the trust the Kingdom reposed in him in the Command of the Army and the good opinion they had of him for his valour and fidelity giving him thanks in the name of the House for the many and great services he had done for the publick and in the defence of Religion Laws and Liberty and incouraged him to go on as he had begun The Ordinance for Tunnage and Poundage sent up to the Lords and another touching the Excise Weymouth held out and received some relief by Sea from Poole Sir William Waller was upon his march to them The House received Letters from their Commissioners at Vxbridge with several Papers concerning the Militia and the Reply made by the King's Commissioners who took advantage the last point of time to deliver in their Reply when it might be conceived no Answer could be made to it by the Parliaments Commissioners But they being impowred by their additional Instructions to reassume the business of the Militia when they pleased the Parliament voted that their Commissioners shall have power to treat with the King's Commissioners about passing a Bill for settling the Militia in the power of the Parliament until such time as the three Kingdoms shall be reduced to peace and so declared by Parliament and three years after or else for seven years from the time of the granting the Militia and after that his Majesty to take the advice of both Houses of Parliament for the settling thereof And the Commissioners of both Kingdoms delivered in a Paper accordingly The Earl of Southampton and some others of the King's Commissioners went from Vxbridge to Oxford to the King about the business of the Treaty to receive some further directions from his Majesty therein The Doctors reported Griffith to be in no danger 20. The Ordinance for Tunnage and Poundage with the Clause for Currants passed both Houses Orders for setting forth the Fleet. Letters from Holland to the Parliament advise that Brown Bushel was at Sea with a small Fleet intended for Piracy Information of a Design to cause the Souldiers to mutiny was referred to be examined An Ordinance passed for raising of 21000 l. for the Scots Army to be repaid out of Sequestrations The Committee at Goldsmiths-hall had 30000 l. ready to be sent to the Scots Army upon their advance Southwards The King's Forces intending to keep a Guard near Harrington Brown sent out a party of Horse from Abington who suddenly fell upon them surprized the whole Guard being about nineteen and brought them prisoners to Abington After that he sent out another party who intercepted and brought away 27 horse-loads of Corn Cheese and other Provisions going towards Oxford Major Purefoy fell upon the Enemy near Oxford tooâ— a Lieutenant and other Officers 12 Troupers and Arms. The Lord Macquire was executed at Tyburn he refused to make any Confession but died desperately 21. The Parliament sent an Express to their Commissioners atVxbridge with their Vote to propound a Limitation of the Militia for three years after the three Kingdoms are declared by the King and Parliament to be settled in peace or to have it settled in the Parliament for seven years after the time the King is willing to settle it To this effect they delivered in a Paper to the King's Commissioners and endeavoured to perswade their Compliance and were full of hopes that they would have consented to it Several Ordinances passed for 20000 l. supplied by the Commissioners of Excise and an Ordinance for all Souldiers to repair to their Colours within 48 hours and an Ordinance was sent up to the Lords for the new Commissioners of the Customs Orders for the Commissioners of the Navy and for the Prince Elector 22. The Commissioners at Vxbridge sent a Letter to the Parliament with all the Papers containing the three Treaties of the three last days about Ireland wherein the Kings Commissioners did not think fit to yield to any of the Propositions but again justified the Cessation with his Majestie 's Catholick Subjects there The Parliaments Commissioners in their Reply laid home the innocent blood shed by the Irish Rebels Letters from Sir John Meldrum informed that Feb. 18. about ten a Clock the Town of Scarborough was stormed in four places by the English and Scotish Souldiers who gained the Town and Church with the loss of eleven men in the Church they took 80 Souldiers and the Governour of Hemsley Castle Cholmley perceiving the Town like to be lost fled into the Castle and was pursued and one of the Works taken but the White Tower in the Castle commanding it they beat out Meldrum's men with stones Cholmley laboured to escape by Sea in a little Pinnace he had there which he called his Running Horse but Meldrum got Boats between him and the Pinnace and forced him back again into the Caâ—tie Sir Hugh Cholmley had five Dunkirk Vessels lying in
Governour and Garrison the which was voted by the Commons and Letters sent to the Officers of the English and Scottish Armies to assure the same to those of Carlisle who had held out very long and courageously for the King Another order for the E. of Northumberland to have the care of the King's Children and 3000 l. per annum allowed him for them The Letters taken in the King's Cabinet at Naseby read in the House and some of them referred to a Committee to be decyphered Mr. Brown a Gun-founder and his Son committed upon matters in some of the Letters 24. The Letters taken in the King's Cabinet were more of them read in the House and in some of them was mention of His Majestie 's intention to make a Peace with the Irish Rebels and to have 40000 of them over into England to prosecute the War here In other Letters to the Queen the King complains That he could not prevail with his Mungrel Parliament at Oxford to vote that the Parliament at Westminster were not a lawfull Parliament that he will not make a Peace with the Rebels the Parliament without her approbation nor goe one jot from the Paper she sent him That upon the Treaty at Uxbridge he did not positively own the Parliament it being otherwise to be construed though they were so simple as not to find it out and that it was recorded in the notes of the King's Council that he did not acknowledge them a Parliament Ordinance sent to the Lords for putting the County of Surrey into a posture of Defence and for pay for the forces there 100 l. given to the Messenger that brought up the Colours from Naseby fight Ordinance sent to the Lords for money for Portsmouth Garrison Order for the business of the Church to be taken into Debate every Wednesday and Friday An Ordinance past for re-imbursing money for Pembrokeshire Sir T. F. prosecuted the King's forces towards Hereford and left Colonel Needham Governour of Leicester Colonel Morgan blocked up Sandal Castle and M. G. Poynes went to Pomfret to order the battery there Colonel Rosseter came back from pursuing the King's forces charged and routed a party of the Newarkers rescued 20 Constables and Tithingmen taken by them and took 50 horse and many prisoners of them 25. The Monthly Fast kept divers Officers Prisoners committed to London-house 26. An Ordinance sent to the Lords about taking the Accounts of the Kingdom and orders for disposal of the Prisoners some to serve the Parliament in Ireland and others as the Parliament shall direct Letters written to Sir T. F. to prosecute his intentions against the Enemy and the Ordinance continued to impower him to press Souldiers for three months longer and another for Recruits for his Army Another Ordinance past impowering the Committees in the several Counties where any Souldiers were pressed and afterwards did desert the service to proceed against them according to Marshal Law Another for money for the late Officers of the Earl of Essex and of Sir William Waller Massey advanced to Lyme in order to relieve Taunton the King was at Hereford and Sir T. F. at Gloucester The Scots Army ordered to march from Nottingham to Worcester Colonel Hunt went from Shrewsbury before Cause Castle which surrendred to him The King's Garrison there marching away with their Colours and Swords and left in the Castle 500 Arms and store of Ammunition M. G. Brown took a Troup of Colonel Royden's horse and a foot Company of Oxford The Commons ordered all the Ensigns and Cornets taken at Naseby or formerly and which hereafter be taken from the Enemy should be brought into the Herald's Office and be there Registred and Mr. Riley to be intrusted therewith 27. The Grand Committee sate for the Church business and after that in the House an Ordinance read to consirm and establish the Directory for worship An Ordinance past for a Collection to provide money and necessaries for those Prisoners who were willing to serve against the Rebels in Ireland to transport them thither Letters from Plymouth informed that Greenvile was raising more forces in Cornwal and that divers Souldiers come away from the King's Garrisons to the Parliaments That three Dunkirk Ships came to Dartmouth with the King's Commission to inhabit there and were received but not well used and two of the Dunkirk Ships were taken by the Parliaments 28. Sir T. F. by order of Parliament advanced toward the relief of Taunton and sent to Massey that by a Day he would joyn with him Letters from General Leuen desired pay for the Scots Army the Houses thereupon sent a Committee to acquaint the Lord Mayor and Common Council of the City therewith and to desire the speedy raising of 30000 l. for this service and wrote answer to General Leuen that they would take care forthwith for their satisfaction The Commons ordered the Prisoners to be removed from the Military Ground where there wanted shelter for them and 300 l. for their supplies 30. Letters from M. G. Skippon informed of his being in a hopefull way of recovery and thereupon the Commons ordered 200 l. to be sent to him as a testimony of their favour and 200 l. more for payment of his Doctours Chirurgeons Apothecaries and other expences Order for 1000 l. for those Gentlemen some of whom were now Members of Parliament who suffered in 1 2 Car. for their affections to the publick and the Committee for them and for the necessities of the present Members was revived and satisfaction of damage voted to be out of the Estates of Delinquents The Letters taken at Naseby referred to a Committee to be perused and observations to be made upon them and to communicate some of them to the Common Council of London An Ordinance sent to the Lords touching Gunpowder and the Office of the Ordnance Letters to the association for Recruits and Arrears to be sent to Sir T. Fairfax's Army Ordinance past for 1500 l. for the Regiment of Colonel John Fiennes M. G. Poynes took the Church at Pomfret Sir T. F. took about 100 Arms from Lieutenant Colonel Not at Highworth who was there slain and divers Officers Colonel Hutchinson took 60 Horse and 48 Prisoners Officers and Arms. Major Saddler took from M. Duet near the Devizes 16 Prisoners Colonel Venables took Sir Th. Powel High Sheriff of Chester 40 Prisoners and 100 Horse July 1645. 1. An Ordinance sent up to the Lords for 400 l. to be paid to Sir William Waller's Life-guard Tuesdays and Thursdays set a part for considering how to raise Monies for Sir T. F. his Army and several Orders passed for that purpose Order of both Houses for the Departure of the Duke of Lorrain's Agent and of the King of Portugal's Agent and for a Letter to be sent to the King of Portugal of the miscarriage of his Agent here Order that the Committee of both Kingdoms should give directions from time to time
liable to Taxes Notwithstanding the Ordinance yet generally this day in London the Shops were shut up and the day observed 26. from the Leaguer before Newarke Intelligence came that the Garrison made many Sallys out and were beaten back again at one time nine of them taken and at another time two hundred of them Sallying out upon Col. Rossiters Quarters were repulsed and followed to their Reserve many wounded some slain and among them Col. Leake Son to the Lord Deincourt The House voted that Parliament men who were only Lodgers and attending the Parliament should not be rated in London to the Assessment 27. Reference to a Committee of the Petition of the Gold Wyre-drawers and Refiners against the Excise on those things An Ordinance sent to the Lords for Money for the Forces before Chester Days appointed as formerly for debate of the business of the Church Order for the Benchers of the Middle Temple to call Baron Tomlins to the Bench. A Party of Sir Tho. Fairfax's Army took in Cataline house near Exeter and therein thirty Horse and Prisoners with Arms. Letters informed the Surrender of Skipton Castle to the Parliaments Forces upon Articles A Trumpet came to Town from Oxford with Letters from his Majesty to the Speaker of the House of Peers about a Treaty for Peace 29. Votes for Recruits Arms and Money for Sir Tho. Fairfax's Army Ordinances agreed on that impressed Soldiers be punished if they run away from their Colours that Parks shall be liable to assessments and Officers likewise and about Provisions for the Navy and next Summers Fleet and for Money for the Waggoners all sent up to the Lords The Kings Letters which came by the Trumpet the other day were read in both Houses and were to this effect That his Majesty conceiving that by Reason of the want of Power conferred upon Messengers the former Treaties have not proved effectual He therefore propounds That if he may have the engagement of both Houses of Parliament the Commissioners of the Parliament of Scotland The Lord Mayor Aldermen Common-Council and Militia of London the Commander in Chief of Sir Tho. Fairfax's Army as also the Scots Army for his free and safe coming to abide in London or Westminster with three hundred followers for forty days and after that time for his free and safe return to Oxford Worcester or Newarke which he shall name And that he doth propound to have a personal Treaty with the Houses of Parliament at Westminster and the Commissioners of Scotland on all matters that may conduce to the restoring of Peace He declares That he is willing to commit the trust of the Militia for such time and with such power as is expressed by his Commissioners at Vxbridge to these Persons viz. The Lord Privy Seal the Duke of Richmond Marquess Hertford Marquess Dorchester Earl of Dorset Lord Chamberlain Earl of Northumberland Earl of Essex Earl of Southampton Earl of Pembroke Earl of Salisbury Earl of Manchester Earl of Warwick Earl of Denbigh Earl of Chichester Lord Say Lord Seymour Lord Lucas Lord Leppington Mr. Pierepont Mr. Hollis Mr. De-la-ware Mr. Spencer Sir Tho. Fairfax Mr. John Ashburnham Sir Gervase Clifton Sir Hen. Vane Jun. Mr. Robert Wallop Mr. Tho. Chichely Mr. Oliver Cromwel and Mr. Phil. Skippon If these Persons do not satisfie he offers to name one half and the Parliament to name the other half A day set to debate upon this Letter A Party of Sir Tho. Fairfax's Army took in Ashton House and the Kings Forces in the West drew together designing to Relieve Exeter Col. Sir John Digby for the King attempted to gain Plymouth by Treachery and offered a great sum of Money to Col. Kerre the Governor for that end but he refused it and the Agent was hanged by Martial Law 30. Debate about the Kings Letter and the House adhered to their former Votes and to have no Treaty but to proceed upon the propositions for Peace to be sent to the King by way of Bills and that the Militia should remain in the hands of both Houses of Parliament as now it was They referred it to the Committee of both Kingdoms and the Scots Commissioners to draw up an Answer accordingly and desired the Lords concurrence therein Sir Peter Killegrew came from Oxford with an Answer from the King to the Parliaments last Letter to his Majesty and this was to the like effect of desires of Peace adding that the King would consent to any necessary course for the payment of the debts of the Kingdom particularly to the City of London and to the Kingdom of Scotland This Letter was referred to the Committee of both Kingdoms An Ordinance read giving power to the Militia of London to provide for the safety of the City and adjacent parts upon the present flocking of Malignants to London and to search for them and expell them the City Orders for strict Guards and persons to examine all Passes Orders for new Elections 31. The day of the publick Monthly Fast after the last Sermon about forty of the new Elected Members took the Covenant The House ordered Mr. Strong one of this days Preachers to be added to the Assembly of Divines and ordered an hundred pounds for Mr. Reynolds January 1645. January 1. The House proceeded upon the propositions for Peace An Ordinance brought in for Martial Law to be executed in London Differences among the Inhabitants of Somerset-shire referred to a Committee Orders for new Elections of Members Referred to the Committee of both Kingdoms to dispose of the Scots Horse that lye upon the Borders of York shire and Derby-shire for the advantage of the publick Order for a Letter of thanks to Col. Kerre for his Fidelity and five hundred pounds to be bestowed on him Prince Rupert and his Company were again received into favour at Oxford A Party of the Kings from Ashby took the Minister of Morley and of other Towns and carried them away Prisoners but Sir John Gell rescued them slew five and took others of the Enemy Prisoners 2. Debate of the business of the Church and a day of Humiliation appointed to seek God for his Blessing and direction to the Parliament and Assembly about the setling the business of the Church the Members of the House ordered to attend and not to be absent that day Letters from Sir Tho. Fairfax informed that some Skirmishes had been between his Forces and the Enemy about Chadsey house wherein he lost Mr. Barrington and a Corporal 3. Proceedings upon the Propositions for Peace in a grand Committee Letters from Sir Tho. Fairfax certified That the Kings Forces in a great Body advanced near Exeter that he drew out to fight them which they perceiving retreated to a place of advantage that Sir Tho. Fairfax could not fight them but he sent two Brigades after them one of them to lie on the right and the other on the left hand of them That a Party of them advancing
part of them in the Warrants The Officers of the Army fully complyed with the Parliaments Commissioners and at their parting all expressed much joy and the General Councel that they would live and dye with the Parliament and gave the Commissioners twenty five Guns from the Castle at their going away from Windsor January 1647. January 1. Letters from Col. Hammond of the great Mutiny two days since in the Isle of Wight in New-port when the Parliaments Commissioners went away That the Mutineers designed to seize upon Carisbrooke Castle and to take away the King That Captain Barley and others of the Mutineers are in Custody and the King yet secured at Caresbrooke Castle and stronger guards set upon him than formerly Divers Letters came from the Parliaments Commissioners at the Cowes to the same purpose Some related not without ground that Mr. William L'Isle had undertaken to provide a Ship for the King's escape out of the Isle of Wight but the Ship failed not without some reflection upon the undertaker and the Kings escape was thereby prevented Order for Vice-Admiral Rainsborough to repair with some Ships to the Isle of Wight and the House approved the Order of the Commissioners for some of the Parliaments Ships to attend at the Island Order for the General to give Commission to Col. Hammond to try by Martial Law the actors in that Mutiny and a Commission of Oyer and Terminer to Try the others Order for a Letter of thanks to the Major and well affected Inhabitants of Newport for their good affections expressed upon the late Mutiny and for Money for the Soldiers there Sir William Constable Lieutenant Collonel Goffe and Lieutenant Collonel Salmon sent from the General into the Isle of Wight More Forces sent thither and Mr. Ashburnham Sir Jo. Berkley Dr. Shelden and the rest of the Kings retinue were discharged 3. Upon a long debate from Morning till late at night of the Kings last Message and the report of the Commissioners who presented the four Bills to him and his not giving any satisfactory answer thereunto the Commons passed these Votes 1. That no more Addresses be made from the Parliament to the King nor any Letters or Messages received from him 2. That it shall be Treason for any to deliver any Message to the King or to receive any Letter or Message from him without leave of both Houses 3. That the Members of both Houses of the Committee of both Kingdoms have power to sit and act alone as formerly the Committee of both Kingdoms for the safety of the Kingdom 4. That the Earl of Kent Sir Jo. Evelyn and Mr. Fines be added to that Committee in the rooms of the Earl of Essex Sir Philip Stapleton and Mr. Glyn. 5. That a Committee draw up a Declaration to satisfie the Kingdom of the reason of the Votes 6. That the Concurrence of the Lords be desired to them The General and his Council published a Declaration reciting tho Orders of Parliament they do now declare and assure That the Army by the fifteenth of January next according to the said directions shall be drawn into Towns Cities and Garrisons and that the Parliament supplying the Soldiery with Pay no free Quarter shall be taken after that day upon any that pay their Assessments nor any inforcement for Horse-meat or Mans meat during the Pay 4. The Commons considering the many weighty Affairs which prolong this Session of Parliament and being willing to for bear their own priviledge for the publick good they did order That from 20th of this January no person under the authority of that House except the Members thereof shall during this Session of Parliament have any Protection or Immunity by reason of any Priviledge of this House in any Suit for Debt or upon contract or security or upon any Title to Lands c. Their Estates to be liable but not their Persons to be imprisoned nor prosecuted upon Poenal Laws and if they refuse to appear to any Suit the House being moved therein will do Justice and appointed a Committee to hear and report complaints of this Nature A Committee of Grievances was named to consider of such whereof redress hath been promised to the People and what ease is fit to be given in relation to their Burdens Freedoms and Liberties and of reforming Courts of Justice and proceedings in Law and in all matters of Trade and to prepare Ordinances for the same to be presented to the House Orders for Money for disbanding the Supernumeraries and for supplyes for Carisbroke Castle and other Forts in the Isle of Wight Several Copositions were passed Letters from the Isle of Wight That the King was much Discontented since the Insurrection at New-port That he much desired Dr. Shelden and Dr. Hammond might continue with him whereof Col. Hammond gave notice to the Parliament and to the General 5. Debate about Compositions Power given to Col. Hammond and Sir William Constable to place and displace such attendants about the King as they think fit for security of his Person Order for allowance for his attendants Divers Compositions passed Both Houses passed some additional Directions for Billeting the Army when they are upon a March or setled in their Quarters The Civil Officers to joyn with the Quarter-masters of the Army and what the Soldiers shall have and what he shall pay for it 6. Order touching relief of Widows and maimed Soldiers One presented to the House a Book concerning the Power of Civil Magistracy for which he was Committed and the Committee about Scandalous Pamphlets ordered to sit and Money ordered to gratifie such as shall discover Presses or Authors of Scandalous Pamphlets Order for Supplies of Garrisons 7. Order for a Letter of thanks to the Committee of Kent for their care in suppressing the tumult in Canterbury and for a Commission of Oyer and Terminer to try the chief Mutineers there The Commons agreed with the Lords for further Liberty upon Bayl for the Marquess of Winton and Earl Cleaveland 8. More Power given to the Committee of Grievances and order for the Printing of that business Order of both Houses to restore to Duke Hamilton his Pictures An Ordinance sent up to the Lords to prohibit the transportation of Wool and of Fullers Earth and of Irish Wool Order for a further Ordinance against Scandalous Pamphlets and Reports from that Committee to have Precedence Upon a petition of the Primate of Armagh Order for him to continue Preacher at Lincolns Inne The general Councel of the Army sat at Windsor and were very Unanimous in the results of their debates and to morrow they were appointed to dine with the General in the Castle to congratulate the Unity of the Army and to take leave of one another before the Armies going into Towns and Garrisons after the fifteenth of this Month. 10. Upon a Report from a Committee of some Papers and Warrants taken in the time of War as a Warrant under
aiding the King in his Wars and of an Act for making void all honours conferred on persons without the consent of both Houses And of an Act for the due observation of the Lords day Order for two great Cannons to be sent down to the Forces before Pontefract and Scarborough The House required an account concerning the taking off of the Sequestration of Sir John Winters Estate Order for addition of seven days more time for the Treaty at the Isle of Wight Letters from St. Albans that the General Officers of the Army upon their several meetings at the head quarters had agreed upon a Large Remonstrance to be presented to the Parliament The new Serjeants appeared at the Chancery Bar and Whitelock made the speech to them to this Effect M r Serjeant S t John and the rest of you Gentlemen who have received Writs to be Serjeants at Law IT hath pleased the Parliament in commanding these Writs to issue forth to manifest their constant resolutions to continue and maintain the old setled form of Government and Laws of the Kingdom and to provide for the supply of the high Courts of Justice with the usual number of Judges and to manifest their respects to our profession And likewise to bestow a particular mark of favour upon you as eminent Members of it the good affections to the publick and the abilities of most of you they know by experience among themselves and of the rest by good information I acknowledge that the burthen of this business lies heavy upon me in regard of my own weakness And the worthiness of the Persons to whom my words are directed but as I am of the least ability to give so you have the least need to receive Instructions I should be unwilling to see the solemnity of this general Call diminished and am the rather perswaded to supply my present duty for several respects 1. For the honour of that Authority which commands your attendance and my service upon this occasion 2. For the honour of this Court which challengeth a great share in this work your Writs issuing from hence your appearance here Recorded and your Oath is here to be taken 3. The honour and particular respects which I have of you that are called to this degree 4. And lastly out of my own affections to the degree being my self the Son of a Sergeant and having the honour to be one of your number in this Call and I do acknowledge that both in my descent and fortune I am a great debtor to the Law For these reasons I presume especially being with those from whom I have by long acquaintance found much friendship that I shall now receive a fair construction of what I speak upon this very great subject My observations shall be upon your Call by Writ and upon the Writ it self Your being called by Writ is a great argument of the antiquity of Sergeants The Register hath many Writs as my Lord Coke holds in his Preface to the 10. Rep. that were in use before the Conquest and in the most antient Manuscript Registers is your Writ of the same form with those by which you are called and if there had beeen any alteration within time of memory it would probably have been extant We find Sergeants at Law often mentioned in our Year-Books and in the Records in the Tower as high as the beginning of E. 1. and by Bracton who wrote in H. 3. time And it may probably be conjectured that William de Bussey was a Sergeant by his habit of the Coif and his Office Of whom Matthew Paris relates 42 H. 3. that he was Seneschallus Principalis Consiliarius Gulielmi de Valentia and being accused for great crimes upon his Tryal when he could not acquit himself Voluit ligamenta suae Coifae solvere ut palam monstraret tonsuram se habere clericalem and so to have avoided judgment but it would not serve his turn Thus far it is granted by a little Manuscript treatise which endeavours to detract from the honour of this degree and therefore requires an answer It asserts that by Magna Charta Communia placita non sequantur curiam nostram the Court of Common-Pleas was crected and that some of our profession by Writ then framed were commanded to attend that lower Court the Lawyers being generally unwilling to leave the Kings House where the other Courts of Justice then sate and to attend this new Court elsewhere It is reasonable well that they are allowed the antiquity of 9 H. 3. and by this as antient as the Common-Pleas Court but the errour that this Court was erected 9 H. 3. is sufficiently refuted The same great Charter is in Matthew Paris in King John's time with the words of Communia placita c. in it but I presume his meaning is that before the Statute of Magna Charta there was no Court of Common-Pleas though his words be before 9 H. 3. It is manifest by undeniable Authorities out of antient Manuscripts and Rolls and the black Book of Peterburgh that Cases were adjudged in R. 1. and H. 2. time coram Justitiariis in Banco residentibus and the names of those that were then Judges of this Court are set down many years before Magna Charta was granted which by Hoveden Paris and others are said to be the Laws of Edward the Confessor And if itbe admitted that Sergeants are as ancient as these Laws they allow them the Antiquity of the Confessor and if as ancient as this Court they are certainly as ancient as any thing in our Law But the Author of this Treatise affirmeth that before the Erection of the Court of Common-Pleas it cannot be shewed that there were any special Sergeant Pleaders I am of his opinion and likewise that no man can shew when that Court was first erected which is also the opinion of my Lord Coke 5. Rep. 9 Ed. 4. Sir Roger Owen Lambert and others Yet if the Author mean that before Magna Charta 9 H. 3. there were no such Sergeants he may be satisfied the contrary out of Hoveden and Paris who lived in R. 1. and H. 3. time and are Authors of good Credit They recite the Charge of the Justices in Eyer given in R. 1. and King John's time One of their Articles is to Enquire of the Sergeants at Law and Attorneys Fees In the Book of Entries in a Bill of Debt against a Sergeant at Law in the Common-Pleas he shows and prescribes that Sergeants could not be sued there by Bill but by Writ out of the Chancery and this being by Prescription shows that Sergeants were before the time of Rich. 1. And the Mirror of Justices which I presume they will not deny to be yet more ancient which my Lord Coke holds to be written before the Conquest saith a Countor est un Sergeant Sachant in la Ley de Realm to pronounce and defend Actions in Judgment From the Antiquity of the degree I come
of the House and of the City ordered to return the hearty thanks of the House to the Lord Mayor Aldermen and Common Councel for their great Love and Civilities yesterday expressed to the Parliament and Army Referred to a Committee to consider what mark of Honour and Favour the Parliament should bestow upon the City for their real Affection to the Parliament Some Aldermen and Common Councel men in the name of the Lord Mayor Aldermen and Common Councel presented the Lord General with a large and weighty Bason and Ewer of beaten Gold as a testimony of the Affections of the Giny to his Excellence They also presented from the City to the Lieutenant General Cromwel Plate to the value of 300 l. and 200 Pieces in Gold 9 A long debate touching absent Members voted that those who gave their Votes for Addresses to be made to the late King should state their Cases in Writing by a day to a Committee for absent Members which if they neglect to do then Writs to be issued out for new Elections in the places of those who shall so neglect 11 Debate touching the Earl of Chesterfields Composition Letters from the Countess of Leicester and the Earl of Northumberland for allowance for the late Kings Children referred to the Committee of the Revenue to provide Monies for them Order for demolishing Montgomery Castle and allowance to the Lord Herbert for his Damage thereby out of his Fine Order for demolishing Winchester Castle and Reparation for the Damage thereby to Sir Willi-Waller The like for Belvoir Castle and for Reparation of the Damage thereby to the Earl of Rutland referred all to the Councel of State The Act passed for relieving Persons comprized in Articles Another for altering the Original Seales of Caermarthen Pembroke and Cardigan Another for altering the Seal of Nisi-prius of the Common Pleas. Order that the Members of the House and of the Councel of State the Lords Commissioners of the Great Seal and Judges do attend the Funeral of Dr. Dorislaus Letters that the Parliament of Scotland took many exceptions to the Letter sent to them from the Parliament of England That they go on in raising Forces but the Quelling of the Levellers in England did not please them But they bewaile the suffering condition of their Preshyterian Brethren in England That in Scotland are many English Officers and Soldiers who expect imployment when their new King cometh and are out of Patience and Mony by his longstay that the Scots fear a Famine and Execute very many for Witches 12 Order for 6000. Men for the Summer Guard to be Proportioned to the ships and 3000 for the Winter Guard Referred to the Commitee of the Army to conferre with the Councel of State touching the number of Forces to be kept up and the Pay of them Referred to a Committee to prepare an Act upon Sir Henry Vane's report touching the Excise The new Judges were Sworn in the several Courts And it came to Whitlock's turn to make the Speech to those who were sworn Judges of the Common-Pleas Who were Mr. Sergeant Penleston and Mr. Sergeant Warberton Wherein amongst other matters he told them of their being the first Judges Publickly Sworn in this Common-wealth and spake to them concerning Judges in general Judges of this Common-wealth and Judges of this Court. On the second Head he told them That the Judges in this Common-wealth are of as great Antiquity as is the Law it self That the Druides were Judges or Interpreters of the Law Amongst the Pritains And as they studyed the Law 20. Years yet committed nothing to writing So out Judges spend as much longer time in the same study and our common Law is Lex non scripta at this Day He also intimated to them what he found in Ingulphus p. 870. and in Seldens Janus Anglorum of the Division made by King Alphred or Allured in Judices quos nunc Justiclarios vacamus et Vicioomites And in the sanie Author that when W. I. upon the suit of the Abbot of Crowland confirmed the Laws of St. Edward he proclaimed them to be kept et Justiciarijs suis commendabat And then he thus proceeds All these are Testimonies of the Antiquity of our Judges but I hold not this essential to be largely considered save as it falls in our way Neither shall I rob you of your time by an elaborate Discourse of the Honour and Respect due to your Place only you may pardon a few Observations thereupon and the rather for the particular Relation I have to that Calling What respect the Sexons had to their Judges appeares in the Etymology of their Word Grave which signifieth a Judge and an Earl Sir John Danys Rep. As in the old Law of the Ripuarians C. 55. Act 1st The Title being Si quis Graffionem interfecerit The Text is Si quis Judicem Fiscalem quem Comitem vocant interfecerit Seld. Tit. Hon. f. 121. 127. and Haillan f. 274. But to come nearer home we find in the Law of H. 1. This Description of a Judge Regis Judicos sunt Barones Comitatus qui liberas in eis tenras habent villani vero corsetti vel ferdingi vel qui sunt viles aut inopes Personae non sunt inter Indices numerandi Whence appears the reason of the Judges of the Exchequer being called Barons Seld. Tit. Hon. f. 347. and 390. Lambert f. 186. 1 H. 6. f. 7. Agreeable with this is the Testimony of Bracton who saith thus Comites vero vel Barones nonsunt amerciandi nisi per pares suos et hoc per Barones Scaccarij vel corain ipso Rege Vpon which and the Case of the Earl of Northumberland under H. 6. Selden observes that all Judges were held antiently as Barons And the Writ by which they were Summou'd to Parliament is in the same Style and hath in it the same words with the Writs of Summons of Barons Consitium vestrum impensuri Those of the Commons being ad faciendum et consentiendum hiis quae de communi Confilio ordinari contigeunt And in some Entries of Judgments upon Writs of Error in Parliament the words are ex assensn Institiariorum and the Title of Lord was given antiently to all the Judges as appears in divers of our Books and Records and is still given to the Judges of Assize They have their Officers and their Purveyante as the Barons had untill taken away by the Statute front both Rot. Parl. 10. E. 2. pt 2. M. 20. and 2. E. 3. pt 1. M. 33. and Rot. Claus 11. E. 1. and this was taken away by the Statute 4. E. 3. C. 3. Theye be divers Cases and Records of Punishments inflicted on those who gave any affronts to Judges and especially that noted Case of Roger Hengham M. 33. and 34. E. 1. rot 71. in the Receipt of the Exchequer So tender hath the State alwayes been of the Honour of their great publick Officers and as the State
be given them nor would they agree to surrender to Mercy but upon Reverence which was consented unto That they took the Governour and the Capt. of the Moss-Troopers and 60 Souldiers That two of the most notorious of them and the Captain were shot to death upon the Place They took in it many Arms 60 Horse which they had taken from the English and released 10 English prisoners and demolished the House That Middleton laid down his Arms upon condition that the King should be forthwith Crowned and the Estates and Kirk ordered him to take his Command again That Recruits were come from England to the Army That the G. and his Officers kept a Fast-day The House had a very long and smart Debate touching the Act for putting all the Books of Law and 〈◊〉 Process and Proceedings in Courts of Justice into the English Tongue in which Debate some spake in Derogation and Dishonour of the Laws of England For some vindication whereof and for satisfying some Mistakes one of the Members delivered his Opinion in the House to this Effect Mr. Speaker The Question upon which your present Debate ariseth is of no small moment nor is it easily or speedily to be determined for it comprehends no less than a total alteration of the Frame and Course of Proceedings of our Law which have been established and continued for so many years I should not have troubled you with any of my weak Discourse but that I apprehend some mistakes and Dishonour to the Law of England if passed by without any Answer may be of ill consequence and having attended to hear them answered by others who are not pleased to do it I held my self the more engaged in the Duty of my Profession to offer to your judgment to which I shall always submit what I have met with and do suppose not to be impertinent for the rectifying of some Mistakes which are amongst us A worthy Gentleman was pleased to affirm with much confidence as he brought it in upon this Debate That the Laws of England were introduced by William the Conqueror as among other Arguments he asserted might appear by their being written in the French Tongue In his first Assertion That our Laws were introduced by William the Conqueror out of France I shall acknowledge That he hath several both Foreign and Domestick Authors whom he may follow therein The Foreign Authors are Jovius Aemilius Bodine Hottoman Dynothus Volateran Berault Berkley Choppinus Uspargensis Malines and Polydore who affirm this erroncous piece of Doctrine but the less to be regarded from them because they were strangers to our Laws and took up upon trust what they published it this point Of our own Countreymen they have Paris Malmesbury Matthew Westminster Fox Cosins Twyne Heyward Milles Fulbeck Cowell Ridley Brown Speed Martin and some others All of them affirm That the Laws of England were introduced by William the Conqueror But their Errors are refuted by Sir Roger Owen in his Manuscrit who saith that Roger Wendover and Mat. Paris were the first Monks that hatched these addle Eggs. I shall endeavour to shew you That the Original of our Laws is not from the French that they were not introduced by William the Conqueror out of Normandy And I shall humbly offer to you my Answer to some of their Arguments who are of a contrary Opinion Polydore Hist Angl. L. 9. Affirmeth That William the Conqueror first appointed Sheriffs and Justices of the Peace erected Tenures brought in Trials by 12 men and several other Particulars of our Laws For Sheriffs their Name Scire Reeve shews them to be of the Saxon Institution And our Histories mention the Division of Shires by King Alphred but in truth it was much more ancient And it is apparent by our Books and Records some whereof are in the Hustings of London and in the Tower that the same things were in use here long before the Time of King W. I. Sir Roger Owen shews at large that Livery of Seisin Licenses or Fines for Alienation Daughters to inherit Trials by Juries Abjurations Utlaries Coroners Disposing of Lands by Will Escheats Gaoles Writs Wrecks Warranties Catalla Felonum and many other parts of our Law and the Forms of our Parliaments themselves were here in being before the time of Duke William Agreeing hereunto are many of our Historians and Learned Antiquaries But it is Objected That in the Grand Customary of Normandy the Laws are almost all the same with ours of England and the form of their Parliaments the same with ours That the Writer of the Preface to that Book saith it contains only the Laws and Customs which were made by the Princes of Normandy by the Counsel of their Prelates Earls Barons and other wise men which shews the forms of their Parliament to be the same with ours and the Laws in that Book to be the proper Laws of Normandy and ours to be the same therefore they argue that our Laws were introduced from thence by William the Conqueror This will be fully answered If that Grand Customary of Normandy was composed in our King E. 1. his time as good Authors hold it was then it cannot be that our Laws or Parliaments could be derived from thence These Learned men say That this Customary was a meer Translation of our Law-Book Glanvill as the Book of Regia Majestas of the Laws Scotland is and the like of the Laws of Burgundy They further add That the first establishing of the Customary of Normandy was in H. 1. his time and afterwards again about the beginning of E. 2. his time If the Laws in the Customary were introduced there from England it will then be granted that the Laws of England were not inoroduced here by William the Conqueror But I think it very clear that their Laws were brought to them cut of England and then you will all agree to the Conclusion Our King H. 1. Conquered Normandy from his Brother Robert and was a Learned King as his Name Beauclerk testifies whom Juo calls An especial Establisher of Justice Sequerius relates That this King established the English Laws in Normandy Herewith do agree Gulielmus Brito Armoricus Rutclarius and other French Writers who mention also that the Laws in the Customary of Normandy are the same with the Laws collected by our English King Edward the Confessor who was before the Conqueror An additional Testimony hereof is out of William de Alenson Revile who in his Comment upon the Customary saith That all the Laws of Normandy came from the English Laws and Nation In the Customary there is a Chapter of Nampes or Distresses and Decreed that one should not bring his Action upon any Seisure but from the time of the Coronation of King Richard and this must be our King Richard 1. because no King of France was in that time of that Name and the Words Nampes and Withernams were Saxon Words taken out of the English Laws signifying a Pawn or Distress
Second Charter dated anno 15. of his Reign he sayeth In Honour of King Edward who made me his Heir and adopted me to rule over this Nation In his Charter dated 1088 of the Liberties of St. Martins the Great in the Manuscript thereof are these words In Example of Moses who built the Tabernacle and of Solomon who built the Temple Ego Gulielmus dei dispositione Consanguinitatis haereditate Anglorum Basileus c. The Charter of H. 1. his Son to this Abby In Honour of Edward my Kinsman who adopted my Father and his Children to be Heirs to this Kingdom c. In another Charter of Henry 1. in the Book of Ely he calls himself the Son of King William the Great who by hereditary right succeeded King Edward It is true that as to his pretence of Title by the Will of the Confessor Mathew Paris objecteth That the device was void being without the consent of the Barons To which may be answered That probably the Law might be so in H. 3. time when Paris wrote and was so taken to be in the Statute of Carlisle and in the case of King John But at the time of D. Williams Invasion the Law was taken to be That a Kingdom might be transferred by Will So was that of Sixtus Rusus and Asia came to the Romans by the Will of King Attalus the words by Annaeus Florus are Populus Romanus bonorum meorum Haeres esto Bythinia came to the Romans by the last Will of their King Nicomedes which is remembred by Utropius together with that of Lybia Cicero in his Orations tells us That the Kingdom of Alexandria by the last Will of their King was devolved to Rome And Prasitagus Rex Icenorum in England upon his death-bed gave his Kingdom to the Emperour Nero. As to Examples in this point at home this King William the 1. by his Will gave England to his younger Son William Rufus King Steven claimed by the Will of Henry the first King Henry 8. had power by Act of Parliament to order the Succession of the Crown as he pleased by Will. And the Lords of the Councel in Queen Marys time wrote to her That the Lady Janes Title to the Crown was by the Will and Letters of Edward 6. As the Case of Henry 8. was by Act of Parliament So Duke William after he had Conquered Harold was by the general consent of the Barons and People of England accepted for their King and so his Title by Will confirmed And he both claimed and Governed the Kingdom as an Heir and Successor confirmed their antient Laws and ruled according to them This appears by Chronica Cronicorum speaking of William the Bastard King of England and Duke of Normandy he saith That whereas St. Edward had no Heir of England William having conquered Harold the Usurper obtained the Crown under this Condition That he should inviolably observe those Laws given by the said Edward It is testifyed likewise by many of our Historians that the antient Laws of England were confirmed by Duke William Jornalensis sayeth That out of the Merchenlage West-Saxon-Lage and Dane-Lage The Confessor composed the Common Law which remains to this day Malmsbury who lived in Duke Williams time sayeth that the Kings were Sworn to observe the Laws of the Confessor so called sayeth he because he observed them most religiously But to make this point clear out of Ingulphus he sayeth in the end of his Chronicle I Ingulphus brought with me from London into my Monastery Crowland the Laws of the most righteous King Edward which my Lord King William did command by his Proclamation to be anthentick and perpetual and to be observed throughout the whole Kingdom of England upon pain of most heinous punishment The Leiger Book of the Abby of Waltham commends Duke William for restoring the Laws of the English Men out of the Customes of their Countrey Radburn follows this Opinion and these Laws of Edward the Confessor are the same in part which are contained in our great Charter of Liberties A Manuscript entituled De gestis Anglorum sayeth That at a Parliament at London 4 W. 1. the Lawyers also present that the King might hear their Laws He Established St. Edward Laws they being formerly used in King Edgars time There is also mention of the 12 men out of every County to deliver truely the State of their Laws the same is remembred by Selden History of Tithes and Titles of Honour and in a manuscript Chronicle bound with the Book of Ely in Cottons Library One of the worthy e Gentlemen from whom I differ in Opinion was pleased to say That if William the Conquerour did not introduce the Laws of Normandy into England yet he conceives our Laws to be brought out of France hither in the time of some other of our Kings who had large Territories in France and brought in their Laws hither else he wonders how our Laws should be in French Sir I shall endeavonr to satisfy his wonder therein by and by but first with your leave I shall offer to you some Probabilities out of the History That the Laws of England were by some of those Kings carryed into France rather than the Laws of France brought hither This is expressly affirmed by Paulus Jovius who writes That when the English Kings Reigned in a great part of France they taught the French their Laws Sabellicus a Venetian Historian writes That the Normans in their Manners and Customes and Laws followed the English Polydore Virgil contradicting himself in another place than before cited relates that in our King Henry 6. time the Duke of Bedford called together the chief men of all the Cities in Normandy and delivered in his Oration to them the many Benefits that the English afforded them especially in that the English gave to them their Customes and Laws By the Chronicle of Eltham H. 5. sent to Cane in Normandy not only Divines but English Common Lawyers by the Agreement at Troys So there is much more probability that the Laws of England were introduced into France and Normandy than that the Laws of Normandy or any other part of France were introduced in England If the Normans had been Conquerours of England as they were not but their Duke was only conquerour of Harold and received as Hereditary King of England yet is it not probable they would have changed our Laws and have introduced theirs because they did not use to do so upon other Conquests The Normans conquered the Isles of Guernsey and Jersy yet altered not their Laws which in their local Customes are like unto ours The like they did in Sicily Naples and Apulia where they were Conquerours yet the antient Laws of those Countries were continued I hope Mr. Speaker I have by this time given some Satisfaction to the worthy Gentlemen who differed from me That the Laws of England were not imposed upon us by the Conqueronr nor brought over hither either out of Normandy or any
other part of France but are our antient native Laws I must now come to endeavour also to satisfy the wonder if they were not brought out of Normandy or some other part of France how come they then to be written in the French Language Sir It is to me an Argument that because they are written in French therefore they were not brought in by Duke William the Norman For the French Tongue was not the Language of Duke William and the Normans They had not been then in Duke Williams time past 4 descents in that part of France and it is improbable that they in so short a time should loose their native tongue and take up and use the Language of another Country which was conquered by them The Normans came from Sueden Gothland Norway and Denmark between whose Languages and with the High-Dutch their Neighbours there is a great affinity but between these Languages and the French there is none at all Ulphilus holds That the Dutch Tongue came from the Goths Jornandus saith The Goths Tongue came from the Dutch all agree that between those Languages and the French there is no Affinity It is so improbable that D. William should cause our Laws to be in French that when he proclaimed them as Ingulphus testifies he commanded that they should be used in the same Language they were written in English to his Justices and gives the reason lest by Ignorance we should happen to break them But it hath been further Objected If D. William did not cause our Laws to be written in French what then should be the reason that the Grand Customary of his Norman Laws were written in the French Tongue The reason thereof is given that the Normans being a rough and martial People had few Clerks among them but made use of those French among whom they then lived and whose Language they then began to be acquainted with and to understand But when they were in England they had not so much use of those Clerks and that Language but more of the English And probably it might be that the Confessor had been so long in France that he was more Master of that Language than of the Norman and that the Normans understood that Language better than the English and thereupon the Customary was written in the French Tongue But it doth not therefore follow that D. William must cause the English Laws to be written in the French Tongue but it is more likely that he might cause them to be continued in their Native Idiom which was much nearer in affinity to his own Northern Language than the French was That the French Tongue was not introduced as to our Laws and other things by D. William into England appears in that the French was in great use with us here both before and some time after his Invasion Beda affirms That in Anno 640. it was the custom of England to send their Daughters into the Monasteries of France to be brought up there and that Ethelbert Ethelwoulf Ethelred and other Saxon Kings Married into the Royal Blood of France Glabor notes That before the time of D. William the Normans and English did so link together that they were a terror to Foreign Nations Ingulphus saith That the Saxon Hand was used until the time of Kind Alfred long before the time of D. William and that he being brought up by French Teachers used the French Hand And he notes many Charters of Edred and Edgar written in the French Hand and some Saxon mixt with it as in the Book of Doomesday That Edward the Confessor by reason of his long being in France was turned into the French fashion and all England with him But that W. 1. commanded our Laws to be written in the English Tongue because most men understood it and that there be many of his Patents in the Saxon Tongue I suppose we may be satisfied that W. 1. did not cause our Laws to be written in French though the French Language was much in use here before his time And if he did not introduce the French Language into England the Argument falls that because they are written in French therefore he brought them in But Sir I shall offer you some Conjectures how it came that our Laws were written in French which I suppose might be begun in the time of our King Hen. 2. who was a Frenchman born and had large Territories and Relations in France many of his Successors had the like and very much to do in France and with Frenchmen of whom great numbers came into England and they and the English matched and lived together both here and in some parts of France Hence it came to pass as Giraldus Cambrensis notes that the English Tongue was in great use in Burdeaux and in other parts of France where the Englishmen were resident and conversant the like was when the Frenchmen were so conversant in England Matthew Westminster writes that he was in hazard of losing his Living because he understood not the French Tongue and that in King H. 2. and King Stephen ' s time who had large Dominions in France their Native Countrey and the number of French and of Matches with them was so great that one could hardly know who was French and who English Gervasius Tilsberiensis observes the same and Brackland writes that in R. 1. his time Preaching in England was in the French Tongue probably Pleading might be so likewise and in King John's time French was accounted as the Mother Tongue There are scarce any Deeds of our Kings in French before H. 2. his time the most are in E. 1. and E. 2. their time That our Laws were pleaded and written in French before E. 3. his time appears by the Statut. 36 E. 3. c. 15. which recites the mischief of the Law being in French and enacts that the Law shall thereafter be pleaded in English and enrolled in Latine This is oneGround of the mistaken Opinion of Lambert Polydor Speed and others that D. Willam brought in hither both the Norman Laws and Language which I apprehend to be fully answered and the contrary manifested by what I have said before on this Subject Polydore's Mistake may appear the more when he asserts that by this Statut. 36 E. 3. Matters are to be Enrolled in English which is contrary to the express words that they are to be Enrolled in Latin Many of our Law-Books were written in Latine before the Norman Invasion as appears bp the Ancient Rolls of Mannors and Courts Baron and our Old Authors Glanvile Bracton Tilesbury Hengham Fleta the Register and Book of Entries The Records at Westminster and the Tower and other Records yet extant are in Latine and many Books of our Law in Latine were translated into English about E. 3. his time Most of our Statutes from E. 1. his time till about the middle of H. 7th ' s Reign are Enrolled in French notwithstanding this Statute 36 E. 3. except the Statute 6 R.
Lieutenant-General not to seize upon meddle with or any ways molest the Persons or Estates of any Excommunicated Person or any ways to discharge any other Persons whatsoever to desist from dealing or trading with the said Excommunicated Persons without order from the Common-wealth of England or their Commissioners 20. Primate received his Sentence from the Parliament at the Bar of the House upon his Knees and Lieutenant-Collonel Lilburne being brought to the Bar refused to kneel the House gave him but Twenty days to depart the Kingdom Debate upon and several Branches passed of the Act of Oblivion Vote That Mr. Hale Mr. Steel Mr. Cocke Mr. Manby Mr. Sadler Collonel Blunt Sir Hen. Blunt Mr. Berners Major-General Desborough Mr. Moyer Collonel Tomlinson Mr. Fountaine Alderman Fowke Mr. H. Peters Major Packer Sir William Roberts Mr. Meltwold Mr. Mansell Mr. Rushworth Mr. Sparrow and Sir Anthony Ashley Cooper be the Committee to take into consideration what inconveniences there are in the Law how the mischiefs which grow from delays the chargeableness and irregularities in the proceedings of the Law may be prevented and the speediest way to prevent the same And to present their Opinions to the Committee of Parliament appointed for that purpose and they or any Seven of them had power to send for any Persons to confer with them in this Business and for Records An Act for compounding with Delinquents and Sequestrations and for the Committee of Haberdashers-Hall 21. Letters of the ceasing of the Plague in Ireland That 300 of the Enemies Horse were taken since the English came to their Winter Quarters That the Commanders of such as are yet out make Overtures of laying down their Arms. That many of the Rebels are in treaty to submit to the Parliament That Galloway offers to treat 23. By a Court-Marshal a Soldier that killed another being first struck by him and highly provoked was according to Num. 35. 22. adjudged only to be Imprisoned for two Months and then to pay 20 l. to the Wife of him that was killed 24. Letters That the Synod of Aberdeen had excommunicated the Lord Drum That the Marquess of Argyle had seised upon a House of Huntleys and put a Garrison into it That the Lieutenant General went to meet the Parliaments Commissioners come from England to Scotland 26. Letters That the Captain of the Success Frigot and Ten more of his Company were cast away at Leith That the Commissioners for Scotland sent forth their Summons for fit Persons to come to them to present their desires That the Lord Wareston chiefly and others were the Grand Sticklers for the Kirk Party A Letter intended to be sent from the Kirk to the Lord-General setting forth the Iniquity of the English Invasion then they inveigh against the Errors and Preaching of Troopers Against the Incorporating of Scotland with England saying it will draw on a Subordination of the Church to the State in the things of Christ Against the gathering of Private Churches and Toleration as they call it and introducing Magistrates of contrary Principles to the Church Against a Civil Headship over the Religious Constitutions 27. Vote That no Fee Perquisite or Reward shall be taken by any of the Judges of Westminster-Hall or their Servants but such Salary as shall be allowed them by the State That all the Publick Revenue shall be brought into one Receipt Instructions passed for ordering and disposing all the Forces and the Charge of them not exceeding the Establishment of the Army A Paper delivered in by the Spanish Ambassador to the Council of State and by them reported to the House read and Instructions given upon it Letters of Credence from the Queen of Sweden by Peter Spiering Silvereroone to the Parliament read and referred to the Council Letters of 2 Ships of Barnestaple taken by Pyrates 28. A Declaration published and Vindication of the Poor oppressed Commons of Scotland in relation to their present sad and Sorrowful condition wherein they were brought by that perfidious Self-seeking Party who did lately wind themselves up in the Offices of Power and Trust in that Estate and Army Wherein they submit to the Parliament of England and pray that they would put nothing upon them which may molest their weak Consciences or imply Perjury 2. That they may be governed by the English and no Scotch-man imployed in any Office of Power or Trust in Church or State who have formerly betrayed their trust 29. Letters of a Vision seen at Sea by the River Maze First about a Mans hight above the Horizon like a Flat land appeared very many Foot-men and Horse-men out of the North North-East After that appeared a Fleet of Ships out of the North and among them a great Ship which lost her Top-Mast and was made ready again and her Flag seemed of 3 Colours like the Prince of Orange his Flag That on the same height appeared a Mighty Fleet of several sorts coming one against the other and a thick Smoak like Fighting That the Smoak vanished and the Ships appeared again clear After which the Ships appeared as if they were sunk and then clear again Then a Mighty great Ship seemed to sink at the Head and the after part to stand on High and another Ship to Sail by it And in the North appeared a Lyon the Vision continued 3 Hours and the Sea-men were much afraid Lieutenant-Collonel John Lilburn took his Journey from London and many Friends went with him to the Sea side 30. Letters of a Ship wracked near to Pendennis That the Parliaments Forces in Vlster met with a Party of Tories killed and drowned 150 of them That the Barony of Burren in Ireland which they say hath neither Wood Water nor Earth enough to Hang Drown or Bury a Man refusing to pay Contribution was harrased by Sir Charles Cootes Forces That the Commissioners of the Parliament of England for the Affaires of Scotland sat at Dalkeith for Setling the business of that Nation 31. The Committee appointed to consider of the Inconveniences and Delayes in the Proceedings of Law met several times and desired the Judges in their several Courts to return to them a List of the Officers in their Courts and what Fees they receive and what Work and Imploymeut they do for the same They entred upon several Heads of Inconveniencies in the Law in relation to Estates in Tail and Copyhold Estates and that for the future they may be made liable to the payment of Debts Whitelock was often advised with by some of this Committee and none of them was more active in this Business than Mr. Hugh Peters the Minister who understood little of the Law but was very Opinionative and would frequently mention some Proceedings of Law in Holland wherein he was altogether mistaken February 1651. 2. Letters of the Proceedings of the Parliaments Commissioners at Dalkeith and the trouble of the Kirke Party 3. An Act passed for executing
transported for Spain That old Van Trump was dead killed with a Cannon shot in the late Fight with the English and that many others of Note were slain Upon Information of designs in hand against the Parliament Order for an Act for Erecting a High Court of Justice That a Standard was set up for the King of Scots in the Highlands and Middleton was among them and some landed out of Ireland and came to them 15. Letters that the Highlanders were up in a body of Four Thousand Glencarn their General Middleton and some other English Officers and the Earl of Argyles Son was with them Of the Refractoriness of the Scots Ministers That the Hollanders endeavoured to lessen their losses in the late Fight that the States keep Guards in several places to prevent tumults and give it out that the English were beaten in the late Fight that twenty five of their Ships carried themselves as Rogues and kept without Cannon shot 16. The Act passed touching Marriages A Committee appointed for Trade and to receive Informations touching the good of the Common-wealth Order for an Act touching Publick Debts Votes concerning the Publick Revenue Mr. Lilburn's Trial at the Sessions proceeded 17. Order for a Grand day of Thanksgiving for the success against the Dutch and the Declaration and Narrative of that business was passed 19. Several Persons secured by the Commander in Chief in Scotland for having intelligence with the Highlanders That Argyle set out a Proclamation declaring all those to be Traitors who joyned with his Son That the King of Scots his Standard was set up in the Highlands and they were raising more Forces to joyn with Glencarn in the Lowlands That Middleton was landed in the Highlands with Arms and Ammunition 20 Of three Dutch Prizes taken by the French A Charge against Sir John Lenthall referred to a Committee Order for an Act for Redress of Grievances touching Prisons and Prisoners A Committee to consider of a new body of Law Orders touching Arrears of some Officers in Ireland and for Sale of some Delinquents Lands to defray publick Charges About twenty Dutch Vessels taken by Lawson who had Fifty Sayl upon the Holland Coast and more going out to him The Jury found Lilburn not Guilty he pleaded long for himself Vice Admiral Lawson with Sixty Ships was upon the Coast of Holland before the Dutch had got out Letters from Holland acknowledging Their loss in the late Fight to have been Twenty Seven Ships and of Men slain drowned wounded and prisoners Six Thousand That the English Merchants there left the Country for fear of the rage of the People that at the Hague they began to be sensible that they had not a Victory That the Dutch labour to get France to them That the States clapt up Three English Men pretending they had Correspondency with England one of them they Rackt and threw the other Two into the Dungeon They appointed a day of publick Fasting and Prayer 23 The House was called and the absent Members appointed to Attend by a day Orders upon Reports from the Committee of Petitions Order for an Act to take care of Ideots Lunaticks and Infants Order for Hampton Court and the Parks there to be sold An Act passed touching Marriages and the Registring of them and of Births and Burials 25 The Solemn day of Thanskgiving for the Victory against the Dutch 26 Letters that Collonel Morgan marched with some Forces to Innerness but the Highlanders being about Seven Hundred in a body and Three Hundred Horse would not force the English nearer than two miles distance and that upon the news then coming to them of the Victory at Sea against the Dutch they presently dispersed themselves 27 Vessels chased into Plymouth and Falmouth being Merchant Men. A Convoy appointed for them 29 Lilburn marched towards the Highlands to suppress any Commotions in those parts The Ministers in Scotland published their Reasons against the Declaration of the English Commissioners and in Justification of their praying for the King and the Answer to those Reasons 30 An Act passed for the bringing in the Arrears of the Excise Referred to the Council to examine and take order to punish a Riot lately committed in Staffordshire in pulling up the Fences of some inclosures and laying the Grounds unto the Common fields again Vote for all Occupyers of Deans and Chapters Lands yet concealed from the State to discover the same by a day on pain of Sequestration Order of the Committee of Petitions for Petitioners in private Matters to set the Matters down in Writing in particular and the Witnesses names to each particular 31 Letters of a Fleet of twenty Sayl of Hollanders gone towards the Orkneys and an express sent thither from the English Fleet. That the Highlanders in Commotion in Scotland were dispersed September 1653. Septemb. 1. Upon Information to the Council of the escape of divers Dutch Prisoners and their being Shipped and transported again into Holland they Prohibite any to Transport them unless they have Certificates from the Parliament of their Discharge from their Imprisonment 2 Many Ministers did forbear to Pray for the King by name but Prayed for all in Distress from the highest to the lowest A Petition to the House from the Lord Mayor Aldermen and Common-Council of London wherein they Pray That the pretious Truths of the Gospel may be preserved in Purity and the Dispensers thereof being approved to be Learned Godly and void of offence may be sent forth to Preach the Gospel That their setled maintenance by Law may be confirmed and their Just properties preserved That the Vniversities may be zealously countenanced and incouraged The Petitioners had thanks for their good affections and were desired to continue their care of the Peace and safety of the City 3 Orders touching Compositions of Delinquents The Ship Love from Surat richly laden was followed by Seven Dutch Ships who viewing her posture and strength did not make any attempt upon her The Parliaments Frigots lying before the Vlye took Eighteen Dutch Vessels some of them Fishermen and some Busses and sent them to Yarmouth 5 Long Papers sent up to London of Answers to the Scotch Ministers Papers of Reasons why they ought not to be troubled for Fraying for the King 6 Letters that near Mallaga an English Ship brake through a whole Squadron of the Dutch and by all their Shot at her had not one Man killed or wounded Many Freebooters upon the Coast of Falmouth That the Lilly Frigot had taken two Freebooters of the French And Order given by the Council of State to the Admiralty for the Trial of them because they had a Commission from the King of Scots 7 Particular Letters of the business of the French Freebooters 8 Letters of Seventeen Sayl of the Dutch Ships in the Streights disturbing that Trade and that they had taken One English Vessel That the Highlanders were all quiet Messengers sent to Collonel Lilburn to
28. Divers Souldiers and Agitators apprehended in several places May 1660. 1. Sir John Greenvile of the Bed-Chamber to the King brought from Breda his Majesties Letter and Declaration to the House of Lords His message and declaration to the House of Commons His Letter and Declaration to Monk to be communicated to his Officers And His Majesties Letter and Declaration to the Lord Mayor Aldermen and Common Council of London By the Declaration The King grants a free generall pardon to all that shall lay hold of it within forty daies except such as the Parliament shall except and a liberty to tender Consciences and that none be questioned for difference of Opinion in matters of Religion which do not disturb the Peace of the Kingdom That differences and all things relating to grants sales and purchases shall be determined in Parliament and he will consent to Acts for that purpose and for satisfaction of the Arrears to Monk ' s Officers and Souldiers and they to be received into His Majesties Service and Pay These things being read in the House of Commons Mr. Luke Robinson formerly a most fierce man did now first magnifie his grace and goodness The Lords House gave thanks to Sir John Greenvile and declared That according to the ancient and fundamentall Laws of this Kingdom the Government is and ought to be by King Lords and Commons And the Lords desired that some way may be considered how to make up the Breaches and to obtain the King's return again to his people They voted a Committee to joyn with a Committee of the House of Commons to consider of an answer to His Majesties Gracious Letter and Declaration and to prepare something in order to this business The King's Letter and Declaration to the House of Commons was read and his Letter to Monk and they named a Committee to prepare an answer to the King's Letter expressing the joyfull sense of the House of His Gracious offers and their humble thanks for them with profession of their Loyalty and Duty to his Majesty and that they will give a speedy answer to His Gracious Proposals The House resolved to present 50000 l. to the King and the Committee ordered to go to the City to advance it upon security and interest and to treat about raising a further summ for the Army Order for Monk to communicate his Letter from the King to the Officers and Souldiers and to return an answer to the King which Monk did accordingly and it was received with great joy Order to enter the King's Letter in the Journall Book The Commons agreed with the Lords Vote of Government by King Lords and Commons and appointed a Committee to search the Journals what Acts or Orders there had been made inconsistent herewith An Assessment agreed of 70000 l. per mensem for three months Bonfires and ringing of Bells and great Guns fired in joy of these resolves 2. An Address to Monk from the Officers of the Army rejoycing in his Majesties offers of Indemnity of Liberty of Conscience satisfaction of Arrears and confirmation of purchases read in Parliament Dr. Clerges a Member of the House had leave to go to the King from Monk Sir John Greenvile that brought the King's Letter had the thanks of the House and 500 l. ordered for him to buy him a jewell The City had leave to send an answer to the King's Letter to them Letters that Lambert's party were all discharged and dispersed The City agreed to lend 50000 l. to the House of Commons 3. Orders touching returns of Elections The Lords agreed upon some of their Members six to be sent to the King and the Common Council of London did the like and gave 300 l. to the L. Mordant and Sir John Greenvile who brought the Letters from the King to buy each of them a Ring 4. The Commons agreed to an Order of the Lords for favour to the D. of Bucks for restoring his Estate The House gave leave to the Members of the Common Council named by them to go to the King and resolved to send twelve of their own Members to His Majesty Dr. Clerges with others went to the King with Monk's answer to the King's Letters to him and the Address of the Army 5. Orders touching returning of Elections An Opinion being discoursed abroad That the Long Parliament could not be dissolved but by themselves and the King 's and Lords consent which was not had for their dissolving and another Opinion being given out That if the Long Parliament were dissolved then the Trienniall Parliament was to take place and no other by that Act of Parliament The Commons thereupon passed a Bill for removing of disputes touching the sitting of this Parliament And they passed a Declaration for adjourning part of next Easter Term to which the Lords concurred and the Commons agreed that the E. of Manchester be one of the L. L. Commissioners for the Great Seal G. Mountague at Sea to whom the Letter to Monk was also directed from the King upon the receipt of it and of the Declaration he called together the Officers of the several Ships and communicated the Letter and Declaration to them who expressed great joy and satisfaction therein and desired Mountague to represent the same with their humble thanks to his Majesty Then Mountague fired the first Gun himself and all his Ships answered it round with loud Acclamations as their General had done crying God bless the King and the General gave two Pipes of Canary to his men 7. Order of the Common Council that at his Majesties return the new Park which Oliver had given them should be presented to the King and he assured that the City had only kept it as Stewards for his Majesty The Commons gave leave to General Mountague to return an answer to the King's Letter to him Resolved by both Houses that the King be proclaimed to morrow King of England Scotland France and Ireland and a Committee of both Houses to consider of the manner of it A Declaration against tumults and to continue Justices of Peace and other Officers in their places The King's Statue again set up in Guild-Hall and the States Armes taken down and the Kings Arms set up in their place Monk removed his Guards out of the City Collonel Salmon discharged upon security New Flags and Standards and Paintings ordered for the Ships 8. Resolved by the Commons That the King be desired to make a speedy return to his Parliament and to the exercise of his Kingly Office A Committee appointed to consider of the manner of his Majesties return and to prepare things necessary for his Reception The King was solemnly proclaimed at Westminster Hall-Gate the Lords and Commons standing bare by the Heralds whilst the Proclamation was made Then he was proclaimed in the several usual places in the City the Lord Mayor Recorder and Officers being present
of the Paâ—liament Montross Obstructions Jones Ireton U 〈◊〉 ties Ireland Cromwel sent for Reasons Scotland Ingagement Courts Marshal Durham Reports Pembroke Scots Declaration Kings Lands New Representatives Acts of Parliament proclaimed Ireland Report Letters from Rome February Gospel Stile Scotland Humiliation publick Register Hinderson Scotland Academy Scotland Army humilation Ingagement Scotland Ireland Gospel Scotland Preachers â—ct for â—eamen March Ministirs Ingagement Taunton Scots â—reland vote Sabboth Blasphemy Blasphemy Ireland Army Petition Ireland 〈◊〉 Judge Nicholas Ireland Letters London Address Answer April New Inventions L. Broghall 〈◊〉 Ireland 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Orders G. Blake Scots Ireland Kilkenny Witches Petition Vote Montrosse Massey Letter Cromwell 〈◊〉 Army Petition Scots Bonds Ireland Proposals Ireland Montross defeated May. Leeds Montress Kirk Montresse Adultery Act. H. Martin trepaâ— Montross Montross Scots Army Law Scotland Ireland 〈…〉 Ireland Clonmel Scots Ireland Scotland Cromwel Cromwel June Blake Scotland Cromwel Scotland Ireland army Ascham Murdered Lady Fitz-gerald acts South-wales Iuncto of State Resolution to invade Scotland Fairfax unsatisfy'd Conference with Fairfax Farfax Lays down his Commission Cromwell made General Court Marshal Ireland Scots Cromwel Scotland Act against Swearing Fleet. Barbados Message from the Scots York Ireland Victory Scotland Letters from Sir Charles Coot July High Court of Justice Plague Cromwel Adultery Act. Scots Scotland Blasphemy Proclamation Portugal Russia Amsterdam Ireland Cromwel G. Lesly Proclamation Baâ—bados Scotland August Amsterdam Spain Scotland Ireland Scotland Scotland H. C. of Justice Scots Scots Officers Cromwel Ireland Scotland Septemb. Call from God Fleer Scots Cromwell Victory at Dunbarre Scots Ministers Colours hung in Westminster Hall Scots London Ireland 〈◊〉 Ministers Letter from Cromwel Another Letter Barbados Blasphemy Ireland Scotland Proclamation sir John Gell. Lady Elizabeth H. C. of â—ustice Scots Barbados Scotland October Ireland Petition Scotland Portugal Kirk Ireland Scots The Engagement Trained Bands Fleet. The Law in English Scotland Cromwel Return of Iuries Cromwel Blasphemy Scots Pr Rupert Scots Ireland Novem. Law-business Irish Scots Proclamation Ministers Moss-Troopers Middleton The English Laws Kirk Ireland Victory C. Axtel December Blake Scots Portugal Sermon Scots Letters from Cromwel Declarations H. C. of Justice Blake Blake Scotland Spanish Ambassador Blake January Scotland Edenburgh Castle sâ—t rendred Scots H. C. of Justice Ireland Portugal Ambassador Coronaâ— at Schone Gr. Seal Scotland Blake New Seal Kirk February Kirk Aysebam Ambassadors to the States Hume-Castle Kings-Armes Ministery Hume-Castle Fenwick Councel of State Court-Marshal Cromwel Ireland Blake Mr. Fryes Book Ireland March Scotland Admirals Revolters Cook Dangerous Opinions Scotland English Ambassadors Holland April Apseley Ireland Van Trump Pyrates Kirk Ireland English Ambassadors Coalition Scilly Island May. Scots Scotland Scilly Island Petition Massey Scotland Cromwel P. Edward English English Ambassadors Scots Cromwell Holland Scotland June Sir George Ascut Scilly Island Ireland Scotland Mr. Love Scots English Ambassadors Holland Mr. Love Scots Lord Broghill Ireland July Ireland Scotland Mr. Love Cromwell Ireland Scots Cromwell Mr. Love Petition St. James's Fair. Jersey Ireland Scotland Love Cromwell Lambert Victory in Scotland Primers Ireland August Fise Battle Ministers Questions Brunt Island Mr. Love Scotland Cromweâ— Harrison Ireland Lord Broghill London Scots invade England Co. Alured Preston Harrison Oxford Letters from Lambert Mr. Love Scots Motion Sterling Castle Scots Letters from Fleetwood E. Derby Ministers Worcester Septem Scotland Worcester Vote C. Alured Tory. Ireland Monk Worcester Fight Letters from Cromwel Harrison Scotland Dundee Massey Sir Arth. Haselrigge Ireland Dundee Dundee Cromwel Scots Cromwel Fast-day Scots General Popham Ireland New Representative Hewson Okey C. Alured Scotland E. Derby October Conspirators Scotland Countess of Derby E. Derby Bill for a New Parliament Conspirators London Scots Moss-Troopers E. Derby King landed in Holland English and Dutch quarrel Ireland Bills Scots Discipline Commissioners for Scotland Holland Ambassadors The Kings Escape from Worcester Prisoners Petition Novem. Jersey taken Argyle Monk Isle of Man Jersey 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Isle of Man Scotland Jersey Votes for Dissolution Jersey Ireland Monk Kirk Huntley Massey Jersey Council of State Ireland Limbrick surrendred Scotland Scotland Jersey Ireland Decem. Ireton dies Preaching Cromwel Conference Petitions Scotland Dutch Ambassadors Votes Dutch Ambassadors Jersey Scotland Dutch Ambassadors Ireton Advice Jersey Elizabeth Castle Lambert Law Barbadoes Scotland Jersey Ayscham Januar. Scotland Haselrigge Scotland Monke Lilburne Committee of the Law Court-Marshal Scotland Votes Sweden Declaration Sea Vision 〈◊〉 Committee of Law H. Peters Februa Acts. Scotland Declaration Ireland Jersey Dutch Scotland Hewson Sir George Ascue Barbadoes Lambert Declaration Committee of Law Scotland Kens Town Ireland Petition Answer Scotland Hans Towns Holland March Blake Kirk Covenant Scotland Ireland Barbadors taken Lord willoughby Ireland â—â—ts Union Petition Danish Minister Scotland Union Ireland Bills Union Scotland Frigots Argyle April Dutch Union Ireland Lieutenant-General Ludlow Ireland Cracovian Catechisme Kirk Ireland Union Dutch Ambassadors Union Scotland Merchants Ireland Vote Hamilton Sir George Ascue Barbadon Scotland France L. Willoughby Sweden Conde Argyle May. Union Representative Captain How Judges in Scotland Ireland Fleet. Dutch Flag Ireland Van Trump Dutch Ambassadors Fight in the Downs Ireland June Throckmorton Judges Scotland Scotland Dunotter Castle Blake Dutch Paper Answer Scotland Dutch Ambassador Fight at Sea Blake Ireland Vote Cromwel Lambert distated Whitelocke Ireland Scotland Kirk Prerogative Sir George Ascue Register Kirk Tumult Storm Petition Votes in Answer to Dutch Paper Dutch Ambassadors Hewson Ireland Blake Ascue July Ireland Ascues Sea Fight Highlands Blake Dr. Winston Fleetwood Ascue Ireland Scots Dutch Fleet. Ascue Highlands Blake Kirke Highlands Dutch-Fleet Q. Sweeden Scots Presbyterian Blake Ascue Kirke Blake Ireland Blake Ireland Highlands Van Trump Ascue St. Pauls Van Trump August Army Petition Answer Cromwel Blake Kirk Ascue Fight Committee for Ireland Ascue Blake Scotland Blake Pen. Compalint Virginia Highlands Dutch Fleet. De Wit Denmark Septem Ireland Blake Wales Ireland â—udges â—rcuits in Scotland Highlands Dutch Bill Parl. Blake Dutch Mutiny Scotland English Judges Blake D. Tuscany Portugal Ambassador October Dutch Fleet. Witches Sea fight Ireland Storm Union Blake Denmark De Witt. Denmark Dutch Denmark Union Ireland Alderman Fowk Kirke Witches Scotland Dutch Petition Union Novem. Dutch Fleet. Union Cromwell Whitelock Blake Monk Parliament Navy Scotland Forreign Ministers Seamenincouraged Februa Placard Sea Fight Cromwell and Army against Parliament Prince Rupert Captain Bodiley Lord Lisle Holland March Scots Dutch Scotland Army Holland Anno 1653. Scots Declaration Sea Fight Irish Scotland Captain Appleton Ministers Sweden Cromwell Colliers April Irish Pamphlet Holland Scots Van Trump Cromwell Parliament turned out of Doors Kirk Cromwell Holland Declaration Great-Seal Sea Captains Scotland Dutch Holland Fleet. May. Durham Acknowledgments Coynen Cromwell Fleet. Dutch Kings-Bench Prison Army Ireland Bodiley Army Ireland Dâ—al Dutch Danâ—s French Ambassador Fleet. Ireland Highlands Army Dutch Ireland Cromwell Van Trump London Addresses Radnor Fleet. Van Trump Scots Jus divinum Sea Fight Dean Monk
His Majestie 's care and zeal to preserve his and the Kingdome 's honour in the dominion of the Sea by a powerfull Fleet. And you are to let them know how just it is for His Majesty to require Shipmoney for the common defence and with what alacrity and chearfulness they are bound in duty to contribute Some of the Judges put on this business in their charges at the Assises with great zeal and gravity to advance the King's pleasure but they did not convince many of the Legality of that business The Hollanders made a League with the French they were to Invade Flanders by Land and to infest Dunkirke and the Hollanders to doe it by Sea They prevailed at Diest and Tellemont but the Insolencies of the French and Dutch Souldiers caused the natives to beat both of their Armies out of the Country and the English Fleet perswaded powerfully the Hollanders to remove from before Dunkirke The Affairs in Germany were somewhat mitigated by the conclusion of the peace at Prague and the Protestants were reduced to their profession as it was setled in the year 1627. Some fiery spirits on both sides fomented by Cardinal Richelieu sought to undermine the peace and to reduce all again to a new Quarrel but the Emperor pursued the agreement confirmed the peace and forced many to an observance of it The Swedes were generally discontented with the peace The Elector of Saxony offered them a 100000 rize Dollars for a Reward but they refused it and held what they had gotten in Pomerland and elsewhere and what they had about Phelesbergh the Chancellor Oxenstierne put into the hands of the French A Ship loaden with many rich spoils of Germany and Goods of a very great value belonging to the Chancellor was cast away and the goods sunk in the Sea within a league of the Coast of Sweden In November this year arrived the Prince Elector in England to sollicite our King his Uncle for his assistance to the restauration of his Nephew to his dignity and Patrimony he was received here with all ceremonies and courtesies answerable to his quality and near alliance and soon after him his third Brother Prince Rupert arrived here also In December the Queen was brought to bed of a second daughter named Elizabeth to congratulate her Majestie 's safe delivery the Hollanders sent hither a solemn Ambassy and a noble present A huge peice of Amber Greece two fair China Basons almost Transparent a curious Clock and four rare peices of Tintinell and Tytian's painting Some supposed that they did it to Ingratiate the more with our King in regard his Fleet was so powerful at Sea and they saw him resolved to maintain his Right and Dominion there In March the Treasurers staffe was given by the King to Dr. William Juxton Bishop of London who was commended to His Majesty by the Arch-bishop Laud his old freind and predecessor in the Presidentship of St. John's Colledge in Oxford He was a Commoner in that Colledge and studied the Civil Law and therein took the degree of Batchellor and afterwards of Doctor of the Laws Yet with his Law he studyed likewise divinity took orders and was presented to the Parsonage of Somerton in Oxfordshire where he had a convenient livelyhood and there he sometimes resided and sometimes at St. John's Colledge He was much delighted with Hunting and kept a pack of good Hounds and had them so well ordered and hunted and chiefly by his own skill and direction that they exceeded all other Hounds in England for the pleasure and orderly hunting of them He was a person of great parts and temper and had as much command of himself as of his hounds he was full of ingenuity and meekness not apt to give offence to any and willing to doe good to all The Privy Council wrote Letters to every High Sheriff of England directing them for the taxing and levying of the Shipmoney and yet with great care and equality much beyond what was observed in following taxes But the guilding of this illegal Pill would not cause it to be swallowed down but many people especially of the knowing Gentry expressed great discontent at this new assessment and burthen as an Imposition against Law and the rights of the Subject The Plague was this year in London but by the mercy of God did not increase so much as was feared Anno 1635 The Earl of Berks whose fortune was lower than his mind betook himself to some new Projects whereof he became a Countenancer and Partner hoping to gain much by them to repair his Estate and had gotten a Patent from the King for the sole making of a new kind of Kiln for making of Malt and laboured to bring the same in use he was to have money of all those who set up this new Kiln This year by a Flood neer Glucstade in Holstein were drowned six thousand Persons and about fifty thousand Cattle And by the Plague there died in Leyden in Holland twenty thousand persons besides those that died in the rest of the Towns of that Countrey The Archbishop Laud made his Visitation and strictly enjoyned and expected a conformity to his Orders one of them which gave most distaste to many was That the Communion-table should be removed in every Church from the body of the Church or Chancel to the upper East-end of the Chancel and the side of the Table to be set against the Wall Altar-wise with a Rail or Ballaster about it Which was opposed by divers and the Bishop of Lincoln wrote a Book called the Holy Table shewing the Practice of the Primitive times and Arguments against this Innovation Anno 1636. Car. 12 The King's Navy of sixty Men of War under the Command of the Earl of Northumberland Admiral seized and sunk divers of the Dutch Busses in the Northern Seas and they fled to our King craving his leave by his Grant to Fish and Trade with the English which the King was ready to Indulge them Ferdinand the second Emperour aged and infirm summoned a Dyet at Ratisbone to be held the sixteenth of September when his Son Ferdinand the 3d. was Elected King of the Romans and was shortly after upon the death of his Father made Emperour Mr. John Hampden a Gentleman of an ancient Family in Buckinghamshire and of a great Estate and Parts denied the payment of Shipmoney as an illegal Tax He often advised in this great Business with Holborn Saint John Whitelocke and others of his friends and counsel Several other Gentlemen refused the payment of this Tax of Ship-money Whereupon the King was advised by the Lord chief Justice Finch and others to require the Opinion of his Judges which he did stating the case in a Letter to them After much sollicitation by the chief Justice Finch promising Preferment to some and highly threatning others whom he found doubting he got from them in Answer to the King's Letter and Case their
into the fire these bloody and mysterious Volumes of constructive and arbitrary Treason as the Primitive Christians did their Books of curious Arts and betake your selves to the plain Letter of the Law and Statute that telleth us what is and what is not Treason without being more ambitious to be more learned in the Art of Killing than our Fore-fathers It is now full two hundred and fourty years since any man was touched for this alleaged Crime to this height before my self Let us not awaken these sleeping Lions to our destructions by taking up a few musty Records that have lain by the walls so many Ages forgotten or neglected May your Lordships please not to add this to my other Misfortunes let not a President be derived from me so disadvantageous as this will be in the Consequence to the whole Kingdom Do not through me wound the Interest of the Common-wealth and howsoever these Gentlemen say they speak for the Common-wealth yet in this particular I indeed speak for and shew the Inconveniences and mischiefs that will fall upon it For as it is said in the Statute 1 H. 4. No man will know what to do or say for fear of such Penalties Do not put my Lords such Difficulties upon Ministers of State that men of VVisdom of Honour and of Fortune may not with chearfulness and safety be imployed for the Publick if you weigh and measure them by Grains and Scruples the publick Affairs of the Kingdom will lie wast no man will meddle with them who hath any thing to lose My Lords I have troubled you longer than I should have done were it not for the Interest of these dear Pledges a Saint in Heaven hath left me At this word he stopt awhile letting fall some tears at her Memory then he went on What I forfeit my self is nothing but that my Indiscretion should extend to my Posterity woundeth me to the very Soul You will pardon my Infirmity something I should have added but am not able therefore let it pass And now my Lords for my self I have been by the blessing of Almighty God taught That the afflictions of this present life are not to be compared to the eternal weight of glory which shall be revealed hereafter And so my Lords even so with all tranquility of mind I freely submit my self to your Judgment and whether that Judgment be of Life or Death Te Deum landamus Certainly never any Man acted such a part on such a Theatre with more Wisdome Constancy and Eloquence with greater Reason Judgment and Temper and with a better Grace in all his Words and Gestures than this great and excellent Person did and he moved the hearts of all his Auditors some few excepted to remorse and pity After he had done Pym and Glyn endeavoured to aggravate his Offences and so both Houses rose The Commons thought fit to justifie their Charge by Law to be Treason To which effect Mr. St. John one of the Committee made an elaborate and learned Argument It was insisted upon amongst many other things That in the Stat. 25 E. 3. the Index of Treason is a Salvo that because all particular Treasons could not be then defined therefore what the Parliament should declare to be Treason in time to come should be punished as Treason April 17. The Point in Law was argued for the Earl by Mr. Lane the Princes Attorney Mr. Loe Mr. Gardiner and Mr. Lightfoot were also present of his Councel Mr. Lane argued upon the Statute 25 E. 3. That it was a declarative Law not to be extended by Equity Consequence or Construction but by the express Letter only and being a Penal Law admitted no Inferences Penalties being to enforce obedience to known Laws not to doubtful or conjectural As to the Salvo he said That 6 H. 8. 4. a Petition was preferred by the Lords to have all Treasons limited by Statute and in that Parliament Chap. 20. an Act was made whereby that Salvo in 25 E. 3. was repealed and nothing to be Treason but what was literally comprehended in the Statute 25 E. 3. After this a Bill was brought into the House of Commons to attaint the Earl of high Treason upon Debate whereof they voted him guilty of high Treason And 19. April upon the Ingrossment of the Bill it endured a sharp Debate The Lord Digby and divers others appearing eminently for the Earl against the Bill but upon division of the House the Bill was passed yet there were fifty nine Dissenters This was 21. April and the same Afternoon it was sent up to the Lords April 24. The Lords were put in mind to appoint a Day for the reading of the Bill of Attainder and 29. April Mr. St. John by command of the House of Commons in the presence of the Lord Strafford offered to the Lords Reasons and Authorities to satisfie them and to justifie the Bill by Law The House of Commons in the mean time petitioned the King 1. For removing Papists from Court. 2. For disarming of them generally 3. For disbanding the Irish Army To which the King gave Answer 1. That all knew the legal trust the Crown had in that particular that he would use it so as not to give just cause of scandal 2. He was content it should be done by Law 3. Vpon Consultation he found many Difficulties therein and so wished the Disbanding of all Armies as he did conjure them speedily and heartily to joyn with him in disbanding those two here Scots and English May 1. The King called both Houses of Parliament together and did passionately desire of them not to proceed severely against the Earl whom he answered for as to most of the main particulars of the Charge against him tells them that in Conscience he cannot condemn the Earl of high Treason and that neither fear nor any other respect should make him go against his Conscience But for Misdemeanours he is so clear in them that he thinks the Earl not fit hereafter to serve him or the Commonwealth in any place of trust no not so much as a Constable May 2 d The Marriage was solemnized at Court between the young Prince of Orange and the Princess Mary the King's Daughter This day being Sunday from some Pulpits it was preached to the People the necessity of Justice upon some great Delinquents now to be acted And the next Morning May 3. a Rabble of about six thousand out of the City came thronging down to Westminster with Swords Cudgels and Staves crying out for Justice against the Earl of Strafford pretending decay of Trade and want of Bread They applyed themselves to the Earl of Mont-gomery who gave them good words and endeavoured to pacific them which is the best way in popular Tumults and yet this Multitude were very rude with some of the Lords and they posted up at Westminster the Names of all those Members of the House of Commons who had Voted for the Earl and
of Offices and desired the concurrence of the Commons to take away all Countrey Committees An Ordinance sent up to the Lords for an Assesment for the Garrison of Bristol and Glocester Vote for an Ordinance for fifty three thousand pounds per mensem assesment for the Army Debate touching the Confession of Faith An Ordinance past for constituting the three Commissioners of the Seal with a Provisoe that if any of them be chosen a Member of the Parliament he shall leave his place Vote for continuing the Seal-bearer The Ordinance past for sale of Bishops Lands and to secure the two hundred thousand pound to the Scots 14. The House sate in a grand Committee upon the Ordinance against Heresies Report of the Marquess of Ormond That he desired supplys and Moneys for the Forces with him and that he would either come to London or go beyond Sea or serve in Ireland as the Parliament pleased and surrender Dublin c. re-committed to treat further upon the surrender of Dublin and the other Garrisons A Letter from Ormond to the King and another to London laid aside not to be delivered The Ordinance for the Commissioners of the great Seal again presented to the Lords at a conferrence with some alterations as reserving power to make Justices of the Peace to present to Parsonages c. The House sent and seized at the Press the Papers of the Lord Chancellors Speeches then in Printing touching the disposal of the Kings Person and took the Printer and Bookseller into Custody for doing it without licence of the Houses though they had the warrant of the Scots Commissioners for it 15. A Pass from both houses to transport sixteen Naggs beyond Seas A Committee named to bring in an Ordinance for the Indemnity of Officers and Soldiers who have taken necessaries in the time of War and are now prosecuted for it at Law and the Committee to receive Complaints and give relief in the mean time A Letter from the Scots Commissioners desired the enlargement of the Stationer and Printer of their Speeches and the Printer and Stationer submitted referred to a further examination Ordinances sent up to the Lords for ten thousand pound for the poor Widows for four hundred pound for the poor Irish Protestants here for setling the Militia and for the Treaties with Scotland 16. A Committee named to consider of Printing the Septuagint Bible A Conference about the Printing of the Lord Chancellor of Scotland's Speeches An Ordinance sent up to the Lords for transporting of Persons to foreign Plantations The House sate in a grand Committee in the afternoon about the Assesments for the Army 17. Order that the Marquess of Hertford his Lady or others who had seized Money or Writings in Essex House should restore them to the Executors of the Earl viz. the Earl of Northumberland the Earl of Warwick and Mr. Sollicitor St. John A Committee named to whom the probate of this and all other Wills was referred and also a Petition of the Doctors of Civil Law concerning the probate of Wills Order that neither the Marquess of Hartford nor any other who had born Arms against the Parliament should go with the Corps of the Earl of Essex at his Funeral Vote for fifteen thousand pound for the Forces in Ireland and for five thousand pound for the Forces of Major General Pointz Sir Fr. Willoughby one of the Lord Ormonds Commissioners sent back to inform him what the Parliament had done 19. Debate about the Trustees for sale of Bishops Lands Order that all the Members of the House do attend the Funeral of the Earl of Essex and that the House be adjourned for that day as the Lords had done In the afternoon the House sate till six at night upon the Ordinance for sale of Bishops Lands The General with Major General Massey went to the Devizes where a rendezvous was appointed for the disbanding of such of Major General Massey's Forces as would not go for Ireland 20. One Arrested contrary to the Articles of Oxford the Serjeants sent for as Delinquents upon a certificate from Sir Tho. Fairfax Difference about the Commissioners of the Seal The Lords named four more to be added to the three named by the Commons they altered their former Vote for the three Commissioners and ordered an Ordinance to be brought in to establish the former fix Commissioners Members of both Houses Order that Col. Mitton offer resonable conditions to the Garrisons in Wales not yet reduced which if they refuse within twenty days that then they shall not be received to Mercy and referred to a Committee to consider of imploying those Forces for Ireland after the rest of the Garrisons should be reduced and a Letter sent to Col. Mitton to acquaint him with these Votes Votes for Mr. Bish to be Garter King at Arms and Mr. Bish to be Clarentiaux Mr. Riley to be Norwâ—y and a Committee to regulate their Fees Ordinance for sale of Bishops Lands The Money and Writings of the Earl of Essex taken away were restored Captain Betten voted to be Vice-Admiral of the Winter Fleet. Dunkirk was surrendred to the French upon Articles great solemnities of Thanksgiving great Guns and Bonefires for it in France 21. The House sate in a Grand Committee upon the Ordinance for Sale of Bishops Lands A Committee named to consider of regulating the Chancery and to receive complaints touching Fees of that or any other Court of Equity within the Kingdom Referred to the same Committee to consider who are fit to be Justices of the Peace and who not in all Counties The Funeral of the Earl of Essex was solemnized with great State All the Members of both Houses Sir Thomas Fairfax the Civil and Military Officers then in Town and the Forces of the City a very great number of Coaches and Multitudes of people present at it The General had been at the Devizes to disband the Brigade of Major General Massey which was done with little trouble and few of them listed themselves for Ireland From the Disbanding the General hasted up to London and was at the Funeral of the Earl of Essex 23. The old Commissioners of the Seal had been voted to be continued upon the constituting new Commissioners now the old Commissioners were voted down again and an Ordinance past and sent to the Lords to make the two Speakers Commissioners of the Seal till twenty days after this Term. This incertainty and change of Resolution in the House was much discoursed of by some who were not their friends they were reflected upon for it But they excused themselves by reason of the difference in Opinion from them by the Lords and now they began to be more apprehensive than formerly that so great a trust as the Custody of the Seal was most proper and fit to be only in their own Members Order for a Commission to enable the Master of the Rolls and the Judges to hear and determine for the
and Officers 1. That in regard of the new Garrisons of Berwick and many other places that provision may be made for three thousand Foot to be continued more than the former establishment 2. More Officers of the Train 3. That the General give command against listing any new Recruits 4. Touching pay of the Army and deduction for free quarter 5. That the Army be drawn into Towns c. 6. That by Towns is meant Market Towns and the streets near to them only 30. Voted that the Kings Message as to Delinquents was un-satisfactory in all the clauses thereof And several Votes admitting of Compositions at lower rates than before and that persons excepted as to life should be admitted to composition at a full Moiety of their Estates except only seven Persons which were not then named Vote that Wiliam Powell John Clerke John Eltonhead Robert Nicholas John Parker and Robert Bernard Esquires should be made Sergents at Law Order to the Committee of Norfolk about securing a Ship and Goods cast away upon that Coast The Lords moved that the dispute about Sale of Bishops Lands might be waved at present and the rest agreed by both Houses to be sent to the King but upon reasons given by the Commons that in regard their Lordships had concurred to abolish Bishops that it could not be if their Lands should not be disposed of and divers of them had been already sold upon the authority of an Ordinance of both Houses the Lords hereupon concurred with the Commons Letters from York of Cromwels coming to Newcastle with his Army and being highly treated there and of his ordering Forces for strengthning the siege of Pomfret that the Army kept a day of thanksgiving for their good success in Scotland That a Souldier by judgment of a Council of War was shot to death for plundering in Scotland That Cromwel and his Officers had a meeting with the Gentlemen of the four Northern Counties who agreed upon a Petition to the Parliament for justice against Delinquents and for a Commission of Oyer and Terminer to be sent down to try such as they should apprehend and for pay for one thousand two hundred Foot in Berwick and a Regiment of Horse under Colonel Fenwick and for eight hundred Foot in Carlisle and a Regiment of Horse Letters from St. Albans mentioning a Petition to the General from Colonel Ingoldsbyes Regiment reciting the hazards charges and victories of the Army and good People of the Parliaments party That nothing remains to be done to make the hazards of their lives and loss of so much blood effectual but an immediate care that Justice be done upon the principal invaders of all their liberties namely the King and his party That they will live and die with the Parliament in their Declaration of non-Addresses to the King That they apprehend with grief that all their Harvest should end in Chaff and what was won in the Field should be given away in a Chamber and they doubt the issue of the Treaty will be neither just nor safe They pray his Excellency to re-establish a General Council of the Army to consider of some effectual remedies hereunto by representing it to the House of Commons as the Petitioners of London and other places have done or in such other way as his Excellency and his Council shall think fit 31. Order to injoyn all the Members of the House to pay their Assessments to the Army equal with the rest of the Subjects Vote that his Majestics answer concerning the Church was un-satisfactory Letters of the Lord Ormonds treating with the confederate Roman Catholicks in Ireland for peace Letters from Edenburgh of a Declaration to prevent injuries or abuses to Major General Lamberts Souldiers That Lieutenant General Gromwel and Sir Arthur Haselrigge were in as high honour with the well affected party in Scotland as ever any of the English were Letters from York that the Garrison of Pomfret had killed and taken divers of the Parliaments Forces that sometimes they have Cessations and drink to one another by the names of brother Roundhead and brother Cavalier That the difference between Sir Henry Cholmely and Colonel Rainsborough who shall command in chief the Forces before Pomfret gives great advantage to the Garrison there November 1648. 1. Order for the Commissioners of the Great Seal to pass a Patent of the place in the Tower formerly given to M r Nichols one of the eleven Members to hold for his life Vote that his Majesties Message concerning Ireland was un-satisfactory The like concerning raising of Monies to pay publick debts Order that the two Catechisms be sent to the Commissioners to be presented to his Majesty Letters from Doncaster that forty Horse sallied out of Pomfret towards Doncaster where they killed the Centinel then three of them rode on to Doncaster and asked for Colonel Rainsboroughs Quarters and came to his Chamber there called to him and said they had a Letter from Lieutenant General Cromwel That the Colonel rose and opened his door to them expecting such a Letter that morning and presently the three Pomfret Souldiers fell upon him shot him into the Neck and another shot him into the Heart with other Wounds and left him dead escaping away without any alarm given 2. Message from the Lords for adding fourteen days more to the Treaty with his Majesty Vote that the Kings answer touching the Court of Wards was satisfactory And that one hundred thousand pounds per annum should be setled on the King and his Heirs in lieu of the Revenue of that Count provided it be not alienated from the Crown Several Messages from the Lords in furtherance of the Treaty Information of terrible designs on foot to kill the Parliament men and of suspicion that the Earl of Warwick would prove false to the Parliament 3. A Petition of the Merchants Trading into France referred to the Committee of the Navy to examine and report the grievances complained of by them Upon a Message from the King Ordered that Dr. Vsher Bambridge Prideaux Warner Fern and Morley have leave to go to his Majesty for information of his Conscience The Commons concurred with the Lords to add fourteen daies more for the Treaty with his Majesty And ordered a Committee to propound to the Common Council of London the loan of four thousand pounds more for the Treaty Referred to Lieutenant General Cromwel to take special care and strict examination concerning the Murther of Colonel Rainsborough Vote that his Majesties answer concerning his declaring against the conjunction of the Lord Ormonds Forces with the Rebels of Ireland was un-satisfactory his Majesty justifying the Lord Ormond in that bloody act 4. Vote of both Houses that any three of the Commissioners with his Majesty one Lord and two Commoners might continue upon the business of the Treaty and the rest to return if they pleased to London Debate about guarding of the
Painted Chamber and such who had any evidence to give against the Earl of Holland Earl of Cambridge Lord Goring Lord Capell and Sir John Owen or any of them were to repair thither where they might be heard A Committee to examine the Authours and publishers of a Pamphlet and such as have preached printed and published seditiously the proceedings in bringing the King to justice and to prepare an Act to restrain the preaching and printing any thing against the proceedings of the House and of the High Court of Justice Letters from Scotland that the Parliament and priests there are at much variance that they bring all to the stool of repentance that were in the last invasion of England yet they are now as much as ever Enemies to the proceedings of the Parliament and Army in England That they talk big of raising an Army in revenge of the Kings Blood and all will joyn unanimously against the Sectaries of England and ground themselves upon breach of the Covenant Letters from New-Castle that many Ships were loaden with Coals for London and the Coast clear and their Governour Sir Arthur Haselrigge and some Officers of the Garrison were gone for London Letters from Pontefract that upon notice of the Kings execution the Garrison made a stout Salley but were beaten in again In the House the debate was long and smart concerning the Lords House 6. Debate concerning the House of Lords and the question being put whether the House of Commons should take the advice of the House of Lords in the exercise of the Legislative power of the Kingdom it was carried in the Negative by many voices Then they voted That the House of Peers in Parliament is useless and dangerous and ought to be abolished and that an Act be brought in to this purpose A Committee named to draw up an Act for making the Estates both of the late Members of Peers and likewise of the House of Commons liable to the Law for payment of all debts Referred to a Committee to consider of a way to take away all Appeals to the Lords and to discharge all persons committed by them in relation thereunto and how the Peers may be elected Burgesses and Knights to serve in the House of Commons Debate what Government to set up in England and Ireland and whether Kingship should be abolished or not Divers Sheriffs made Scruple of acting in their Office because of the Death of the King Order for instructions to be drawn up therein Order for Sergeant Bradshaw to make a Deputy in Guild-Hall where he is Judge in regard of his imployment in the High Court The accounts allowed of the Charges of the Kings Tryal Letters that the Irish Pyrates take divers vessels at Sea from the English and that the several Parties in Ireland are agreed to carry on the designs of the Prince of Wales It was put upon Whitelock to draw an Act to take away the House of Lords wherein he desired to have been excused in regard he was not in the house when the vote passed and had Declared his opinion against it but he could not get excused 7. Debate whether the Government by Kings should be abolished and upon the Question whether it should be referred to a grand Committee of the whole House it was carried in the Negative Then after a long and quick Debate they passed this vote Resolved upon the Question by the Commons of England in Parliament assembled That it hath been found by experience and this House doth declare That the Office of a King in this Nation and to have the power thereof in any single person is unnecessary burthensome and dangerous to the liberty safety and publick interest of the People of this Nation and therefore ought to be abolished and that an Act be brought in to that purpose A Committee appointed to bring in names of persons not exceeding forty to be a Councel of State Instructions passed for drawing new Commissions for the Judges the new Great Seal being ready The Judges appointed to meet with the Speaker and a Committee of the House about the Judges Commissions The High Court of Justice sate receiving witnesses and preparing the Charges against the five persons to be tryed The Earl of Holland sent up by post that he was dangerously sick at Warwick-Castle The Corps of the late King was removed from St. James's to Windsor to be interred in St. George's Chappel there and monies allowed for it An Act appointed to be brought in to make Sir Thomas Widdrington and Whitelock Commissioners of the new Great Seal with a blank for others to be added 8. Instructions passed for Commissions to the Judges of whom six agreed to hold viz. Rolles Jermyn St. John Pheasant Wilde and Yates provided that by Act of the Commons the fundamental Laws be not abolished The other six Judges viz. Bacon Brown Bedingfield Creswell Trevor and Atkins were not satisfied to hold Order for altering the Judges Oaths formerly in the name of the King now to be in the People A Committee appointed to bring in a list of fit persons to be Justices of peace in every County Instructions passed for rewards to such as shall bring in any of the revolted Ships The Duke of Richmond and others had leave to attend the late Kings funeral at Windsor Widdrington and Whitelock without the Lords who were in Commission with them yet having an Act of the House of Commons for it they went with the old great Seal to the House Mr. Malbon the usual Seal-bearer carried it to the door where Widdrington and Whitclock took the Purse and Seal in it and both of them holding it brought it in solemnly into the house all the Members being silent and laid it down upon the Table in the house Then the House past an Act for the old Seal to be broken and a work-man was brought into the house with his tools who in the Face of the house upon the Floor brake the old Seal in pieces and the house gave to Widdrington and Whitelock the pieces and purse of the old Seal After this the House passed another Act for establishing the new Great Seal to be the Great Seal of England Then they read another Act to constitute Widdrington and Whitelock to be Commissioners of the New Great Seal which occasioned Sir Thomas Widdrington to stand up and excuse himself very earnestly because of his unhealthfulness but that excuse would not be allowed Then he further excused himself by reason of some scruples in conscience which he had concerning the acting in this high place though he did acknowledge the Authority and submit to it and had Acted by vertue of it in signing a Warrant for a Writ to adjourn the Term and bringing in the new Great Seal without the Lords Commissioners Upon a long Debate the House did excuse Widdrington and to manifest their respects for his former services
and in the same sence are used in the Customary That which puts it further out of scruple is that there are yet extant the Manuscripts themselves of the Saxon Laws made in the Parliamentary Councels held by them here which are in the Language and Character of those times and contain in them many of those things which are in the Norman Customary It is no improbable Opinion that there was a former establishment of our Laws in Normandy before the time of H. 1. and that it was by Edward the Confessor who as all Writers of our History agree was a great Collector and Compiler of our English Laws He lived a long time with his Kinsman Duke William in Normandy who was willing to please the Confessor in hopes to be appointed by him to be his Successor wherein the Dukes expectation did not fail him The Confessor having no Children and finding Normandy without a setled Government and wanting Laws advised with his Kinsman Duke William to receive from him the Laws of England which he had collected and to establish them in Normandy which Duke William and his Lords readily accepted for the Good of their People and thereby obliged the Confessor Another Proof hereof is That such Laws as the Normans had before the time of D. William were different from those in the Customary and from the English Laws As their Law that the Husband should be hanged if the Wife were a Thief and he did not discover it The meaner People were as Slaves and the like and the trial of Theft by Ordeil which then was not in England Wigorniensis reports That the Normans who came in with Queen Emma the Wife of Ethelred were so hated of the English for their Injustice and false Judgment that in the time of King Canutus they were for this cause banished and it is the less probable that they being so unjust themselves should introduce so just Laws as ours are Between the Conquest of Normandy by Rollo and the Invasion of England by Duke William there were not above 160 Years that of Normandy was about An. 912. that of England An. 1060. It is not then consonant to reason That those Normans Pagans a rough Martial People descended from so many barbarous Nations should in the time of 150 Years establish such excellent Laws among themselves and so different from the French Laws among whom they were and all parts in the World except England And such Laws which were not onely fit for their Dukedom and small Territory but fit also for this Kingdom which in those dayes was the second in Europe for antiquity and worth by confession of most Forreign Historians If we will give Credit to their own Authors this Point will be sufficiently evinced by them these words are in the Proheme of the Customary which is titled Descriptio Normanniae Hucusque Normannicae consuetudinis latorem sive datorem Sanctum Edvardum Angliae regem c. The same is witnessed by Chronica Chronicorum That St. Edward King of England gave the Laws to the Normans when he was long harboured there And that he made both the Laws of England and Normandy appears sufficiently by the conformity of them for which he cites several particulars as of Appeals and the Custom of England ad probandum aliquid per credentiam duodecem hominum Vicinorum which he sayeth remained in Normandy to that day Polydore forgetting himself what he wrote in another place sayeth of King Henry the Seventh That when a doubt was made upon the Proposal of Marriage of his Daughter to Scotland that thereby England night in time be subject unto Scotland The King answered No and that England as the greater will draw it to Scotland being the less and incorporate it to the Laws of England as sayeth the Historian it did Normandy though the Owner thereof was Conquere in England And Sir Roger Owen in his Manuscript affirms That there is not any of our Historians that lived in the space of 200 Years immediately after the Conquest which doth describe our Laws to be taken away and the Norman Custome introduced by the Conquerour Some of them and not improbably mention the alteration of some part of them and the bringing in some Norman Customes effectual for the keeping of the Peace There is yet behind the great Argument most insisted on and often urged by the Gentlemen of another Opinion which is the Title of William who is called the Conquerour from whence they conclude That by his Conquest he changed the Laws and Government of this Nation and that his Successors reckon the beginning of their Reigns from his Conquest To this is answered that â posse ad esse non valet argumentum the conquering of the Land is one thing the introducing of new Laws is another thing but there is direct Proof to the contrary of this Argument Duke William never surnamed himself the Conquerour nor was so called in his life time as may appear by all the Letters Patents and Deeds that he made wherein he is called Gulielmus Rex Dux c. never Conquestor and our antient Historians give him the same Titles and not that of Conquerour In the Title of Nubrigensis's Book he is surnamed William the Bastard Malmsbury calls him W. 1. Hoveden W. the Elder Adam de Monmouth sayeth That 1. E. 3. this word Conquest was found out to denote and distinguish the certain Edward because two of the same name were Predecessors to this King and to the Conquerour who claimed the Crown as Heir to Edward the Confessor but saith he we call him the Conquerour for that he overcame Harold Duke William himself claimed to be King of England as Successor and adopted Heir of the Confessor by his Will and Harolds renouncing of his Title by Oath The Register of St. Albans Math. Paris and others attest that the Barons of England did homage to him as Successor and he relyed on them in his Forreign Wars and the check given to him by the Kentish men and the Forces gathered by the Abbot of St. Albans brought him to ingage to confirm the Laws of the Confessor and as his Successor by legal right they admitted him to be their King Volaterus writes That he was made Heir to the Confessor and was Vncle to him Another affirms That Edward by his Will left England to him Paulus Aemilius and Fulgasius are to the same purpose Pope Alexander the Second sent him a Banner as witness that with a safe Conscience he mighe expel Harold the Tyrant because the Crown was due to him by the Confessors Will and by Harolds Oath Agreeable hereunto are Gemiticensis Walsingham Malmsbury Huntington Ingulphus Paris Pike Wendover Caxton Gisborn and others The antient Deeds of the Abby of Westminster which were sometimes in my Custody do prove this King William in his Charter to them sets forth his own Title to the Crown thus Beneficio Concessionis Cognati mei gloriosi Regis Edvardi In his
2. and some others in Latine R. 2. H. 4. H. 5. and H. 6. used to write their Letters in French and some of our Pleadings are in French and in the Common-Pleas to our time But Sir our Law it Lex non scripta I mean our Common-Law and our Statutes Records and Books which are written in French are no Argument that therefore the Original of our Laws is from France but they were in being before any of the French Language was in our Laws Fortescue writes That the English kept their Accounts in French yet doubtless they had Accounts here and Revenues before the French Language was in use here My Lord Cooke saith That the Conqueror taught the English the Norman Terms of Hawking Hunting Gaming c. yet no doubt but that these Recreations were in use with us before his time And though D. William or any other of our Kings before or after his time did bring in the French Tongue amongst us yet that is no Argument that he or they did change or introduce our Laws which undoubtedly were here long before those times and some of them when the French Tongue was so much in use here were Translated Written and Pleaded and Recorded in the French Tongue yet remained the same Laws still And from that great Vse of the French Tongue here it was that the Reporters of our Law-Cases and Judgments which were in those times did write their Reports in French which was the pure French in that time though mixt with some words of Art Those Terms of Art were taken many of them from the Saxon Tongue as may be seen by them yet used And the Reporters of later times and our Students at this day use to take their Notes in French following the old Reports which they had studied and the old French which as in other Languages by time came to be varied I shall not deny but that some Monks in elder times and some Clerks and Officers might have a Cunning for their private Honour and Profit to keep up a Mystery to have as much as they could of our Laws to be in a kind of Mystery to the Vulgar to be the less understood by them But the Councellors at Law and Judges can have no advantage by it but perhaps it would be found that the Law being in English and generally more understood yet not sufficiently would occasion the more Suits And possibly there may be something of the like nature as to the Court-hand yet if the more common Hands were used in our Law-writings they would be the more subject to change as the English and other Languages are but not the Latine Surely the French Tongue used in our Reports and Law-Books deserves not to be so enviously decried as it is by Polydore Aliott Daniel Hottoman Cowel and other Censurers But Mr. Speaker if I have been tedious I humbly ask your pardon and have the more hopes to obtain it from so many worthy English Gentle-men when that which I have said was chiefly in vindication of their own Native Laws unto which I held my self the more obliged by the duty of my Profession and I account it an honour to me to be a Lawyer As to the Debate and Matter of the Act now before you I have delivered no Opinion against it nor do I think it reasonable that the Generality of the People of England should by an implicit Faith depend upon the knowledge of others in that which concerns them most of all It was the Romish Policy to keep them in ignorance of Matters pertaining to their Souls health let them not be in ignorance of Matters pertaining to their Bodies Estates and all their worldly Comfort It is not unreasonable that the Law should be in that Language which may best be understood by those whose Lives and Fortunes are subject to it and are to be governed by it Moses read all the Laws openly before the People in their Mother-Tongue God directed him to write it and to expound it to the People in their own Native Language that what concerned their Lives Liberties and Estates might be made known unto them in the most perspicuous way The Laws of the Eastern Nations were in their proper Tongue The Laws at Constantinople were in Greek at Rome in Latine in France Spain Germany Sueden Denmark and other Nations their Laws are Published in their Native Idiom For your own Countrey there is no man that can read the Saxon Character but may find the Laws of your Ancestors yet extant in the English Tongue D. William himself commanded the Laws to be proclaimed in English that none might pretend Ignorance of them It was the Judgment of the Parliament 36 E. 3. That Pleadings should be in English and in the Reigns of those Kings when our Statutes were enrolled in French and English yet then the Sheriffs in their several Counties were to proclaim them in English I shall conclude with a Complaint of what I have met with abroad from some Military Persons nothing but Scoffs and Invectives against our Law and Threats to take it away but the Law is above the reach of those Weapons which at one time or another will return upon those that use them Solid Arguments strong Reasons and Authorities are more fit for confutation of any Error and satisfaction of different Judgments When the Emperor took a Bishop in compleat Armor in a Battel he sent the Armor to the Pope with this Word Haeccine sunt vestes silii tui So may I say to those Gentlemen abroad as to their Railings Taunts and Threats against the Law Haeccine sunt Argumenta horum Antinomianorum They will be found of no force but recoyling Arms. Nor is it ingenious or prudent for Englishmen to deprave their Birthright the Laws of their own Countrey But to return to the Matter in Debate I can find neither strangeness nor foresee great inconvenience by passing of this Act and therefore if the House shall think fit to have the Question put for the passing of it I am ready to give my Affirmative The Question being put It was unanimously carried That the Act should pass for turning the Law-Books and the Process and Proceedings in the Courts of Justice into English 23 Letters from Scotland of the Proceedings of the Army in Mining Edinburg-Castle and that part of the King's House there was burnt 25 Letters That the Scots Officers had sent to break off any Treaty of Accommodation and that they were to have a general Meeting for reconciling all Parties That among some Tories taken in Scotland one was an Elder of the Kirk who confessed the killing of some of the English being instigated by the Ministers That C. Monk had taken in the strong Castle of Roswel That the Scots were agreed amongst themselves and raising Forces to recruit their Army to 30000. 26 Letters That C. Axtel Governour of Kilkenny marched forth with about 800 Horse and Foot to relieve the Parliaments Garrison
of the Parliaments Soldiers 10. Upon the Defeat at Worcester Cromwel desired a Meeting with divers Members of Parliament and some chief Officers of the Army at the Speakers House and a great many being there he proposed to them That now the Old King being dead and his Son being defeated he held it necessary to come to a settlement of the Nation And in order thereunto he had requested this meeting that they together might consider and advise what was fit to be done and to be presented to the Parliament Speaker My Lord This Company were very ready to attend your Excellence and the Business you are pleased to propound to us is very necessary to be considered God hath given marvellous success to our Forces under your Command and if we do not improve these Mercies to some settlement such as may be to Gods Honour and the Good of this Common-wealth we shall be very much blame-worthy Harrison I think that which my Lord General hath propounded is to advise as to a Settlement both of our Civil and Spiritual Liberties and so that the Mercies which the Lord hath given in to us may not be cast away how this may be done is the great Question Whitelocke It is a great Question indeed and not suddenly to be resolved yet it were pity that a Meeting of so many Able and Worthy Persons as I see here should be fruitless I should humbly offer in the first place whether it be not requisite to be understood in what way this Settlement is desired whether of an absolute Republick or with any mixture of Monarchy Crom. My Lord Commissioner Wh. hath put us upon the right Point and indeed it is my meaning that we should consider whether a Republick or a mixt Monarchical Government will be best to be setled and if any thing Monarchical then in whom that Power shall be placed Sir T. Widdrington I think a mixt Monarchical Government will be most suitable to the Laws and People of this Nation and if any Monarchical I suppose we shall hold it most just to place that Power in one of the Sons of the late King Collonel Fleetwood I think that the Question whether an absolute Republick or a mixt Monarchy be best to be setled in this Nation will not be very easie to be determined Lord Chief-Justice St. John It will be found that the Government of this Nation without something of Monarchical Power will be very difficult to be so setled as not to shake the Foundation of our Laws and the Liberties of the People Speaker It will breed a strange Confusion to settle a Government of this Nation without something of Monarchy Collonel Desborough I beseech you my Lord why may not this as well as other Nations be governed in the way of a Republick Wh. The Laws of England are so interwoven with the Power and Practice of Monarchy that to settle a Government without something of Monarchy in it would make so great an alteration in the Proceedings of our Law that you have scarce time to rectifie nor can we well foresee the Inconveniences which will arise thereby Collonel Whaley I do not well understand matters of Law but it seems to me the best way not to have any thing of Monarchical Power in the Settlement of our Government and if we should resolve upon any whom have we to pitch upon The Kings Eldest Son hath been in Arms against us and his Second Son likewise is our Enemy Sir T. Widd. But the late Kings Third Son the Duke of Glocester is still among us and too young to have been in Arms against us or infected with the Principles of our Enemies Wh. There may be a day given for the Kings Eldest Son or for the Duke of York his Brother to come in to the Parliament and upon such terms as shall be thought fit and agreeable both to our Civil and Spiritual Liberties a Settlement may be made with them Crom. That will be a Business of more than ordinary difficulty but really I think if it may be done with safety and preservation of our Rights both as Englishmen and as Christians that a Settlement with somewhat of Monarchical Power in it would be very effectual Much other discourse was by divers Gentlemen then present upon several Points and too large to be here inserted generally the Soldiers were against any thing of Monarchy though every one of them was a Monarch in his Regiment or Company The Lawyers were generally for a mixt Monarchical Government and many were for the Duke of Glocester to be made King but Cromwel still put off that Debate and came off to some other Point and in conclusion after a long debate the Company parted without coming to any result at all only Cromwel discovered by this meeting the Inclinations of the Persons that spake for which he fished and made use of what he then discerned 11. Several Petitions from divers Counties were directed to the General and his Officers and Army acknowledging with thankfulness their great Services and setting forth the insupportable burdens upon the Country for the removal whereof they pray the General and his Officers and Army to be instrumental 1. Burden is of Tithes at first by a Cheat put upon us for advancement of Popery and maintaining superstitious and idle Persons whereby a third and fourth part of our Estates is taken away from us and the Fruit of our Labours by Priests and Improprietors And that in so-cruel and tyrannical a manner as in former times before 2 E. 6. was never practised among Christians and at present we are not able to get competent livelihood for our Children and Families leaving them as Slaves intailed to Priests and Improprietors who as cruel Task-masters do torment us 2. Burden is the managing and unlawful using of the Laws of the Land through the Number Pride Subtlety and Covetousness of Lawyers Atturneys and Clerks whereby the poor Country-men find the Cure worse than the Malady 3. Burden is the Excise 4. The great Assesses upon the Nation The Petitioners humbly pray That as God hath not put the Sword into your hand in vain you will mediate for us to the Parliament that the oppressed People may be eased and setled in freedom which they cannot be while Tithes continue and Covetousness executes the Law 12. Letters of Provisions arrived in Scotland for the Army and of Huntley and the other Lords coming in to the protection of the Parliament of England upon Capitulation and ingagement of the Lords and Gentlemen to disband all their Forces That the English Army have no opposition in Scotland and that only four Castles stand out against them in all Scotland 13. Letters That the Marquess of Argyle excused his coming to meet the Commissioners appointed by the Lieutenant-General to treat with him he being hindered by the Stone but he promised to come in Person to the Lieutenant-General That Ashfield's Regiment was marched into Murrayland
exercise and discharge of their Trust and we shall be ready in our places to yield them as becomes us our utmost Assistance to sit in safety for the improving present opportunity for setling and securing the peace and freedom of this Commonwealth praying for the presence and blessing of God upon their endeavours Signed by direction of the Lord Fleetwood and the Council of Officers of the Army Tho. Sandford Secretary May 6. 1659. â—ambert Berry Cooper Haslerigge Lilburn Ashfield Salmon Zanchey Kelsey Okey Blackwell Haynes Allen Packer and Pierson went to the old Speaker Lenthal with this Declaration to the Rolls and presented it to him and divers of the Members of the long Parliament came thither afterwards to advise with the Speaker and declared their willingness to meet again which they appointed to Morrow-morning in the Painted-Chamber 7. They met accordingly and in a body went together to the House Lambert guarding them with Souldiers Then they passed a Declaration touching their Meeting and their purpose to secure the Property and Liberty of the people both as Men and as Christians and that without a single Person Kingship or House of Peers and to uphold Magistracy and Ministry 8. A Sermon was Preached in the House by Dr. Owen 9. The House appointed a Committee of Safety most of them Souldiers except Vane and Scot and ordered that all Officers should be such as feared God and were faithfull to the Cause Letters of General Monk to Fleetwood of the Concurrence of the Army in Scotland with the Army at London Letters ordered to be sent to the particular Members of this Parliament to come and discharge their duty 11. An Act passed for the continuing of Sheriffs Justices of Peace c. in England and in Scotland and Ireland 12. An Address to the Parliament with their Desires in it from many in and about London and their Protestation to stand by this Parliament The like Address to this Parliament from the Officers of the Army These Passages gave the more hopes to many that this Parliament thus restored might be blessed of God for settling the Peace and Liberty of the Nation and the more because they were upon the first right foundation of that long Parliament which had done so great things and therefore divers were the better satisfied to go on with them 13. The Parliament named a Council of State and several Gentlemen not Members of the House were also of it their Names were as followeth Thomas Lord Fairfax M. G. Lambert Col J. Desborough Col. James Bury John Bradshaw Serjeant at Law Sir Anthony Ashley Cooper Sir Horatio Townsend Sir Arthur Haslerigge Sir Henry Vane L. G. Ludlow L. G. Fleetwood Major Salwey Col. Morley Mr. Scot Mr. Wallop Sir James Harrington Col. Wanton Col. Jo. Jones Col. Sydenham Col. Sydney Mr. Nevil Mr. Thomas Chaloner Colonel Downes Lord chief Justice St. John Col. Thompson Lord Commissioner Whitelocke Col. Dixwell Mr. Reynolds Josiah Barners Sir Archibold Johnson Sir Robert Honywood 14. An Act for a new Great Seal different from that whereof Fiennes L'Isle and Whitelocke were Commissioners and so their Office ceased 15. Newdigate Atkins Archer and Parker were made Judges and Easter Term was continued 16. An Act passed appointing Judges for Probate of Wills Applications from Mr. Nathaniel Bacon and his Brother about the payment of their Salary as Masters of the Requests to the Protector and Serjeant Lynne about his Arrears of his Salary Votes passed for Pay of the Army and Navy and for Sale of Whitehall and Somerset-house 17. Address to the Parliament from the Army in Scotland Right honourable THat a Nation may be born in a day is a truth which this days experience witnesseth unto us against all the dictates of humane Reason and that a glorious Cause whose Interest was laid low even in the dust should be in one day restored to its life and lustre when almost all the Asserters of it had so manifestly declined it by a defection of many years cannot be imputed to less than the greatest and most powerfull manifestation of the Arm of God that ever this or former Generations saw or heard of In the sense of this the greatest of our Temporal Mercies we now come to address to your Honours as those whose presence we have so long wanted that had you staid but a little longer it might have been left to be enquired what England was we mean what was become of that People by whom God for so many years filled the World with so much admiration and terrour But though this great Work be as most justly it ought to be wonderfull in our eyes yet when we consider its Author who calls things that are not as if they were bringeth down to the Pit and raiseth up again we see that nothing is difficult to Faith and the Promises of God are sure and stable even then when in the eye of man no less than impossible We cannot but acknowledge to our exceeding great sorrow and shame that our selves though we hope most of us through weakness and frailty not out of design have very much contributed to those Provocations which have caused God to depart from our Israel and we could hearâ—ily wish that even amongst those that help to make up your own number there had not been an helping hand to this sad and deplorable work But we see when God's hour is come and the time of his people's deliverance even the set time is at hand he cometh skipping over all the Mountains of sin and unworthiness that we daily cast in the way We are not willing to detain your Honours too long upon this subject and therefore besecching the God of all our Mercies to heal the backslidings of his people and not to charge unto their account in this his day of their deliverance their miscarriages whilst they were wandering in dark and slippery places after the imaginations of their own hearts we with all bumility and affection in the first place congratulate you in this your happy hestauration to the Government of these Nations which God was pleased once so to own in your hands as to make you both the praise and wonder of the Earth the glory and rejoycing of his People and the terrour of your Adversaries and we acknowledge it a singular condescention in you in this day of 〈◊〉 great difficulties to take upon you so heavy a burthen And sceing his late Highness hath been pleased to manifest so much self-denial and love to his Country in appearing for the Interest thereof against his own we humbly intreat that some speedy care may be taken for him and his family together with her Highness Dowager that there may be such an honourable Provision settled upon them and such other Dignities as are suitable to the former great Services of that Family to these Nations And in the next place we cannot but humbly beseech you now you