University of Virginia Library

1. CHAPTER I.

Shakspeare —Macbeth.

A YEAR had passed since Ardenne's landing on
his native shores, unfixed of purpose, and, above
all, an advocate for peace!—a year in which events
had taken place that rendered hopeless all accommodation
between the hostile parties, until one
should have been proved decidedly superior. The
very day on which the king had fled from London,
lest he should witness the return of the five members
to the house, having been signalized by a most
wild and ill-digested movement of the fiery Lunsford,
sufficiently disclosed the intentions of the royalists
in an attempt to seize a magazine of arms at
Kingston. Then came the treachery of Goring—
the king's fruitless effort against Hull—the calling
out of the militia—the arming on both sides—and
all the small guerrilla skirmishes that were occurring
daily for some months previous to the nominal
commencement of the war. The queen, who had
escaped to Holland, stealing and bearing with her
the crown jewels, which were pawned at once to
furnish arms, and men, and money, was setting

every spring in motion on the continent. Rupert
and Maurice had arrived in England, and the former
was, on his first interview, appointed general
of the cavalry. The royal standard had been
raised, some two months past, at Nottingham, with
evil omens, and under auspices the most unfavourable—a
mighty tempest having poured its fury on
the gathering of the troops, dispirited and few in
number, and unfurnished with the most evident
and indispensable equipments of an army—weapons,
and clothes, and ammunition. The flag itself,
displaying, in addition to the wonted quarterings of
England, a small escutcheon, charged with the royal
bearings and the crown, and compassed by a scroll,
with the proud motto, “Render his due to Cesar!”
was scarcely elevated ere a heavier gust of wind,
accompanied with floods of rain and a fierce crash
of thunder, shivered the staff in twain, and dashed
the ensign violently to the ground; while such was
the increasing fury of the tempest that two whole
days elapsed before it could be reared again. Still,
although by this overt act the king had most unquestionably
issued his appeal to the sword as to
the sole remaining arbiter, matters went on but
heartlessly and slowly. Each side, averse to
throw away the scabbard, paused in a grim and
terrible suspense, irreconcileably hostile to the
other, yet unwilling to incur the blame of being
first to strike, or foremost to refuse accommodation.
The royal forces, far too weak to court the
brunt of battle, aimlessly marched and countermarched,
levying contributions in this place, and
mustering volunteers in that; while the superior
party of the parliament, already strong enough to
have surprised and crushed the royalists at a single
blow, lay in their quarters, waiting, as it would
seem, till they should muster resolution to commence
hostilities. The truth, which has been
strangely overlooked by all historians of these turbulent
and most important times, was simply this
—that, in the outset of that fearful strife, there was
but little difference between the views, and hopes,
and fears of the most eminent and upright men of
either party. How it should ever have been fancied,
much less gravely argued, that the great body
of the English gentry and nobility were anxious to
subvert the constitution, which had been freed from
the arbitrary power of the Norman princes by the
sole efforts of their order, and to erect an absolute
and unchecked despotism, which must have necessarily
ruined their own caste, it is most difficult indeed
to comprehend or to conjecture. Nor is it
less absurd to hold that the more liberal peers,
who, neither few in number nor deficient in sagacity,
were enlisted on the people's side, were in the
least degree prepared to overthrow that ancient
monarchy from which they all derived their greatness,
and to descend at once from their exalted
grade to mere equality with their less elevated
countrymen. In simple fact, the leading men of
either party dreaded defeat or victory with a nearly
equal apprehension; knowing that such an overthrow
befalling either host, as should conclude the
other absolutely masters of the game, would be
most hopelessly destructive to the liberties of England.
It was then in this spirit that the counsellors
of Charles, scarcely more fearful of reverses which
should deliver them a prey to their stern foemen,
than of success which would inflame and aggravate
the monarch's native haughtiness, laboured, with all
their powers, to bring about some reconciliation;
but in vain, their every effort being frustrated by
the imbecile insincerity and double-dealing of their
principal! At length, when the last hopes were
quenched of peace unbought by victory, the fiery
Rupert, who, from the first, had been the open advocate
of instant battle, acting with indefatigable
and almost sleepless energy, collected horses, men,
and cannon from the northern and the midland counties,
until the royal army amounted to the number
of ten thousand—three foot brigades under Sir Jacob
Astley, and the Earl of Lindsey, an officer experienced
in the wars of the Low Countries—three
dragoon regiments, to act as horse or infantry as
need might be, under Sir Arthur Aston—Lord
Bernard Stuart commanding the king's guards, a
troupe dorée, composed entirely of gentlemen,
whose annual incomes are said to have exceeded
the united fortunes of all the members who, at the
outbreaking of the war, were voters in both houses
—a good park of artillery, under the trusty Sir John
Heydon—and the adventurous prince—himself a
host—leading the cavalry, consisting of the very
flower of the youthful gentry, practised in arms,
and high in chivalrous and daring spirit. Then,
early in October, having resolved to strike a blow,
and anxious to give battle to his enemies, the king
marched hastily from Shrewsbury upon the capital.
Meantime the Earl of Essex, who had been recently
appointed by the parliament their general-in-chief,
left the metropolis with an array some fifteen
thousand strong, more thoroughly equipped
and better armed than were the gentlemen of the
opposing host, but far inferior to them in that sustained
and burning spirit, which is of more avail
than tenfold numbers in the day of battle. The
earl's instructions were to tender to the king a joint
petition of the houses—beseeching him to leave the
gathering of malignants, whose ill counsels had so
far prevailed to alienate him from his loving subjects,
and to repair at once to the vicinity of his
most loyal parliament—and, in the case that this
petition should prove of none effect, to rescue him,
by force of arms, from the foul traitors who surrounded
and misled him. To this intent, he was
provided with all the requisites that constitute an
army—a heavy train of well-arranged artillery,
with ammunition and supplies of all kinds in profuse
abundance—a powerful brigade of horse, under
the Earl of Bedford and Sir William Balfour; and
a picked body of the London train-bands, well disciplined
and admirably well appointed! Among
the numerous nobles who accompanied the general
of the parliament, two, perhaps, merit an especial
notice—the young lords Rochford and Feilding—
as being destined soon to meet, as foemen in the
shock of battle, their own fathers, the earls of Dover
and of Denbigh, who were enrolled as volunteers
in the king's guard of horse! Many there
were, indeed, in this array, who yielded not in spirit
or in valour to the proudest cabalier of Charles!—
many who panted for the onset with all the patriotic
zeal of freemen trampled and oppressed—with
all the bitter and fanatic rancour of religious prejudice—and
these were more than matches for the
best of Rupert's soldiery!—but more were doubtful,
and reluctant, and affected by the cold and
backward spirit of their leaders, who felt, perhaps,
a secret apprehension that, in battling for the liberty
and constitution of their land, they might in some
degree be warring with the interests of their order.

Such was the aspect of affairs, and such the
state of parties, when, on a brilliant morning toward
the last days of October, a gallant regiment
of horse was winding through the deep green lanes
and devious woodlands of Northampton toward the
little town of Keinton, distant, perhaps, some twenty
miles, at which it was beginning to be understood

that Essex had established his headquarters. An
animating spectacle they formed, and lively, as
they gleamed out and disappeared among the lofty
hedges and dense coppices, still glorious in the
leafy garniture of variegated autumn, their polished
armour glinting back the cloudless sunshine in
long and dazzling flashes, their colours fluttering
in the cheerful breeze, their videttes warily surveying
every thicket, the matches of their arquebuses
ready kindled, and their extended lines sweeping
along the irregular wood-roads in serpentine and
wavy order—pausing at every brook or dell where
they might possibly be set upon at disadvantage,
until their advanced guard should fall back with
tidings that their path was unobstructed—and varying
their array from open file to solid column, as
the nature of the ground might dictate. The leader
of this splendid body was a fine-looking figure, in
the prime of life, well formed and stately, and far
above the ordinary height of men. He wore a
military coat of strong buff leather, garnished with
fringe of tawny silk three inches broad, and loops
of golden braid, partially covered by a breast-plate
and its corresponding back-piece, polished till
they shone bright as silver. He had no gorget,
but a rich cravat of Flanders lace, with long, transparent
ends, half veiling the clear steel on which it
fell. His dark curled hair flowed down his neck
beneath the rim of a steel cap or morion, exquisitely
damasked, but without crest or feather; his
hands were guarded by high gauntlets, and his
lower limbs by breeches of the same material, similarly
ornamented with his cassock, and strong jack-boots
that would have set a sabre-cut at naught.
His sword, a two-edged, basket-hilted rapier of uncommon
length, hung from an orange-coloured
scarf, betokening his adherence to the parliament
—its army having adopted for their badge that colour
from the ancient liveries of Essex, as the cavaliers
had assumed for their distinctive uniform
black feathers and blue shoulder-knots—although
the fashion of his garments and the general bearing
of the wearer were more in character with the demeanour
and the principles of their opponents, than
of those stern and gloomy fanatics who are so generally
and so erroneously believed to have composed
the great numerical strength of the liberal, or
—to speak more justly—constitutional party. The
animal he rode, a mare of splendid action, symmetry,
and size, was evidently a practised charger,
and accoutred, as became one, with demipique and
holsters, and all that goes to the equipment of a
war-horse. In these minutiæ, no less than in the
accurate array and perfect discipline of the tall,
hardy-looking youths who rode along behind him
in the strictest silence—in the condition and the
bitting of the horses—and, above all, in the cool
intelligence with which he listened to the varying
reports of his subordinates, the quick, decisive
firmness which made known, and the prompt energy
which carried out, his orders—might be discovered
at a glance the officer of many actions!—
the soldier on whose mind no lesson of experience
had been lost, until his very nature was no more
the same; that which was once an effort—once
the result of intricate and thoughtful calculation,
arising now from an intuitive foreknowledge, more
like the wondrous instinct of an animal than the
deep reasoning combinations of a man!

It lacked, perhaps, an hour of noon when this detachment,
having extricated itself, without so much
as hearing of an enemy, from the wide tracts of
woodland, portions of which may still be seen in
the adjacent counties of Huntingdon and Bedford,

had reached the summit of a considerable eminence;
which, falling away steeply toward the
west, commanded an extensive view over the velvet
pastures of Northampton, checkered with cornfields
and dark tracts of fallow—with many a whitewashed
cottage peering from out the foliage of its
orchards, and many a village steeple, with its mossy
graves and tufted yew-trees, and here and there
some castellated mansion, scarce seen amid its
shadowy plantations — stretching away till they
were bounded far to westward by the blue hills
of Warwickshire. Just on the brow of the declivity
there stood a large and isolated farm, with stabling
and outhouses sufficient to accommodate a
hundred head of cattle; upon the green before it
the leader of the party drew his bridle, and, after
a quick glance across the champaign at his feet,
and another toward the sun, which had already
passed its height, entering the dwelling, held short
consultation with the sturdy yeoman who possessed
the fertile acres. Before five minutes had elapsed
he issued from the lowly doorway, ordering his
party to dismount and pile their arms, and take
what brief refreshment the farmhouse might offer
during an hour's halt. A hasty bustle followed, as
down the troopers sprang with jingling spur and
scabbard, and merriment suppressed no longer by
the rigid discipline enforced upon the march—no
oaths, however, or profane and Godless clamours
were heard, disgracing equally the officers who tolerated
and the men who uttered them. Gayety
there was, and decent, sober mirth, but naught of
hoisterous, much less licentious revelling. Videttes
were stationed on commanding points, patrols
detailed—and then, the horses picketed and
well supplied with provender, fires were lighted,
and canteens produced with all their savoury
stores; and the men, stretched at length on the
smooth greensward, chatted and laughed as gayly
over their hurried meal as though they were engaged
in some exciting sylvan exercise, and not in
the tremendous toil of warfare. The hour allotted
for their stay had wellnigh passed—when, from
their farther outpost, a horseman galloped in,
bloody with spurring, and, driving through the scattered
groups, flung his rein heedlessly upon his
charger's neck, and turned him loose before the
door—while, with an air betokening the consciousness
of bearing high and stern intelligence, he hastened
to convey his tidings to his officer. There
needed not, however, words to tell the men that
danger was at hand! A moment's anxious gaze at
the vidette, and the jest ceased, the flagon was suspended
ere it reached the thirsty lip, the laugh was
not laughed out! Another moment, and the fires
were all deserted—the remnants of the meal laid
hastily aside—horses, recruited by their feed, were
bridled—swords buckled on, and helmets braced,
and firearms inspected; and, ere their leader came
again among them, in anxious conversation with
the messenger, they waited to mount only till the
ready trumpets should sound boot and saddle!

“Get you to horse!” he said—“get you to horse
as silently as may be! But spare your breath,”
he added, turning abruptly to the bugler, who was
already handling his instrument, “till it be needed
for a charge, which, an' we be so lucky as I deem
we are, it may be—and right early! Sir Edmund
Winthrop, have your men into line as speedily as
may be; but move not until farther signal! My
charger, Anderton — and let a sergeant's guard
mount instantly! I go to reconnoitre—a bugler
with the party. Soh! Steady, men, steady!”—and,
without farther pause, he leaped into his saddle

and, followed by the small detachment, galloped
at a fierce pace down the hill-side, rugged and broken
as it was, in company with the patrol who had
brought in the tidings. Close to the bottom of the
hill whereon the troops were halting there ran a
deep and hollow gorge, cutting across the road
which they had kept thus far directly at right angles,
and screened from observation on the upper
side by a long, straggling belt of furze and underwood,
with here and there a huge and weather-beaten
oak or glossy beech, forming the outskirts
of a heavy mass of forest that fringed, for several
miles in length, the extreme left of the level country
across which their line of march would lead
them. Through this gorge, as the sentinel reported,
a powerful force of cavalry was moving toward
the causeway at scarcely two miles distance; but
whether friends or foes he might not, as he said,
determine. Checking his charger at the junction
of the roads, the officer dismounted; and, taking
off his head-piece lest its glitter should betray him,
stole forward through the trees to a high sandstone
bluff commanding the whole gorge. From this he
instantly discovered the approaching troops, who
had so nearly come upon him unawares. There
were at least five hundred horse in view, all cuirassiers
completely cased in steel, escorting, as it
seemed, a strong brigade of field artillery. When
first they had been seen by the vidette, they were
emerging from the forest-land alluded to before,
and had attempted, as he said, a cross-road visible
from the hill-side; but it had proved so miry, as he
judged from the slow progress of the guns, that
they had countermarched, and were advancing
steadily, as now beheld, under the guidance of a
countryman who rode beside their leader, toward
the sandy gorge by which they evidently hoped to
gain the practicable road. Earnestly did the wary
partisan gaze on the glittering columns, searching
their movements, and examining their dress and
arms with eager scrutiny, and ever and anon
sweeping the country in their rear with an inquiring
glance, that seemingly expected father indications
from that quarter. But it was all in vain!
The regiment in view wore neither scarfs, nor any
badge that might inform him of their politics or
party—their colours were all furled around the
staves and cased in oil-skin—and all, from which
he might in anywise conjecture of whether host
they formed a portion, was the exact and veteran
discipline their movements indicated—far too exact,
as he supposed from the reports prevailing
through the country, for the tumultuary levies of
the Puritans. The hollow way on which they
were advancing opened, at a mile's distance, on the
plain, and it appeared that the new-comers were
about to enter it unthinking of surprise, and confident,
perhaps, in their own power. “If they be
foes, we have them!” cried the partisan. “Back,
Anderton, back to the regiment—ride for your life!
—tell Major Armstrong to lead down three troops—
dismounted, with their arquebuses ready, and their
matches lighted—beneath the cover of yon dingle
on the hill-side till he shall reach this gorge, then
line it with his musketry! Let Anstruther wheel,
with three more, about yon round-topped hillock—
in half an hour he may debouche upon the plain—
or sooner, if he hear our shot—and charge upon the
rear of yon horse-regiment—they will be in the
trap ere then! Sir Edmund Winthrop will lead
down the rest by the same road we came—I tarry
him! Away! Be swift and silent! Away! for
more than life is on your speed!” and, with the
word, the subaltern dashed furiously away, spurning
the pebbles high into the air at every bound,
and instantly was lost to sight behind the angle of
the sandy banks, while he who had commanded,
after another wistful gaze toward the approaching
squadron, returned with leisurely and quiet steps
to his good charger. With his own hands he drew
the girths more tight, looked to each strap and
buckle of his rein and stirrups, patted her arched
crest with a fleeting smile, and mounting, rode,
with half a dozen followers, sharply along the
gorge, as if to meet the strangers, who now seemed
disposed to pause upon the plain, and reconnoitre,
ere they should enter a defile so perilous and narrow.
Just at this moment—while a score or two
of troopers rode out from the advanced guard of
the horse, which had now halted, and warily dispersing
themselves among the broken ground, began
to beat the thickets with deliberate and jealous
scrutiny—a low, stern hum arose from the dark
corps of cuirassiers—increasing still and swelling
on the ear, till it was clearly audible for a full mile
around, a burst of deep-toned, manly voices—harsh
perhaps in themselves, and tuneless, but harmonized
by distance and the elastic atmosphere on which
they floated, till they were blended at least into
a solemn and melodious sound. Louder they rose,
and louder on the breeze, and now were answered
by a faint and dream-like echo from out the dim
aisles of the forest in their rear, among the leafy
screens of which the arms and standards of another
and another band might fitfully be seen to glitter.
It was the soul-inspiring crash of sacred music,
the peal of choral voices untaught and undirected,
save by the impulse of a thousand hearts attuned
to one high key of patriotic piety—unmixed with
instruments of wind or string—a deep, sonorous
diapason—the soldier's anthem to the God of battles
and the Lord of Hosts!

“Arise! arise!” the mighty sound went forth,
its every syllable distinctly audible to the excited
listener—

Scarce had the first sounds reached the leader's
ear, before he checked his mare abruptly—“Walters,”
he cried at once, “away with you, and overtake
him ere he gain the regiment! These be no
enemies, but friends! Let not a troop descend
from the hill-side—bid them await me, as they be,
in order! Spare not your spurs, nor fear to spoil
your horseflesh—we have no time to lose! I well
had deemed,” he added, muttering to himself, after
the orderly had galloped off with his commands—
`I well had deemed their rear was many a mile
advanced past this ere now. Pray Heaven that
Essex lack not men to hold the king in check, as
he is like to do, if that this news be sooth how he

hath gathered head toward Keinton and Edgehill!”
and, without farther words, he hastened down the
road, to be, as soon as he had cleared the first projection
of the broken banks, discovered by the reconnoitering
party in advance. A dozen carbines
were presented on the instant at a short range—
“Stand—ho!”

“Friends! friends!” he shouted, in reply, but
without altering his pace—“can you not see our
colours?” waving his orange scarf abroad, as he
closed with the foremost trooper.

“Stand, friend, then!—if that friend you be—
stand, friend, and give the word!” returned the
other, gruffly—“stand! or I do profess that I will
shoot—yea! shoot thee to the death!”

“How now, thou peevish knave,” replied the
officer, in high and ireful tones. “Recover instantly
thy carbine—marshal me straight unto the
leader of you horse! Who is he that commands
them?”

For a moment's space the grim parliamentarian
stubbornly gazed upon the features of the gallant
who addressed him, as if reluctant to obey his
mandate; but then a gleam of recognition flashed
across his sunburnt features—“I crave your pardon,”
he said, half abashed; “it is, an' I mistake
not, Lieutenant-colonel Ardenne, of the parliament's—”

“Lead on, then, sirrah! since thou knowest me,”
interrupted Edgar, shortly—“lead on, an' thou
wouldst not repent it—and tell me who commands
yon horse brigade!”

“Stout Colonel Cromwell,” answered the soldier,
more respectfully—“stout and courageous
Colonel Cromwell! He will, I do believe, rejoice
at this encounter. This way, good sir. Yonder
he sits on the black horse beside the standard,

awaiting our return. Lo you! he sees us, and the
files move onward!”

And he spoke truly; for, as the cavalry perceived
the videttes moving orderly and slowly
back, they filed off, troop succeeding troop, toward
the entrance of the lane, advancing on a gentle trot
in regular and beautiful array. As they passed
Ardenne, many a scrutinizing eye perused his figure
and equipments, and in most instances a sanctified
and solemn sneer disturbed the dark repose
of their grave features—called up, as it would
seem, by the rich dress and courtly air of the
young officer, which, in their wonted parlance,
were denounced as “fleshly lusts that war against
the soul,” devices of the Evil One, fringes, phylacteries,
and trappings of the beast. Nor, in meanwhile,
did Edgar turn a heedless or incurious glance
toward those with whom, discarding friends and
kindred, birthright, and rank, and chivalrous association
as things of small avail compared to the
great common weal, he had now cast his lot for
ever. The first emotion of his mind was deep
anxiety—the second wonder—and the third unqualified
and unmixed admiration. Never, he
thought, in Germany or France—never, among the
veteran legions of the Lion of the North, the Protestant
Gustavus, had he beheld superior discipline,
or men more soldier-like and promising. Mounted
on strong black chargers of full sixteen hands in
height, their furniture of the most simple kind, but
well designed and in the best condition—their iron
panoply, corslet, and helm, and taslets, stainless
and brilliant—and, above all, their bearing and
demeanour—their seats upon their horses, firm yet
easy—their muscular and well-developed limbs—
their countenances full of resolution, and breathing
all—despite the difference of individual character,

and the various operations of the same affection
on minds of different bias—a strange expression
of religious sentiment—solemn in some, and
stern, or even sullen—in others wild, fanatical, exalted,
and triumphant—yet in all more or less apparent,
as evidently forming the great spring and
motive of their action. Still, though attentive in
the first degree to the essential rules of military
discipline, keeping an accurate and well-dressed
front, and managing their heavy chargers with precision,
there was not any of that deep, respectful
silence among these military saints which Edgar
had been used to look for in the strictly-ordered
service of the Netherlands, and to esteem a requisite
of soldiership—but, on the contrary, as every
troop rode past him, there was a constant hum of
conversation, suppressed, indeed, and low, but still
distinctly audible; and he might mark the knotted
brows and clinched hands of the vehement disputers,
arguing—as it would seem from the decided
gestures, and the texts which he occasionally
caught lending an elevated savour to their homely
language, and, more than all, from the continual
appeal to the well-worn and greasy Bibles which
each of these stern controversialists bore at his girdle—on
questions of religious discipline or points
of abstruse doctrine. Although this mixture of the
soldier and religionist, this unduc, and, as it seemed
to him, irreverent blending of things good and holy
with the dreadful trade of blood, jarred painfully on
his correct and feeling mind, he could not but acknowledge
that this dark spirit of religious zeal,
this confidence in their own overweening righteousness,
this fixed, unwavering belief that they were
the elected and predestined instruments of the Most
High—“to execute,” as he could hear them cry
aloud, “vengeance upon the heathen and punishment
upon the people!—to bind their kings in
chains and their nobles in fetters of iron!” was indeed
a mighty and effective agent to oppose that
chivalrous, enthusiastic bravery, that loyal, self-devoting
valour which inflamed the highborn army of
the cavaliers to deeds of noble daring. Nor did he
entertain a doubt, when he perceived the extraordinary
person who commanded them, occupied himself
in preaching, or expounding rather, the mysterious
prophecies of the Old Testament—to which
especially the puritans inclined their ear—to an attentive
knot of officers, grouped, some upon their
horses, and yet more dismounted, around the regimental
standard, but that he had some reason far
more cogent than mere feelings of devotion for thus
encouraging a spirit so unusual in the breasts of his
stout followers. The colonel—for to such rank
had Cromwell recently been elevated, more even
in consideration of the powerful and trusty regiment
which he had levied from the freeholders and
yeomanry of Huntingdon by his own personal and
private influence, than of his services performed already,
not either few or inconsiderable, keeping the
cavaliers in check, surprising many of their leaders,
anticipating all their meditated risings, and cutting
off all convoys, whether of money or munitions,
throughout the counties of the Eastern Association—the
colonel, as he met the eye of Ardenne,
was seated on his powerful black war-horse,
bestriding him, as it would seem, with giant
strength, and perfect mastery of leg and hand, but
with an air wholly unmilitary and devoid of ease or
grace—sheathed nearly cap-a-piè in armour of
bright steel, heavy and exquisitely finished, but utterly
without relief or ornament of any kind. A
band or collar of plain linen, with a broad hem, fastened
about his short Herculean neck, varied alone
the stern simplicity of his attire; no feather waved
above his low and graceless casque—no shoulder-knot
or scarf bedecked his weapon, which was girt
about his middle by a belt of buff three inches at
the least in width, and balanced on the right side
by a formidable dudgeon and the brass-bound case
of the familiar Bible, which he now held extended
in his left hand, while with the finger of his right
he vehemently smote the open pages at each emphatic
pause of his discourse. His features showed
not now so sanguine or so kindled as when Ardenne
last beheld them; but, on the contrary, there
was a mild, half-veiled expression about the heavy
eye; and, though the lines were strong and marked
as ever, there was more of deliberate and quiet
resolution than of imperiousness denoted by the
firmness of his mouth. It was the countenance,
he thought, of a calm visionary, pensive and meditative
in his mood, and rather steady in the maintenance
of his own fixed opinions than zealous to
proscribe or controvert the fancies or the rights of
others. But he had little time for noting the expression,
changed as he fancied it to be, of his superior,
much less for marking the diverse features
of the martial auditors—for, as he drew nigh to
the spot whereon they stood, Cromwell had ended
his discourse, and, with a word or two of military
precept, was dismissing his attendants to their several
stations. Several dashed past him as he rode
up to the little eminence on which the colours were
erected, and but two were waiting near the colonel
when he reached him—one a bull-necked, coarse-featured,
and ungainly-looking person, with a gay
feather in his morion, a showy tassel on his rapier's
hilt, and a falling collar of some low-priced lace
hanging above his gorget—the other an erect and
well-made man, not past the prime of youth, with
features singularly noble and expressive, though of
an almost Spanish swarthiness, and tinctured with
a deep and melancholy gravity.

“Ha! Master Ardenne!” exclaimed Oliver, his
eye joyfully flashing as he recognised him—“right
glad am I to see you—not carnally, nor with a
worldly-minded and a selfish pleasure, but in that
there will be work to do anon, in which the righteous
cause shall need all arms of its supporters!
Have you a power at hand?—where be they?—in
what force?—not travel-worn, I trust me!”

“Three hundred horse,” Edgar replied, “on the
height yonder—but for those trees you might behold
them where we stand! I left them but just
now, to reconnoitre your advance, under Sir Edmund
Winthrop, my lieutenant.”

“Good! good!” cried Cromwell, eagerly; “and
how far have you marched to-day—be your men
travel-toiled—your steeds leg-weary?—for verily
we have a march before us.”

“We have but travelled six brief miles this fore-noon,
and barely sixteen yesterday—my men are
in right spirits, and my horses fresh! I could accomplish
twenty miles ere nightfall, and that without
fatigue!”

“Surely the Lord is gracious,” was the answer
—“and of his grace, too, shall we right soon make
trial. My Lord of Essex hath, ere now, his post
at Keinton—and the man Charles of Stuart hath
at length mustered head to face him. 'Tis marvel
that they be not at it even now. I fear me the
lord general shall lack both horse and cannon; but
we have marched already a sore distance with our
ponderous guns and heavy armature, nor may I
now adventure to press on more hastily without
dispersing my command. Ride with me to your
regiment, good sir; I trow you were best speedily

move forward. Keinton is barely twelve miles
distant, and the roads, they tell me, sound and passable;”
and, as he spoke, touching his charger
lightly with the spur, he broke into a managed canter.
“Cornet, advance your colours,” he exclaimed,
in short, keen accents, strangely at variance
with the monotonous and inexpressive tones
of his discourse when unexcited—“sound kettledrums,
and march!” and, riding briskly forward,
easily passed the troops while filing through the
lane. “Halt them here, Ireton,” he said to the
dark-favoured officer who had accompanied him, as
he turned into the main road, having outstripped
the forces—“halt them in column here, within
the lane, till I return—and, Desborough, do thou
ride back to Hampden's regiment of foot—it is a
mile or so in the rear—and bid him bring it up as
rapidly as may be. Now, Master Ardenne, I attend
you!”

As they rode up to Edgar's quarters, Cromwell
informed him briefly, and with none of those prolix
and verbose sentences with which he was at times
accustomed to confuse the senses of his hearers,
that he, as senior officer, and therefore in command
of the brigade forming Lord Essex's rear
guard, was marching up, at his best pace, with his
own trusty cavalry, and two—the stoutest—of the
parliament's foot-regiments, besides a strong division
of field-guns—that, by want of intelligence, the
general—as he had learned himself but yesterday
—was hastening right upon the king, and, he was
fearful, would fall, unawares and unprepared for
battle, upon his very outposts! “These tidings I
received of a sure hand,” he added, “though whence
it needeth not to advertise you. Whom the Lord
listeth to enlighten, surely at his own time shall he
inform him. But so it is—and it may be that Essex

knoweth not his peril! Wherefore I pray you
—ha! be these your men? I do profess to you I
hold them stout and soldierly—not like the drunken
tapsters and vile turncoat serving-men who—fy on
it! that I should say so—do compose the bulk of
our array! Truly these fellows shall do credit to
the cause—so that the spirit—the right leaven be
toward—and the Lord strike on our side! Wherefore
I pray you lead them, as swiftly as you find
consist with order, upon Keinton. If that they
have not yet joined battle, say thus to the lord general,
that I beseech him hold off from them so long
as he may; I shall be with him by nine of tomorrow's
clock. Ha! heard you nothing?” he
broke off abruptly, as a deep, distant sound rolled
heavily upon the air; and, before Ardenne might
reply the sullen rumbling was again repeated, like
the faint muttering of a rising thunder-storm, or
the premonitory growling of an earthquake. “It
was not thunder!” answered Edgar, in the voice of
one asserting rather than questioning; “there are
no clouds aloft, nor yet on the horizon!”

“Ordnance!” exclaimed the other—“ordnance,
and heavier, too, than ours! Listen, now listen!”
And again the heavy rolling sound came surging
down the wind, which freshened slightly from the
westward—again it came after a momentary pause,
yet loader than before, and more distinct; and then
continued without interval the deep, unquestionable
voice of a hot cannonade.

“Away, sir—God go with you!” cried the stern
puritan, excited now beyond the bounds of self-restraint
“Tarry not on the way, nor loiter! Gird
up your loins, I say. Ride on! ride on, and conquer!
Verily, but that it is the Lord's own doing,
verily, Edgar Ardenne, I would have envied thee

thy fortune. Ride on—thou shalt be yet in time
—ride on—amen! Selah!”

While he yet spoke, the officers and men, stirred
up already by the near sound of battle, and almost
maddened with excitement by the exulting and prophetic
cries of Cromwell, were vying with each
other, these to give forth, those to obey, and almost
to anticipate, the needful orders—and, as he uttered
the last words at the full pitch of his piercing voice,
the trumpets rang a wild and thrilling flourish—the
squadron, with a single shout, unbidden and unanimous,
that spoke the burning feelings of the troopers,
swept on at a hard trot; and, in an instant, not
a sound was to be heard save the thick-beating
clatter of the hoofs, mixed with the clang of spur
and scabbard, and now and then a boom of the
deep kettle-drum timing the pace of the advance.

Onward! onward they hurried at the utmost
speed which prudence would admit, which nothing
but the admirable quality and high condition of
their chargers enabled them to prosecute. Mile
after mile was passed, and still the dull and awful
roar—the knell of many a gallant spirit—waxed
clearer and more clear. Having accomplished
seven miles within the hour, they halted for ten
minutes in a small hamlet to water and to breathe
their horses; and there—when the confused and
constant noise of their own rapid march was silent
—they might distinguish the first sharp explosion
of the leading gun in every rolling volley—and ever
and anon, between the deep-mouthed cannon, the
grinding rattle of the musketry was audible, though
faintly. Onward! onward again, and, ere another
hour elapsed, Ardenne had marked the clouds of
smoke surging and eddying above the distant hills.
The squadron cleared the verge of a low eminence;
a gentle valley slept below them in the still misty radiance

of a rich autumnal sunset; a tranquil stream
wound through it, crossed by a lofty one-arched
bridge—built, as was evident from the bright ripples
of the ford beside it, merely for use in times
of wintry flood—and to the left, at a short mile
above the bridge, nestled the white washed cottages
of a neat country village. The ridge which bounded
this fair dale toward the west, though cultivated
at the base, and checkered with dark woods and
golden stubbles, lay bare toward the rounded summits
in unenclosed and open sheep-walks. Above
these summits the volumed smoke rose white as
fleeces of the purest wool, and scarce less solid to
the eye, relieving every object on the brow as
plainly as though it had stood out against a clear
horizon; while all the mingled din of battle rolled
up, a near and fearful contrast to the sweet peace
of that secluded spot. Just as they gained a fair
view of the valley and the heights beyond, a single
figure crossed the opposite swell, dark and distinctly
seen; a horseman on a furious gallop! As he
descended, a slant sunbeam glanced upon his iron
headpiece—he was a trooper—flying! Another
rushed across the ridge—another, and another—a
confused and panic-stricken group. “Forward!—
secure the passage of the stream! Forward! ho!
forword!” and at a yet more rapid pace they
plunged down the descent; they reached the
causeway of the bridge—they lined the banks with
their arquebusiers, and waited the arrival of the fugitives.
On came the first, urging his jaded steed,
but urging him in vain; his sword was gone—his
holsters empty—his buff-coat soiled and splashed
with many a miry stain. His spurs alone were
bloody! Long ere he reached the bridge Ardenne's
quick eye had caught the orange scarf, and
he rode forth alone to meet him. At first the fugitive
drew up his horse as though he would have
turned, but a fresh roar of cannon from behind decided
him. “All's lost! all's lost!” he cried—
“all's lost! Fly! fly! Rupert is close behind!”

“Silence, for shame!” shouted the partisan—
“coward and slave, be silent, or I cleave thee to
the earth! If all be lost, why rages you hot cannonade!
How far from this to the field?”

“A short three miles,” replied the other, trembling,
and fearful no less of new acquaintance than
of the foes he fled. Meanwhile on came the rest
—all panic-stricken, travel-soiled, and weaponless;
but not one man was wounded.

“The cowards!” Edgar muttered, as if carelessly,
when he rejoined his men, fearful lest they
might be disheartened—“the vile, dastard hounds!
that fled without blow stricken or blood drawn!
But that 'twere loss of time, I would draw out a
file for execution. We will advance, and win more
casily, that none are left to cumber us with heartless
counsels! Fly on, ye dogs,” he cried, more
loudly, as he wheeled his men once more into their
column—“fly on, and pray the while ye fly that ye
meet not with Cromwell on your route, else shall
ye but repent that the cavaliers made not an end of
ye before your race began; for, an' I know him,
he will cut it right short with a halter or a volley!”
And, with a scornful laugh, he cantered on, eager
to gain the vantage of the hill, and seeing at a
glance that no more runaways poured over it. “It
cannot be,” he said to his lieutenant—“it cannot
be the day goes utterly against us, else how should
these have fled three miles from the encounter, and
still the firing on both sides continue—continue,
said I—nay, but it waxes warmer!”

They reached the summit of the ridge, and at
first sight Edgar indeed believed that all was over-A

long broad valley lay outstretched beneath him,
that might almost be called a plain—the foreground
scattered thick with groups of roundheads, flying
—here singly, here in bodies—to the south, toward
the town of Keinton, in a line nearly parallel to the
range of heights on which he stood; while in the
middle distance he might see a torrent of dispersed
pursuing cavalry, with flaunting plumes and fluttering
scarfs, swords brandished to the sun, and
pistol-shots all redly flashing out through the dense
smoke, as unrelentingly they urged the massacre.
But, as he looked more steadfastly upon the scene,
he could distinguish, at some two or three miles'
distance toward the northern verge of the unbroken
valley, two dark, uninterrupted lines, whence rose
the smoke and burst the vivid flashes of artillery
with undiminished vigour—he could discern, between
the cloudy screens, the wavering and wheeling
masses that still waged the balanced fight, and
he could hear the rattling volleys of the musketry
sharp and incessant. “'Tis but our cavalry,” he
said—“'tis but our cavalry that fly, and their horse-general
has lost a golden opportunity; had he but
wheeled upon our flank when the dog-troopers fled,
he might have gained the battle! But it is now
too late, and, an' he look not out the sharper, we
may yet give him a rebuff he dreams not of. Sound
trumpets—ha! sound merrily a rally and a charge!
Advance, brave hearts, we will redeem the day.
For lo!” he added, with rare tact, as he perceived
the royal horse relaxing their pursuit, and heard
their bugles winding a recall—“for lo! they have
perceived us, and retreat already!”

And down the slope he moved in admirable order,
interposing a small wood between his force and the
retiring cavalry of the victorious royalists—whom,
notwithstanding his most politic vaunt, he little

wished at that time to encounter. Just ere he sank
upon the level ground he carefully reviewed the
scene before him, and was even more convinced
than ever that the battle was indeed still undetermined—and,
farther yet, that the royalist horse
were at the last aware of their mistake in urging
the pursuit too far; for he might see them straining
every nerve now to repair their error, as they
swept back toward the left-hand rear of the contending
parties, leaving thereby the access to the
right wing of Lord Essex, whom Ardenne justly
deemed to lie between himself and the king's forces,
easy and unobstructed. Instantly he perceived,
and profited as instantly by this advantage; marching
at a sharp trot across the field strewed with the
mangled carcasses of those who, by their dastard
flight, had lost the wretched lives they sacrificed
their honour to preserve, and forfeited all claim to
that precarious boon, a soldier's pity. Once on the
level ground, he could discover nothing farther, and
the suspense was fearful; and now the cannonading
ceased—the musketry fell thicker and more constant—then
that ceased likewise, and was followed
by the faintly-heard hurrah of charging horse, and
the wild chorus of a psalm. “The day is ours,”
he shouted, as he recognised the sounds—“on!
on! to share the glory!” Faster they hurried, and
but little time elapsed ere he brought up his squadron,
without the slightest opposition, or indeed notice,
on the king's part, to the extreme right of the
position occupied in the commencement of the action
by the army of the parliament. The moment
was indeed most critical, and Edgar could not but
perceive, as, having left his squadron for the moment
in command of his lieutenant, he rode up and
reported to the general, that his arrival was deemed
singularly opportune. Never, perhaps, had been a
field more nearly lost—never a victory more madly
cast away—never a battle poised more equally.
The base desertion of Sir Faithful Fortescue, the
terror-stricken flight of Waller's horse on the left
wing before the fiery charge of Rupert, and the
defeat of the right wing by Wilmot and Sir Arthur
Aston, had left both flanks of the parlimentarians
utterly naked and unguarded; so that a single
charge by either of the royalist commanders upon
the flank or rear which they had turned, must
have annihilated all of their array which yet stood
firm—the foot under the earl in person, and a reserve
of horse under Sir William Balfour. But
with that desperate and selfish fury which neutralized,
in every instance, the effects of his undaunted
valour, Rupert drove past the left, as Wilmot passed
the right, of Essex, trampling and cutting down
their unresisting countrymen for several miles' distance
from the field, the former suffering his men
to sack the town of Keinton, and to disperse among
the baggage of the enemy; while his desertion had
not only robbed the king of all his hopes of victory,
but actually placed him in a more evil plight, and
peril far more imminent, than had defeat the foe.
For Balfour, with his squadron of reserve, seeing
the plain entirely clear of horse, had charged the
royal foot with such a steadiness of persevering
courage, that he had cut the Earl of Lindsay's
regiment to pieces, taking that nobleman, with
his brave son Lord Willoughby, both desperately
wounded, prisoners—winning the king's own standard—throwing
the centre into perilous confusion
—and hewing his way almost to the person of the
monarch. Just at this moment, when a bold advance
of his whole line must have completed the
king's ruin, Lord Essex was compelled, by Rupert's
reappearance on his left with his fast rallying
cavalry—who, though in disarray, and tired both
horse and man, were flushed with their success and
high in spirit—to recall Balfour to make head
against him; and that bold leader's trumpets were
calling off his troopers from their half-achieved success
when Ardenne reached the field, and was directed
instantly to move his fresh men forward to protect
the left wing of the infantry till Balfour should
draw off and relieve him. His troops, though new
to service, were admirably disciplined and full of
daring confidence in their tried leader; and with
such promptitude and regularity did they manœuvre
and deploy in face of a superior body, that he
almost regretted that there was no better opportunity
to prove their mettle and to flesh their maiden
swords. His duty quietly performed, and the reserve
of Balfour being reformed in haste and fronting
Rupert, he was commanded once again to occupy
his first position on the right; and now instinctively
he saw that either army might be
deemed half conquered—that a single charge—
nay, but a single demonstration—would suffice to
win an absolute and undisputed victory. Each
host was spiritless and disarrayed—the leaders on
each side confused and doubtful—the troops exhausted,
slack, and heartless. Vainly he prayed
the general-in-chief to suffer him to risk his single
regiment in but one charge on Rupert's half-collected
squadrons; pointing out to him clearly, but
without effect, the strong presumption that his fresh
men and vigorous horses must sweep away, like
dust, the cavaliers, worn out with the lassitude for
ever consequent on over-fierce excitement, and
troubled farther at finding themselves assailed from
having of late been assailants—and the certainty
that, if such should be the case, undoubted conquest
must ensue. The earl was cold and dubious.
“We may not hope,” he said—“we may not
hope for victory to-night. It is a mercy from on
high—I had right nearly said a miracle—that we
stand here as now, at vantage, holding the better
of a doubtful day! An hour ago methought that
all was lost. Moreover, it has gone tenfold more
fatally with them than us. We have lost privates
—men neither high of heart nor strong of hand,
much less of eminence or wisdom—they the first
flowers of England. Oh! I could wellnigh weep,
but that 'twere treason to our cause, for the pure
blood that has been shed like water—Lindsay, and
Aubigney, and Stewart, and Edmund Verney, the
bravest and the best of the array, all lost—all lost
in this accursed quarrel! Two more such fields
as this were fatal to the king, while ten such would
but leave us, at the worst, where now we are!”
Slowly and unconvinced Edgar rode back to his
command; and as he watched the movements of
the enemy, now holding the precise position they
had occupied three hours before, whatever doubt he
might have entertained till then vanished at once—
for he beheld the hapless Charles—armed as becomes
a king to battle for his crown, all steel from
spur to helinet, a mantle of black velvet, with the
star and George of diamonds, floating above his armour—reining
his snow-white charger gallantly
among his wavering lines, beseeching them “once
more,” with energetic gestures—“once more to
charge the rebels!”—and he beheld the faint and
false-hearted denial; for not by any prayer or
promise could those to whom he spoke with words
of fire be wrought upon a second time to dare the
onset.

Meanwhile the sun set gloomily in a dense bank
of clouds—the night, “that common friend to wearied
and dismantled armies,” sank darkly down

upon the plain so thickly set with sights and sounds
of agony and horror that it was but one mighty
charnel-house; and the two hosts, each on the
ground whereon they fought, slept anxious and uneasy
on their arms—uncertain of their present
safety, and unresolved of their proceedings for the
morrow.