The Lions Whelp 53

The Lions Whelp 53

One hundred and sixty years after Blake’s punishment, England and

America united to finally put an end to the pirates of the

Mediterranean.

 

 

In the meantime Spain was helping Charles with money which was spent in

plots to assassinate the Protector. The effect of this underhand,

contemptible warfare was several petitions and addresses offered in

Parliament begging Cromwell to assume the ancient office of King, if

only for the settlement of the nation. He was quite strong enough to

have taken it, and there was nothing unmanly either in his desire for

the crown or in his refusal of it. His conscience, not his reason,

decided the question. He waited many a long, anxious night on his knees

for some sign or token of God’s approbation of the kingship, but it did

not come; and Cromwell was never greater than when, steadily, and with

dignity, he put the glittering bauble aside—"Because for it, he would

not lose a friend, or even a servant." He told the Parliamentary

committee offering him the title that he "held it as a feather in a

man’s cap;" then burst into an inspired strain, and quoting Luther’s

psalm, "that rare psalm for a Christian," he added, "if Pope and

Spaniard and devil set themselves against us, yet the Lord of Hosts is

with us, and the God of Jacob is our refuge." One thing he knew well,

that the title of King would take all meaning out of the Puritan

revolution, and he could not so break with his own past, with his own

spiritual life, and with the godly men who had so faithfully followed

and so fully trusted him.

 

Why should he fret himself about a mere word? All real power was in his

hands: the army and the navy, the churches and the universities, the

reform and administration of the law, the government of Scotland and of

Ireland. Abroad, the war with all its details, the alliance with Sweden,

with France, with the Protestant princes of Germany, the Protestant

Protectorate extending as far as Transylvania, the "planting" of the

West Indies, the settlement of the American Colonies, and their defense

against their rivals, the French,—all these subjects were Cromwell’s

daily cares. He was responsible for everything, and his burden would

have been lightened, if he could have conscientiously taken on him the

"divinity which doth hedge a king." The English people love what they

know, and they knew nothing of an armed Protector making laws by

ordinance, and disposing of events by rules not followed by their

ancestors. But Oliver knew that he would cross Destiny if he made

himself King, and that this "crossing" always means crucifixion of some

kind.

 

"To be a king is not in my commission," he said to Doctor Verity. "It

squares not with my call or my conscience. I will not fadge with the

question again; no, not for an hour."

 

The commercial and national glory of England at this time were, however,

in a manner incidental to Oliver’s great object—the Protection of

Protestantism. This object was the apple of his eye, the profoundest

desire of his soul. He would have put himself at the head of all the

Protestants in Europe, if he could have united them; failing in this

effort, he vowed himself to cripple the evil authority of Rome and the

bloody hands of Inquisitorial Spain. His sincerity is beyond all doubt;

even Lingard, the Roman Catholic historian, says, "Dissembling in

religion is contradicted by the uniform tenor of his life." He wrote to

Blake that, "The Lord had a controversy with the Romish Babylon, of

which Spain is the under-propper;" and he made it his great business to

keep guard over Protestants, and to put it out of the power of princes

to persecute them. It is easy to say such a Protestant league was

behind the age. It was not. Had it been secured, the persecutions of

the Huguenots would not have taken place, and the history of those

hapless martyrs—still, after the lapse of two hundred years, read with

shuddering indignation—would have been very different. Cromwell knew

well what Popery had done to Brandeburg and Denmark, and what a

wilderness it had made of Protestant Germany, and his conception of duty

as Protector of all Protestants was at least a noble one. Nor was it

ineffective. On the very day he should have signed a treaty of alliance

with France against Spain, he heard of the unspeakably cruel massacre of

the Vandois Protestants. He threw the treaty passionately aside, and

refused to negotiate further until Louis and Mazarin put a stop to the

brutalities of the Duke of Savoy. As the details were told him, he

wept; and all England wept with him. Not since the appalling massacre

of Protestants in Ireland, had the country been so moved and so

indignant. Cromwell instantly gave two thousand pounds for the

sufferers who had escaped, and one hundred and forty thousand pounds was

collected in England for the same purpose. It was during the sorrowful

excitement of this time that Milton—now blind—wrote his magnificent

Sonnet,

 

"Avenge, O Lord, Thy slaughtered saints, whose bones

Lie scattered on the Alpine Mountains cold."

 

Furthermore, it was in Milton’s luminous, majestic Latin prose that

Cromwell sent his demands to King Louis for these poor, pious

peasants,—demands not disregarded, for all that could be found alive

were returned to their desolated homes.

 

For the persecuted Jews his efforts were not as successful. They had

been banished from England in A.D. 1290, but three hundred and

sixty-five years of obstinate prejudice had not exhausted Christian

bigotry. Cromwell made a noble speech in favour of their return to

England, but the learned divines and lawyers came forward to "plead and

conclude" against their admission, and Cromwell, seeing no legal

sanction was possible, let the matter drop for a time. Yet his favour

towards the Jews was so distinct that a company of Oriental Jewish

priests came to England to investigate the Protector’s genealogy, hoping

to find in him "the Lion of the tribe of Judah."

 

So these three years were full of glory and romance, and the poorest

family in England lived through an epic of such national grandeur as few

generations have witnessed. Yet, amid it all, the simple domestic lives

of men and women went calmly on, and birth, marriage, and death made

rich or barren their homes. Jane Swaffham attained in their progress to

a serene content she had once thought impossible. But God has appointed

Time to console the greatest afflictions, and she had long been able to

think of Cluny—not as lying in a bloody grave, but as one of the Sons of

God among the Hosts of Heaven. And this consolation accepted, she had

begun to study Latin and mathematics with Doctor Verity, and to give her

love and her service to all whom she could pleasure or help. Indeed,

she had almost lived with the Ladies Mary and Frances Cromwell, who had

passed through much annoyance and suffering concerning their love

affairs. But these were now happily settled, Lady Mary having married

Viscount Fanconburg, and Lady Frances the lover for whom she had so

stubbornly held out—Mr. Rich, the grandson of the Earl of Warwick.

 

Matilda’s life during this interval had been cramped and saddened by the

inheritance from her previous years. Really loving Cymlin, she could not

disentangle the many threads binding her to the old unfortunate passion,

for, having become wealthy, the Stuarts would not resign their claim

upon her. Never had they needed money more; and most of their old

friends had been denuded, or worn out with the never-ceasing demands on

their affection. Thus she was compelled, often against her will, to be

aware of plots for the assassination of Cromwell—plots which shocked her

moral sense, and which generally seemed to her intelligence exceedingly

foolish and useless. These things made her restless and unhappy, for she

could not but contrast the splendour of the Protector’s character and

government with the selfishness, meanness and incapacity of the Stuarts.

 

She loved Cymlin, but she feared to marry him. She feared the

reproaches of Rupert, who, though he made no effort to consummate their

long engagement, was furiously indignant if she spoke of ending it.

Then, also, she had fears connected with Cymlin. When very young, he

had begun to save money in order to make himself a possible suitor for

Matilda’s hand. His whole career in the army had looked steadily to

this end. In the Irish campaign he had been exceedingly fortunate; he

had bought and sold estates, and exchanged prisoners for specie, and in

other ways so manipulated his chances that in every case they had left

behind a golden residuum. This money had been again invested in English

ventures, and in all cases he had been signally fortunate. Jane had

told Matilda two years previously that Cymlin was richer than his

father, and she might have said more than this and been within the

truth.

 

But in this rapid accumulation of wealth, Cymlin had developed the love

of wealth. He was ever on the alert for financial opportunities, and,

though generous wherever Matilda was concerned, not to be trifled with

if his interests were in danger. So Matilda knew that if she would

carry out her intention of making over de Wick house and land to

Stephen, it must be done before she married Cymlin. Yet if she

surrendered it to Stephen under present circumstances, everything would

go, in some way or other, to the needy, beggarly Stuart Court. If

Cromwell were only out of the way! If King Charles were only on the

throne! he would have all England to tax and tithe, and Stephen would

not need to give away the home and lands of his forefathers.

 

She was fretfully thinking over this dilemma in its relation to a new

plot against Cromwell’s life, when Jane Swaffham visited her one morning

in February of 1658. Jane’s smiling serenity aggravated her restless

temper. "Does nothing on earth ever give you an unhappy thought, Jane?"

she asked. "You look as if you dwelt in Paradise."

 

"Indeed, I am very unhappy this morning, Matilda. Mr. Rich is thought to

be dying."

 

"And, pray heaven, _who is_ Mr. Rich?"

 

"You know who Mr. Rich is, perfectly. Why do you ask such a foolish

question? Lady Frances is broken-hearted. I am going now to Whitehall.

The Cromwells are in the greatest distress."

 

"On my word, they have kept others in the greatest distress for many

years! I am not sorry for them."

 

"I only called to tell you there is another plot."

 

"I have nothing to do with it."

 

"Some one you know may be in danger."

 

"Stephen is at Cologne. If you are thinking of Stephen, thank you. I

will write and tell him to keep good hope in his heart, that Jane

Swaffham remembers him."

 

"Dear Matilda, do not make a mock of my kindness. The Protector’s

patience is worn out with this foolish animosity. He is generous and

merciful to no purpose. I myself think it is high time he ceased to

warn, and begin to punish. And poor Lady Rich! It would grieve you to

the heart to see her despair. She has only been three months married,

and it was such a true love match."

 

"Indeed it was a very ’good’ match, love match or not. Frances Cromwell

to be Countess of Warwick. Faith, ’tis most easy to fall in love with

that state!"

 

"She might have chosen far greater state; you know it, Matilda. She was

sought by Charles Stuart, and by the Duke Enghien, and the Duke of

Buckingham, and by the Protector’s ward, William Dutton, the richest

young man in England; but for love of Mr. Rich, and in spite of her

father’s long opposition, she would marry no one else."

 

"Mr. Rich was good enough for her, surely!"

 

"Her father did not think so. There were reports of his drinking and

gaming."

 

"And the Puritan Dove must not, of course, marry a man who threw dice or

drained a glass. Those are the works of the profane and wicked

malignants. However was the marriage made at all?"

 

"You know all about it, Matilda. What is the use of pretending ignorance?"