king, the only course which was left of the realm have been, under these was to make him a mere trustee, no- circumstances, safely confided to the minally seised of prerogatives of which King? Would it not have been frenzy others had the use, a Grand Lama, a in the Parliament to raise and pay an Roi Fainéant, a phantom resembling army of fifteen or twenty thousand those Dagoberts and Childeberts who men for the Irish war, and to give to wore the badges of royalty, while Charles the absolute control of this Ebroin and Charles Martel held the army, and the power of selecting, proreal sovereignty of the state. moting, and dismissing officers at his ? punish his opponents, he would establish an arbitrary government, and exact a bloody revenge? Our own times furnish a parallel case. Suppose that a revolution should take place in Spain, that the Consti The conditions which the Parlia-pleasure? Was it not probable that ment propounded were hard, but, we this army might become, what it is the are sure, not harder than those which nature of armies to become, what so even the Tories, in the Convention of many armies formed under much more 1689, would have imposed on James, favourable circumstances have become, if it had been resolved that James what the army of the Roman republic should continue to be king. The chief became, what the army of the French condition was that the command of republic became, an instrument of desthe militia and the conduct of the war potism? Was it not probable that the in Ireland should be left to the Par- soldiers might forget that they were liament. On this point was that great also citizens, and might be ready to serve issue joined, whereof the two parties their general against their country put themselves on God and on the Was it not certain that, on the very sword. first day on which Charles could venWe think, not only that the Com-ture to revoke his concessions, and to mons were justified in demanding for themselves the power to dispose of the military force, but that it would have been absolute insanity in them to leave that force at the disposal of the King. From the very beginning of his reign, it had evidently been his object to go-tution of Cadiz should be reestablished, vern by an army. His third Parliament had complained, in the Petition of Right, of his fondness for martial law, and of the vexatious manner in which he billeted his soldiers on the people. The wish nearest the heart of Strafford was, as his letters prove, that the revenue might be brought into such a state as would enable the King to keep a standing military establishment. In 1640, Charles had supported an army in the northern counties by lawless exactions. In 1641 he had engaged in an intrigue, the object of which was to bring that army to London for the purpose of overawing the Parliament. His late conduct had proved that, if he were suffered to retain even a small body-guard of his own creatures near his person, the Commons would be in danger of outrage, perhaps of massacre. The Houses were still deliberating under the protection of the militia of London. Could the command of the whole armed force that the Cortes should meet again, that the Spanish Prynnes and Burtons, who are now wandering in rags round Leicester Square, should be restored to their country. Ferdinand the Seventh would, in that case, of course repeat all the oaths and promises which he made in 1820, and broke in 1823. But would it not be madness in the Cortes, even if they were to leave him the name of King, to leave him more than the name? Would not all Europe scoff at them, if they were to permit him to assemble a large army for an expedition to America, to model that army at his pleasure, to put it under the command of officers chosen by himself? Should we not say that every member of the Constitutional party who might concur in such a measure would most richly deserve the fate which he would probably meet, the fate of Riego and of the Empecinado? We are not disposed to pay compliments to Ferdinand; nor do we con ceive that we pay him any compliment, | and by their standard, which bore on when we say that, of all sovereigns in one side the watchword of the Parliahistory, he seems to us most to re- ment," God with us," and on the other semble, in some very important points, King Charles the First. Like Charles, he is pious after a certain fashion; like Charles, he has made large concessions to his people after a certain fashion. It is well for him that he has had to deal with men who bore very little resemblance to the English Puritans. the device of Hampden, "Vestigia nulla retrorsum." This motto well described the line of conduct which he pursued. No member of his party had been so temperate, while there remained a hope that legal and peaceable measures might save the country. No member of his party showed so much energy and vigour when it beThe Commons would have the power came necessary to appeal to arms. He of the sword; the King would not made himself thoroughly master of his part with it; and nothing remained military duty, and "performed it," to but to try the chances of war. Charles use the words of Clarendon, "upon all still had a strong party in the country. occasions most punctually." The reHis august office, his dignified man- giment which he had raised and trained ners, his solemn protestations that he was considered as one of the best in the would for the time to come respect the service of the Parliament. He exposed liberties of his subjects, pity for fallen his person in every action, with an ingreatness, fear of violent innovation, trepidity which made him conspicuous secured to him many adherents. He even among thousands of brave men. had with him the Church, the Univer-"He was," says Clarendon, " of a persities, a majority of the nobles and of sonal courage equal to his best parts; the old landed gentry. The austerity so that he was an enemy not to be of the Puritan manners drove most of wished wherever he might have been the gay and dissolute youth of that age made a friend, and as much to be apto the royal standard. Many good, prehended where he was so, as any brave, and moderate men, who disliked man could deserve to be." Though his former conduct, and who enter- his military career was short, and his tained doubts touching his present military situation subordinate, he fully sincerity, espoused his cause unwil-proved that he possessed the talents of lingly and with many painful misgiv-a great general, as well as those of a ings, because, though they dreaded his great statesman. tyranny much, they dreaded democratic violence more. On the other side was the great body of the middle orders of England, the merchants, the shopkeepers, the yeomanry, headed by a very large and formidable minority of the peerage and of the landed gentry. The Earl of Essex, a man of respectable abilities and of some military experience, was appointed to the command of the parliamentary army. We shall not attempt to give a history of the war. Lord Nugent's account of the military operations is very animated and striking. Our abstract would be dull, and probably unintelligible. There was, in fact, for some time no great and connected system of operations on either side. The war of the two parties was like the war of Arimanes and Oromasdes, neither of whom, according to the Eastern theologians, has any exclusive domain, who Hampden spared neither his fortune are equally omnipresent, who equally nor his person in the cause. He sub-pervade all space, who carry on their scribed two thousand pounds to the public service. He took a colonel's commission in the army, and went into Buckinghamshire to raise a regiment of infantry. His neighbours eagerly enlisted under his command. His men were known by their green uniform, eternal strife within every particle of matter. There was a petty war in almost every county. A town furnished troops to the Parliament while the manor-house of the neighbouring peer was garrisoned for the King. The combatants were rarely disposed to march far from their own homes. It perpetually passing and repassing bewas reserved for Fairfax and Cromwell tween the military station at Windsor to terminate this desultory warfare, by and the House of Commons at Westmoving one overwhelming force suc-minster, as overawing the general, and cessively against all the scattered fragments of the royal party. It is a remarkable circumstance that the officers who had studied tactics in what were considered as the best schools, under Vere in the Netherlands, and under Gustavus Adolphus in Germany, displayed far less skill than those commanders who had been bred to peaceful employments, and who never saw even a skirmish till the civil war broke out. An unlearned person might hence be inclined to suspect that the military art is no very profound mystery, that its principles are the principles of plain good sense, and that a quick eye, a cool head, and a stout heart, will do more to make a general than all the diagrams of Jomini. This, however, is certain, that Hampden showed himself a far better officer than Essex, and Cromwell than Leslie. as giving law to that Parliament which knew no other law. It was at this time that he organised that celebrated association of counties to which his party was principally indebted for its victory over the King. In the early part of 1643, the shires lying in the neighbourhood of London, which were devoted to the cause of the Parliament, were incessantly annoyed by Rupert and his cavalry. Essex had extended his lines so far that almost every point was vulnerable. The young prince, who, though not a great general, was an active and enterprising partisan, frequently surprised posts, burned villages, swept away cattle, and was again at Oxford before a force sufficient to encounter him could be assembled. The languid proceedings of Essex were loudly condemned by the troops. All the ardent and daring spirits in the parliamentary party were eager to have Hampden at their head. Had his life been prolonged, there is every reason to believe that the supreme command would have been intrusted to him. But it was decreed that, at this conjuncture, England should lose the only man who united perfect disinterestedness to emínent talents, the only man who, being capable of gaining the victory for her, was incapable of abusing that victory when gained. The military errors of Essex were probably in some degree produced by political timidity. He was honestly, but not warmly, attached to the cause of the Parliament; and next to a great defeat he dreaded a great victory. Hampden, on the other hand, was for vigorous and decisive measures. When he drew the sword, as Clarendon has well said, he threw away the scabbard. He had shown that he knew better than any public man of his time how to value and how to practise modera- In the evening of the seventeenth of tion. But he knew that the essence of June, Rupert darted out of Oxford with war is violence, and that moderation his cavalry on a predatory expedition. in war is imbecility. On several occa- At three in the morning of the followsions, particularly during the operations ing day, he attacked and dispersed a in the neighbourhood of Brentford, he few parliamentary soldiers who lay at remonstrated earnestly with Essex. Postcombe. He then flew to Chinnor, Wherever he commanded separately, burned the village, killed or took all the the boldness and rapidity of his move-troops who were quartered there, and ments presented a striking contrast to prepared to hurry back with his booty the sluggishness of his superior. and his prisoners to Oxford. In the Parliament he possessed boundless influence. His employments towards the close of 1642 have been described by Denham in some lines which, though intended to be sarcastic, convey in truth the highest eulogy. Hampden is described in this satire as Hampden had, on the preceding day, strongly represented to Essex the danger to which this part of the line was exposed. As soon as he received intelligence of Rupert's incursion, he sent off a horseman with a message to the General. The cavaliers, he said, A short time before Hampden's death the sacrament was administered to him. He declared that though he disliked the government of the Church of England, he yet agreed with that Church as to all essential matters of doctrine. His intellect remained unclouded. When all was nearly over, could return only by Chiselhampton of England, with whom he had lived Bridge. A force ought to be instantly in habits of intimacy, and by the chapdespatched in that direction for the lain of the Buckinghamshire Greenpurpose of intercepting them. In coats, Dr. Spurton, whom Baxter the mean time, he resolved to set describes as a famous and excellent out with all the cavalry that he divine. could muster, for the purpose of impeding the march of the enemy till Essex could take measures for cutting off their retreat. A considerable body of horse and dragoons volunteered to follow him. He was not their commander. He did not even belong to their branch of the service. But he was," says Lord Clarendon, he lay murmuring faint prayers for "second to none but the General him- himself, and for the cause in which he self in the observance and application died. "Lord Jesus," he exclaimed in of all men." On the field of Chal- the moment of the last agony, "receive grove he came up with Rupert. A my soul. O Lord, save my country. fierce skirmish ensued. In the first O Lord, be merciful to .." In charge Hampden was struck in the that broken ejaculation passed away shoulder by two bullets, which broke his noble and fearless spirit. the bone, and lodged in his body. The troops of the Parliament lost heart and gave way. Rupert, after pursuing them for a short time, hastened to cross the bridge, and made his retreat unmolested to Oxford. 66 He was buried in the parish church of Hampden. His soldiers, bareheaded, with reversed arms and muffled drums and colours, escorted his body to the grave, singing, as they marched, that lofty and melancholy psalm in which the fragility of human life is contrasted with the immutability of Him to whom a thousand years are as yesterday when it is passed, and as a watch in the night. Hampden, with his head drooping, and his hands leaning on his horse's neck, moved feebly out of the battle. The mansion which had been inhabited by his father-in-law, and from which in his youth he had carried home his The news of Hampden's death probride Elizabeth, was in sight. There duced as great a consternation in his still remains an affecting tradition party, according to Clarendon, as if that he looked for a moment towards their whole army had been cut off. that beloved house, and made an effort The journals of the time amply prove to go thither to die. But the enemy that the Parliament and all its friends lay in that direction. He turned his were filled with grief and dismay. horse towards Thame, where he arrived Lord Nugent has quoted a remarkable almost fainting with agony. The sur-passage from the next Weekly Intelligeons dressed his wounds. But there gencer. "The loss of Colonel Hampwas no hope. The pain which he suf- den goeth near the heart of every man fered was most excruciating. But he that loves the good of his king and endured it with admirable firmness country, and makes some conceive and resignation. His first care was little content to be at the army now for his country. He wrote from his that he is gone. The memory of this bed several letters to London concern- deceased colonel is such, that in no ing public affairs, and sent a last age to come but it will more and more pressing message to the head-quarters, be had in honour and esteem; a man recommending that the dispersed forces so religious, and of that prudence, should be concentrated. When his judgment, temper, valour, and integpublic duties were performed, he calmly rity, that he hath left few his like prepared himself to die. He was at behind." tended by a clergyman of the Church He had indeed left none his like 220 BURLEIGH AND HIS TIMES. (APRIL, 1832.) Memoirs of the Life and Administration of behind him. There still remained, BURLEIGH AND HIS TIMES. THE work of Dr. Nares has filled us Compared with the labour of reading got the most amusing of writers: these memoirs excel A..! thing to do with the terrery circulating Horary, intest notion. There is readers of history co nd competitors. He had a co |