59

he had commission to raise money for the King; but it appears not that the money was to be expended upon the advancement of either Crispe or Waller's plot '.

The Earl of Northumberland, being too great for prosecution, was only once examined before the Lords. The Earl of Portland and lord Conway persisting to deny the charge, and no testimony but Waller's yet appearing against them, were, after a long imprisonment, admitted to bail. Hassel, the King's messenger, who carried the letters to Oxford, died the night before his trial. Hampden escaped death, perhaps by the interest of his family; but was kept in prison to the end of his life 3. They whose names were inserted in the commission of array were not capitally punished, as it could not be proved that they had consented to their own nomination, but they were considered as malignants, and their estates were seized.

60 'Waller, though confessedly,' says Clarendon, 'the most guilty, with incredible dissimulation affected such a remorse of conscience that his trial was put off, out of Christian compassion, till he might recover his understanding.' What use he made of this interval, with what liberality and success he distributed flattery and money, and how, when he was brought (July 4) before the House, he confessed and lamented, and submitted and implored, may be read in the History of the Rebellion (B. vii.). The speech, to which Clarendon ascribes the preservation of his dear-bought life,' is inserted in his works 5. The great historian, however,

This sentence is not in the first edition. In his dying speech he said: As Mr. Waller was the mouth from the Lords, as he did declare, so I was the unhappy instrument from Mr. Waller to the rest.' Rushworth's Hist. Coll. v. 327.

2 For the accusation of the Earl of Northumberland, it was proceeded tenderly in; for though the violent party was heartily incensed against him, as a man weary of them, yet his reputation was still very great.' CLARENDON, History, iv. 77.

3 Alexander Hampden. Rushworth's Hist. Coll. v. 323. In the first edition the sentence ran:-'Hampden was kept,' &c. Dr. Gardiner says that ' he fell ill, and ultimately died in confinement.' Civil War, i. 157. Between the arrest of the conspirators

and their trial John Hampden, Waller's first cousin, received his death wound at Chalgrove.

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By drawing visitants to himself of the most powerful ministers of all factions he had, by his liberality and penitence, his receiving vulgar and vile sayings from them with humility and reverence, as clearer convictions and informations than in his life he had ever had; and distributing great sums to them for their prayers and ghostly counsel, so satisfied them that they satisfied others.' Clarendon's Hist. iv. 78.

5 Fenton's Waller, p. 275; also in Rushworth's Hist. Coll. v. 328; Parl. Hist. iii. 140. He would not suffer this speech to be inserted in his poems after the Restoration. Aubrey's Brief Lives, ii. 276.

seems to have been mistaken in relating that 'he prevailed' in the principal part of his supplication, 'not to be tried by a Council of War ''; for, according to Whitlock, he was by expulsion from the House abandoned to the tribunal which he so much dreaded, and, being tried and condemned, was reprieved by Essex 2; but after a year's imprisonment, in which time resentment grew less acrimonious, paying a fine of ten thousand pounds, he was permitted to recollect himself in another country 3.'

Of his behaviour in this part of his life it is not necessary to 61 direct the reader's opinion. 'Let us not,' says his last ingenious biographer, 'condemn him with untempered severity, because he was not a prodigy which the world hath seldom seen, because his character included not the poet, the orator, and the hero".'

For the place of his exile he chose France, and staid some time 62 at Roan, where his daughter Margaret was born, who was afterwards his favourite and his amanuensis". He then removed to

a

''He prevailed not to be tried by Council of War, and thereby preserved his dear-bought life.' Clarendon's Hist. iv. 78.

2 Whitelocke's Memorials, 1732, p. 70. This is also Rushworth's account, vol. v. p. 330.

According to Dr. Gardiner :-'He could not appear before a court-martial without leave given by the House. ... He was expelled the House [on July 4], but he remained in prison for many months, untried and unsentenced, till the throng of events had almost blotted out the memory of his crime.' Civil War, i. 158.

3 'He had leave to recollect himself in another country (for his liberty was to be in banishment) how miserable he had made himself in obtaining that leave to live out of his own.' Clarendon's Hist. iv. 79.

'The Houses [in Sept. 1644] hardly knew where to turn for money. In their distress they offered to pardon him on his engagement to leave the country and to pay £10,000. Waller caught at the bargain.' Gardiner's Civil War, ii. 37.

'He had much adoe to save his life; and in order to it, sold his estate in Bedfordshire, about 1,300 li. per annum, to Dr. Wright, M.D., for

10,000 li. (much under value) which was procured in 24 hours' time, or els he had been hanged.... With which money he bribed the whole House, which was the first time a House of Commons was ever bribed.' AUBREY, Brief Lives, ii. 276.

The Life of Edmund Waller, by Percival Stockdale (prefixed to an edition of Waller's Works), 1772, p. 63. For Stockdale see Boswell's Johnson, ii. 113; John. Misc. ii. 330.

Sir Walter Scott, telling a story of the Ettrick Shepherd's locking up 'twae folk come frae Glasgow (he said) to provoke mey to fecht a duel,' continues :-'I am afraid we must apply to Hogg the apology which is made for Waller by his biographer.' Scott quotes the passage in the text. Journal, 1891, p. 454.

5 Waller, addressing Charles II on the Restoration, says:'Like your Great Master you the storm withstood,

And pitied those who love with frailty shew'd.'

Eng. Poets, xvi. 151. 'In this allusion Mr. Waller seems to touch tenderly upon his own want of resolution.' FENTON, Observations, P. 124.

6

Life, p. 40.

Paris, where he lived with great splendour and hospitality'; and from time to time amused himself with poetry, in which he sometimes speaks of the rebels and their usurpation in the natural language of an honest man2.

63 At last it became necessary for his support to sell his wife's jewels, and being reduced, as he said, at last 'to the rump jewel 3,' he solicited from Cromwell permission to return, and obtained it by the interest of colonel Scroop, to whom his sister was married. Upon the remains of a fortune, which the danger of his life had very much diminished, he lived at Hall-barn, a house built by himself, very near to Beaconsfield, where his mother resided. His mother, though related to Cromwell and Hampden', was zealous for the royal cause, and, when Cromwell visited her, used to reproach him; he in return would throw a napkin at her, and say he would not dispute with his aunt ; but finding in time that she acted for the king as well as talked, he made her a prisoner

row. Sometimes we footed it through pleasant fields and meadows; sometimes we shot at fowls and other birds; nothing came amiss; sometimes we played at cards, whilst others sung, or were composing verses; for we had the great_poet, Mr. Waller, in our company.' Diary, i. 252. See also ib. p. 225.

2

Johnson refers to the lines To my Lady Morton, Eng. Poets, xvi. 125. Fenton says in a note on this poem that 'Mazarin seems to have reverenced Cromwell more than his Maker.' Observations, p. 108.

3'Except my Lord St. Alban's [ante, COWLEY, 12,44; post, WALLER, 104], there was no English table but Mr. Waller's; which was so costly to him that he used to say he was at last come to the rump jewel.' Life, P. 40.

4 lb. p. 42. 'Adrian Scroop of Buckinghamshire, Esq., descended from the ancient lords of that name.' Ath. Oxon. iii. 47 n. On Oct. 17, 1660 Evelyn 'met the quarters, mangled, cut and reeking,' of Scroop and three other regicides, 'as they were brought from the gallows in

8

baskets on the hurdle.' Diary, i.

360.

On Jan. 13, 1651-2 he had recorded:-'I took leave of Mr. Waller, who had obtained of the rebels permission to return.' Ib. p. 286.

5 In the first edition 'Hillburn.' Malone, visiting Burke in 1789, recorded:-'We dined this day at Hall-barn, as it is now called, though Dr. Johnson, in his Life of Waller, calls it Hill-barn[sic].' Prior's Malone, p. 155. He adds:-' The house was built by Waller himself, but there have been considerable additions. Mr. Waller, the present owner, is a young man, the sixth I believe from the poet. The estate is now not more than about £1,500 per annum. Ib. p. 162.

"'He residing mostly at Hall Barn, near Beaconsfield, he was on all occasions called Mr. Waller of Beaconsfield; the greatest honour that poor but pleasant town has to boast of.' Life, p. 42.

Ante, WALLER, I. Her brother, William, married Cromwell's aunt, Elizabeth Cromwell.

8 The Life, p. 6, whence this anecdote is taken, continues :-' for so he used to call her, though not quite so nearly related.'

to her own daughter, in her own house. If he would do any thing, he could not do less.

Cromwell, now protector, received Waller as his kinsman to 64 familiar conversation. Waller, as he used to relate, found him sufficiently versed in ancient history'; and when any of his enthusiastick friends came to advise or consult him, could sometimes overhear him discoursing in the cant of the times, but when he returned he would say, 'Cousin Waller, I must talk to these men in [after] their own way,' and resumed the common style of conversation 2.

He repaid the Protector for his favours (1654) by the famous 65 Panegyrick, which has been always considered as the first of his poetical productions 3. His choice of encomiastick topicks is very judicious, for he considers Cromwell in his exaltation, without enquiring how he attained it; there is consequently no mention of the rebel or the regicide. All the former part of his hero's life is veiled with shades, and nothing is brought to view but the chief, the governor, the defender of England's honour, and the enlarger of her dominion. The act of violence by which he obtained the supreme power is lightly treated, and decently justified. It was certainly to be desired that the detestable band 5 should be dissolved which had destroyed the church, murdered the King, and filled the nation with tumult and oppression; yet Cromwell had not the right of dissolving them, for all that he had before done could be justified only by supposing them invested with lawful authority. But combinations of wickedness would overwhelm the world by the advantage which licentious principles afford, did not those who have long practised perfidy grow faithless to each other".

In the poem on the war with

''Very well read in the Greek and Roman story.' Life, p. 43.

2

"'And would then go on where they left off. Ib. p. 43.

3

A Panegyric to my Lord Protector, Eng. Poets, xvi. 136; post, WALLER, 128; ADDISON, 128. There is no copy of the first edition in the British Museum, but in the Catalogue the conjectural date of The AntiPanegyrick is 1654.

* Scott says of Dryden's Elegy on Cromwell (post, DRYDEN, 7):'Although a panegyric on an usurper, the topics of praise are selected with

Spain are some passages at 66

attention to truth, and are, generally speaking, such as Cromwell's worst enemies could not have denied to him.' Scott's Dryden, 1821, i. 41.

5 The Long Parliament. Ante, WALLER, 24.

"I remember (said Johnson) this remark of Sir Thomas Browne's, "Do the devils lie? No; for then Hell could not subsist.”› Boswell's Johnson, iii. 293.

O shame to men! devil with devil damn'd

Firm concord holds.'

Paradise Lost, ii. 496.

67

68

least equal to the best parts of the Panegyrick, and in the conclusion the poet ventures yet a higher flight of flattery, by recommending royalty to Cromwell and the nation'. Cromwell was very desirous, as appears from his conversation, related by Whitlock 2, of adding the title to the power of monarchy, and is supposed to have been with-held from it, partly by fear of the army and partly by fear of the laws, which, when he should govern by the name of King, would have restrained his authority. When therefore a deputation was solemnly sent to invite him to the Crown he, after a long conference, refused it; but is said to have fainted in his coach when he parted from them 3.

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5

The poem on the death of the Protector seems to have been dictated by real veneration for his memory. Dryden and Sprat wrote on the same occasion; but they were young men, struggling into notice, and hoping for some favour from the ruling party. Waller had little to expect; he had received nothing but his pardon from Cromwell, and was not likely to ask any thing from those who should succeed him.

Soon afterwards the Restauration supplied him with another subject; and he exerted his imagination, his elegance, and his melody with equal alacrity for Charles the Second". It is not

3 Mr. C. H. Firth informs me that he knows of no authority for this story. 'In itself it is improbable, for Cromwell refused the Crown at Whitehall, where he was living.'

4

Eng. Poets, xvi. 147. It contains the famous instance of the bathos, quoted in The Art of Sinking, ch.xi:"Under the tropic is our language spoke,

And part of Flanders hath receiv'd our yoke.'

'He would not suffer this poem to be inserted in the edition of his Poems since the restauration of King Charles II.' AUBREY, Brief Lives, ii. 276.

5 Post, DRYDEN, 7; SPRAT, 2. The three poems were printed in 1659 under the title of Poems upon the Death of his late Highnesse Oliver Lord Protector of England, Scotland and Ireland. Written by Mr. Edm.Waller, Mr. Jo. Dryden, Mr. Sprat of Oxford. Eng. Poets, xvi. 148. 'It was registered on May 30, 1660, the day after His Majesty's entry into Whitehall.' Masson's Milton, vi. 12.

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