THE BATTLE OF NEWBURY. 255 Each side claimed the victory, but if up to the CHAP. moment of Charles's retreat the Parliamentarians had X. 1643. plaint. failed to gain their object, at least they had shown A disputed themselves the better soldiers. To the great Royalist victory. historian of the war there seemed to be something Clarencontrary to the order of nature in their achievement. don's comOn the King's side unequal fate cut down 'persons of honour and public name,' whilst amongst his adversaries it was only known that some obscure, unheardof colonel or officer was missing,' or that 'some citizen's wife bewailed the loss of her husband.' It is indeed unnecessary for those who respect humanity above any single class to hold that the lives of all men are of equal value to their fellows. The loss of the leader is greater than that of the led, and the fall of the worthy general or statesman is more deeply felt than that of hundreds of the toilers but for whose hearty co-operation neither general nor statesman would have saved themselves from failure. The charge against the Royalist gentry is that they had ceased to lead. The contrast between the infantry which followed Essex and the infantry which followed Charles is their bitterest condemnation. They could fling themselves upon death with romantic heroism, but they had lost touch of the middle and lower classes. They could not inspire the common man with their own courage, because they had no living faith in which he was able to share. They could point sarcasms at the narrowness and harshness of popular Puritanism, but a nation cannot live upon sarcasms, and the culture which raised the higher minds amongst them above any possibility of accepting Puritanism as a standard of life was entirely inaccessible to the rank and file of their followers. On the battle-field of Newbury death had dealt X. 1643. The monument. CHAP. hardly with the noblest of the King's supporters. A monument, which has recently been erected not far from the actual scene of the battle, gracefully couples with that of Falkland the names of Carnarvon and Sunderland, who fell in the struggle either on the Wash or on Enborne Heath. Unhappily, modern political partisanship, stretching across the ages, has attempted to awaken the now silent feuds of the past, and has refused to commemorate the deaths of any except those who fought on the royal side on that memorable day. Such an exclusion is especially unjust to Falkland. By assigning to him a memorial which would be suitable to a Rupert, it deprives him of his special claim to the loving memory of future generations. His glory was that when other eyes persisted in seeing nothing but party divisions, he had persisted in seeing England as a whole, and that he had thus ceased to be in accord either with the party which he had joined or with the party which he had deserted. It was because he could sympathise with neither that he flung away his life by an act which can hardly be distinguished from suicide. He could not, like Wolfe, die happily because the enemy had taken to flight. All that he asked of the enemy was to lodge a bullet in his body. He had ceased to hate, if he had not yet learnt to love. History, which takes note of the aspiration as well as of the accomplishment, cannot but think of Falkland as of one whose heart was large enough to embrace all that was noble on either side. It sees in him a prophet whose vision of peace was too pure and too harmonious to allay the discords of his own day, and whose longings could only be satisfied by the reconciliation which was to be accomplished long after he had ceased to breathe. Little recked Essex of dreams or visions. Finding RETREAT OF ESSEX. X. 257 1643. A skirmish near Alder maston. Sept. 22. Essex Reading. the way open before him he pushed on steadily. A CHAP. sudden attack by Rupert in a deep lane near Aldermaston threw his rearguard into a momentary panic, but Rupert was beaten off, and on the 22nd Essex, without further difficulty, entered Reading. The King, after throwing a garrison into Donnington Castle, reaches retired to Oxford. After the fight at Newbury it was at least plain that Charles needed more force than he had at his disposal to overpower the resistance of London, whilst it was equally plain that the Parliamentary armies were not as yet adequate to the task of crushing Charles. Much, therefore, depended on the result of the struggles round Hull and Plymouth; much, too, depended on the result of the negotiations which, during these weeks of balanced warfare, Charles was carrying on in Ireland and the Houses were carrying on in Scotland. 258 СНАР. 1643. May. Progress of the negotiation in Ireland. June 1. CHAPTER XI. THE IRISH CESSATION AND THE SOLEMN LEAGUE AND COVENANT. AID had not come to Charles from Ireland as speedily as he had once thought possible. Loyal as the confederate Catholics professed themselves to be, they were not inclined to neglect the interests of their country and of their religion merely to give Charles the opportunity of entering Westminster in triumph. They asked that a free parliament might meet at Dublin-a parliament, that is to say, in which, as matters stood in Ireland, the vast majority of the members would be Catholics. On June 1, however, Ormond informed them that they must be content to rely on what they may gain from the King upon humble and reasonable propositions to be made by their agents, which may be fit for his Majesty to grant.' In the meanwhile, to afford an opportunity for a peaceful negotiation at Oxford, there must be a cessation of hostilities, and they must themselves contribute a sufficient sum to enable the King's army in Ireland to subsist without plundering. At the same time Ormond pointed to the rock on which the negotiation was likely to be wrecked. To allow a free parliament to meet would be, 'in the construction of some, in effect, to make them judges of their own actions, and to entrust them to make laws for them who have had little cause to trust to THE WAR IN IRELAND. the provision they shall make for their future security, for few but themselves are like to be of that parliament, as the times are now composed, and how unequal that course would be they who are indifferent do foresee.'1 259 CHAP. ΧΙ. 1643. cesses. June 21. Ormond's Lords Time was fighting for the Irish confederates. Irish sucBefore the end of June the castle of Galway capitulated to their army in Connaught, and Sir Charles Vavasour was defeated by Castlehaven in Munster. On June 21 Ormond, knowing how hopeless his military position was, and perhaps wishing to establish offer to the beyond dispute the necessity of coming to terms with Justices. the insurgents, told the Lords Justices that he was ready to break off the negotiations if they could find any possible way of maintaining the troops.2 The Lords Justices were at their wits' end. An attempt to draw money or supplies from the impoverished June 22. citizens of Dublin ended in complete failure, and on the 24th Ormond set out, with at least the tacit consent of the Government in Dublin, to attempt to come to terms with the enemy. He found the Supreme Council less yielding than he had hoped, and after nearly three weeks spent in fruitless diplomacy he resolved to try the fortune of arms once more. At July. the head of 5,000 men he threw himself on Preston, opera ns and captured a few strong places; but Preston wisely avoided a battle, and Ormond, unable to feed his soldiers, was compelled to retire to Dublin.3 The resumption of negotiations was now a matter of necessity. It was the less distasteful to Ormond as he now knew that the King was prepared to discuss 1 Ormond to Barry, June 1. 2 Ormond's motion, June 21. Bellings, i. 156; ii. 290. 3 Carte's Ormond, ii. 501. Bellings, ii. 284. Order by the Lords Justices, June 22. Warlike renewed. July 2. The King consents to the demand listen to for a free parlia ment. |