difficulty in recognising the Protector; and at a grand audience vouchsafed to him at Whitehall, gave "his Highness an elaborate account of his reception at the Swedish Court by the Queen and the Chancellor Oxenstern, and how he had escaped shipwreck by embarking in one of "his Highness's frigates" in the Baltic. CHAP. LXXI. tector de On the 14th of July, Whitelock, Lisle, and Widdrington Lord Prowere sworn in before the Council; when the Lord Protector, livers Great after the royal fashion, with great form, delivered the Great Seal to Seal to them as Lords Commissioners.* Commis sioners. Cromwell's Cromwell's second parliament met on the 3d of September, Sept. 3. a day he considered so auspicious to him. The session 1654. was opened with royal splendour, the Protector proceeding second parto Westminster in a grand state carriage, attended by his life liament. guards, and followed by the Commissioners of the Great Seal and other officers of state and of the household, all in coaches, carrying swords and other emblems of sovereignty with them. In his speech he boasted much of the appointment of Commissioners to consider how the laws could be made plain, short, and easy, of putting into the seat of justice men of the most known integrity and ability,—and that the Chancery had been reformned to the just satisfaction of all good men.† ww The Lord Commissioner Whitelock was returned by three constituencies, the county of Buckingham, the city of Oxford, and the borough of Bedford. He chose to sit for Buckinghamshire, but does not appear to have taken any part in the debates. Other members more adventurous questioned the title of the Lord Protector, and debated whether the government should be in the hands of one individual,—so that, in the month of January, he thought fit, after the manner of the Stuarts, abruptly to dissolve the parliament before it Abruptly had passed a single act. A bill had been brought in to regu- ve late-not to abolish - the Court of Chancery; but it had 1655. not proceeded further than the committee‡, and we are not informed of its contents. dissolved, Cromwell now for a while assumed legislative power to Cromwell's himself with the advice of his council, and, under the name for reform Rot. Cl. No. 62. in Petty Bag Office. † Mem 600. ordinance CHAP. of Chan cery. Lords sioners re- of "Ordinances," issued proclamations which he enforced as law. Among these was "an ordinance for the better limiting the jurisdiction of the High Court of Chancery," which had been framed without the slightest communication with the Lords Commissioners, and displayed such ignorance that it might have been the production of General Harrison. The Lords Commissioners were summoned before the Council, where the ordinance was delivered to them, and "they were gravely admonished to be careful not to oppose his Highness's intentions for the common good." Lisle, who was an exceedingly illiterate person as well as very subservient, promised obedience; but Whitelock and Widdrington saw that many parts of the "ordinance" were quite impracticable, and that they should expose themselves to derision if they attempted to put it in execution. Lenthal, the Master of the Rolls, likewise joined them in a remonstrance against it. They represented that it would deprive many persons of their freehold without offence or legal trial, contrary to the Great Charter and many acts of parliament, and they presented a memorial on the proposed rules, showing that in many instances they could not be obeyed, and in others the most mischievous consequences would follow from obeying them. Two of the rules, with the objections to them, may serve by way of specimen of this Chancery Reform: - Rule. "Every cause shall be heard and determined the same day it is set down, and for this purpose the Lords Commissioners shall sit if necessary in the afternoon as well as the forenoon, except upon Saturdays." Objection: "This is impossible, for Equity causes depend upon so many circumstances in cases of fraud, that ofttimes three or four days are not sufficient for the orderly hearing of one single cause, and the Commissioners cannot sit at the times appropriated to the sittings at the Rolls, as counsel and solicitors cannot do their duty in two places at the same time.' Rule." No injunction shall be granted to stay the mortgagee from his suit at law, and no injunction shall be granted but upon motion in open court after hearing the merits." *It was not then foreseen that there would be five Courts of Equity sitting together in Westminster Hall, Objection: -"The mortgagor would often be unjustly turned out of possession, and there is more reason for allowing the interference of a Court of Equity on mortgages than on bonds and other securities, where it is and must be allowed. By the negation to the granting of injunctions in cases of waste, timber might be felled, houses pulled down, meadows and ancient pasture ploughed up to the irreparable loss of the plaintiffs and the Commonwealth."* The Lords Commissioners went on for a whole term after the making of the "ordinance," refusing to observe it. Whitelock said, "that he had taken an oath to execute the place of Commissioner of the Great Seal legally and justly, and for him to execute that ordinance' as a law, when he knew that those who made it had no legal power to make law, could not be justified in conscience, and would be a betraying of the rights of the people of England." CHAP. LXXI. 1665. The day after term they were summoned before the Lord June 6. Protector and the Council, and ordered to bring the Great Lords Seal with them, which they knew was the signal of their Commis dismissal. sioners summoned Council. His Highness told them "that every one was to satisfy his before the own conscience in a matter to be performed by himself, and that he had not a worse opinion of any man for refusing to do that which he was dubious of; but that the affairs of the Commonwealth did require obedience to authority, and that the Great Seal must be put into the hands of others who might be satisfied that it was their duty to perform that command." dismissed. Whitelock and Widdrington both tried to justify them- They are selves; but the Protector required them to lay down the Seal, and to withdraw. Having, after the example of the Kings, kept the Seal some days in his own possession, and personally directed the sealing of various instruments, without any Lord Chancellor, or Lord Keeper, or Lords Commissioners, he delivered it to a new Lord Commissioner, Colonel FIENNES, a soldier,—and to the noted Major LISLE, I find one regulation, however, more reasonable, "that the Masters in Chancery shall sit in public;" to which the only objection was, "that it was so worded as to take away the power of excepting to their Report.” CHAP. "a man for all assays, who had no other knowledge of the business he undertook beyond the little he had learned by accomGreat Seal panying the late Commissioners." In presence of his Highness and his Council, they took the oaths appointed by his Highness and his Council to be taken.” * committed to the keeping of a Colonel and a Major. History of Lord Com- "Thus," says Whitelock, "my fortunes and interest decreased; and now my pretended dear friends and frequent visiters withdrew themselves from me, and began neither to own nor to know me: such is the course of dirty worldlings." † He returned to the bar, and at once got into great practice; but Oliver soon made him and Widdrington Commissioners of the Treasury, with a salary of 1000l. a year. Nathaniel Fiennes, the new Lord Keeper, -placed the first in the commission, I presume, on account of his superior military rank, was the second son of Viscount Say and Seal. Having left the University, he passed a short time in the Inns of Court, but merely to finish his general education, without any view to the profession of the law. He sat for Banbury in the parliament which met in the beginning of 1640, and again in the Long Parliament, and was much in the confidence of Pym and the popular leaders. When hostilities began he had a commission given him, first to be a captain, and afterwards a colonel of horse, under the Earl of Essex, General of the parliamentary forces. Inspiring great confidence by his military ardour, he was made Governor of Bristol, but, to the great disappointment and indignation of his whole party, he surrendered that city to Prince Rupert, after a very feeble defence. He was brought to trial before a court-martial for cowardice, and condemned to death; but, by the intercession of his father, he was pardoned, and he afterwards published a justification of his conduct, which very much reinstated him in public opinion. Although not afterwards trusted with any command in the Cl. R. 1625. p. 8. n. 26. † Mem. 627. This is but an indifferent specimen of republican manners, and affords a great contrast with our own times, when loss of office does not imply loss of friends. 4 St. Tr. 186. army, he obtained considerable influence in the House of Commons, and was a very active committee-man. He was, for a long time, a violent Presbyterian, and supporter of the Solemn League and Covenant. In consequence, he was expelled from the House by Pride's purge. But he then made a sudden wheel, struck in with the Independents, favoured the ascendency of the army, and became a tool of Cromwell. Hence his present promotion to the Bench; and the highest civil office in the state was committed jointly to a Colonel and a Major. СНАР. LXXI. conduct of Major. I do not find any particular account of the manner in Judicial which Lords Commissioners Fiennes and Lisle discharged the Colonel their judicial duties, although there were loud complaints of and the their general incompetency. However, their appointment was sanctioned by Oliver's third parliament*, and they continued in office till his death. It may be presumed that they continued the practice of calling in the assistance of the Judges; and we must remember that the common-law bench never was better filled, the Protector not only having said that he wished to govern by "red gowns rather than red coats," but having actually appointed Hale and the most distinguished and honourable lawyers in the profession to preside in the Upper Bench, the Common Bench, and the Exchequer. The Equity business in Chancery must have had great assistance from Lenthal, who, released from his duties as Speaker On the 10th of October, 1656, there came the following message from his Highness, addressed To Our right trusty and right well beloved Sir Thomas Widdrington, Knight, Speaker of the Parliament: ". "OLIVER, P. "Right trusty and well-beloved, We greet you well. It being expressed in the 34th article of the Government that the Chancellor, Keeper, or Commissioners of the Great Seal, shall be chosen by the approbation of parliament, and in the intervals of parliament by the approbation of the major part of the Council, to be after approved by the parliament, and We having before the meeting of the parliament appointed, with the approbation of the Council, Our right trusty and right well beloved Nathaniel Fiennes and John Lisle, Commissioners of the Great Seal of England, I have thought it necessary to transmit to you their names, to the end that the resolution of parliament may be known concerning their approbation, which I desire may be with such speed as the other public occasions of the Commonwealth will permit, and so I bid you heartily farewell." The required approbation was given forthwith. Serjeant Glynne was approved of the same day as Chief Justice of the Upper Bench, from which it has been erroneously supposed that he was made a Commissioner of the Great Seal. See Hardy's Chancellors, 74. |