obeyed; and from that time all communication between that city and London was interdicted by the parliament. Clarendon assigns as the true cause of Charles's haughty refusal of all concession, the famous promise to the queen, that he would neither give away any office nor consent to a peace except by her mediation. The noble historian likewise asserts, that at her landing she wrote to Oxford, expressing apprehension on the subject of the treaty; and that the king's motive for desiring a prolongation of the treaty was, that she might have time to reach Oxford before its conclusion. But we have seen that he did not regard the first part of this promise as binding, in the sense commonly understood; and of the other (if it ever were made), the most rational and probable interpretation seems to be that of Lingard. "As far as I can judge," writes that historian," it only meant that whenever he made peace, he would put her forward as mediatrix; to the end that, since she had been calumniated as being the cause of the rupture between him and his people, she might also have, in the eyes of the public, the merit of effecting the reconciliation." The truth is, the wound had long become immedicable. The faults of both the leading parties in the nation- perhaps, the sins of the nation itself - demanded, at the hand of a corrective Providence, the excision of the "ulcerous part" by the sword; and peace was impossible till one of them had fallen. War was renewed amidst the mournful apprehensions of the good and wise, who clearly saw that, whichsoever side should now prevail, the liberty as well as the prosperity of the country must inevitably suffer. On the very day the commissioners returned to London, the Earl of Essex quitted it; and, rejoining his army, laid siege to Reading. CHAPTER X. HAMPDEN. Neither THE parliament passed the winter in devising schemes for raising money to carry on the war. The assessments were rigidly enforced; the estates of delinquents and the lands of the church were sequestered ; an excise was, for the first time in our country, imposed on a great number of commodities. these designs, nor their efforts to recruit the army, were for a moment relaxed during the negotiations at Oxford. The army of Essex, when he sat down before Reading on the 17th of April, was the finest that had yet been seen in this unhappy war. It consisted of about 16,000 foot and above 3000 horse, all well armed, and abundantly supplied with every thing necessary for a siege. Under the command of Sir Arthur Aston, there were few short of 4000 excellent troops; but he had very little ammunition; and the slight defences of the town were not capable of being long maintained against a powerful enemy. Essex resolved to reduce it by the cautious method of approach. The indefatigable Skippon, to whom the operations were committed, had already planted his batteries within less than musket-shot of the outworks, in doing which the besiegers succeeded in beating back the garrison in several sorties; when Hampden, whose influence in the army was now of nearly equal weight with the authority of the lordgeneral, impatient any longer to wait the issue of that dilatory procedure, determined to attempt the walls by assault. Advancing silently from the trenches with 400 picked men, seconded by Colonel Hurry, he passed the ditches in the grey twilight of the morning, and, mounting the rampart, seized upon the northernmost bastion. They met with a brave resistance, and were driven back. Hampden, calling forward his reserves, immediately placed himself at the head of a second attack; and, again struggling up the well-defended walls, renewed the fight. The governor had previously been disabled by a shot. Colonel Fielding, who had supplied his place, now brought forward the main strength of the garrison, and a bloody conflict ensued. Both leaders fought, hand to hand, on the ramparts, each at the head of his party. Overpowered by the numbers and determined valour of the royalists, Hampden was on the point of once more retiring, when Hurry, by a sudden movement, threw himself between the royalists and the town. The inhabitants, ill-affected to the royal cause, at once ceased firing; and, after a severe struggle, a parley was demanded by Fielding, and a truce followed. Meantime the king, who had no intention to retain - the permanent occupation of Reading, reluctantly advanced to its relief, with some divisions of his army hastily drawn together; designing only to force one of the besiegers' quarters, and withdraw the garrison. But Essex had drawn the principal strength of his army to the west side of the town, towards Oxford. On that side there was no pass, except over Caversham Bridge. To protect that place, a body of the parliamentary troops was posted; against which the king, understanding them to consist of only two regiments, the Lord Roberts and Colonel Berkeley's - detached two of his own, the green and the red, commanded by General Ruthen in person. The parliamentarians, however, were immediately supported by strong reinforcements. The skirmish that followed was sanguinary; and the royalist troops suffering severely, and perceiving no movement attempted from the town, retired, in the end, to their main body. In the night came Fielding to the king, and assured him that neither could he, on his part, hold out the town, nor would the small force which Charles had brought suffice to raise the siege; but that if the king agreed to his surrendering, good terms might be granted. Charles, who only desired to secure the safety of his troops, consented. The next morning, the town was given up on honourable conditions; the garrison joined the army at Wallingford; and the king once more retired to Oxford. Essex lingered in the neighbourhood of Reading. There his army was wasted with disease and desertion; and his counsels, at the same time, thwarted both by his great masters |