There was no time to spare. The Lord General, dressed in a rich suit of black velvet, appeared, and the procession was formed. The Commissioners of the Great Seal, the Judges and Barons of the Exchequer in all the splendour of their insignia, preceded it. Then came the Council of State and the Lord Mayor and Aldermen in their scarlet robes. Cromwell followed. He was alone in a magnificent coach with outriders, but he was attended by the chief officers of the army, and by an imposing military escort. His family and friends in conveyances of equal splendour were behind, and were also attended by a military guard of honour.
"Is it a dream, Jane?" said Mrs. Swaffham to her daughter. "Am I asleep or awake? Are these the very Cromwells we used to know? Did you see that little chit, Frank, whom I have birched and stood in the corner, and scolded more times than I can remember?—did you see her? Did you see her curtsying to her mother and calling her, 'Your Highness'? and Mary Cromwell giving orders like a very Queen? and even Elizabeth Claypole looking as if England belonged to them? After this, Jane, nothing can astonish me."
Jane was as silent as her mother was garrulous; the crowds, the excitement, the poignant crash and blare of martial music, the shining and clashing of steel, the waving of flags, the shouts and huzzas of the multitudes, the ringing of innumerable bells, the overpowering sense of the brotherhood of humanity in a mass animated by the same feeling, these things thrilled and filled souls until they were without words, or else foolishly eloquent.
A place of honour had been reserved for the Cromwell party, and the great General's mother found a throne-like chair placed for her in such a position that she could see every movement and hear every word of that august ceremony which was to acknowledge her son "the greatest man in England." And as she sat there, watching him stand uncovered beside the Chair of State, and listened to him taking the solemn oath to rule England, Scotland and Ireland justly, she thought of this battle-scarred man as a baby at her breast, fifty-four years before, pressing her bosom with his tiny fingers, and smiling up in her face, happily unconscious of the travail of body and soul he was to undergo for the sake of England, and of all future free peoples. And she thought also of one cold winter day, when, a lad of twelve, he had come in from his lessons and his rough play at football and thrown himself upon his bed, weary with the buffeting; and as he lay there, wide-awake in the broad daylight, how he had seen his angel stand at his feet, and heard him say, "Thou shalt be the greatest man in England." And there in her sight and hearing, the prophecy was fulfilled that day, for she had never doubted it. The boy had been scolded and flogged for persisting in this story, but she had comforted him and always known that it was a vision to be realised.
Her faith had its reward. She watched this boy of hers put on his hat, after taking the oath, and with a kingly air ascend to what was virtually the throne of England. She saw him unbuckle his sword and put it off, to signify that military rule was ended; and then she heard, amid the blare of trumpets, the Heralds proclaim him Lord Protector of England, Scotland and Ireland. Her lips moved not, but she heard her soul singing psalms of glory and thanksgiving; yes, she heard the music within rising and swelling to great anthems of rejoicing. Her body was impotent to express this wonderful joy; it was her soul that made her boast in the Lord, that magnified the God of her salvation. And she really heard its glad music with her natural body, and the melody of that everlasting chime was in her heart to the last moment of her life. And her children looked at her and were amazed, for her face was changed; and when the people shouted, to "God save the Lord Protector of the Commonwealth!" she stood up without her staff, and was the first to render him obeisance.
Jane watched her with wonder and delight; she forgot her own grief in this aged mother's surpassing happiness, and she partly understood that hour the new doctrine of the men called Quakers. For she had watched this Inner sight of Life transfuse the frail frame, and seen it illuminate the withered face and strengthen the trembling limbs, and, above all, fill the Inner woman with a joy unspeakable and beyond speech or understanding.
The ride back to Whitehall was an intoxicating one. Londoners had at last a ruler who was a supremely able man. They could go to their shops, and buy and sell in security. Oliver Protector would see to their rights and their welfare. His very appearance was satisfying; he was not a young man headstrong and reckless, but a Protector who had been tried on the battle-field and in the Council Chamber and never found wanting. His personality also was the visible presentment of the qualities they admired and desired. They looked at his sturdy British growth, and were satisfied. His head and face, muscular and massive, were of lion-like aspect; his stature nearly six feet, and so highly vitalised as to look much higher. Dark brown hair, mingled with gray, fell below his collar-band, and from under large brows his deep, loving eyes looked as if in lifelong sorrow; and yet not thinking life sorrow, thinking it only labour and endeavour. Valour, devout intelligence, great simplicity, and a singular air of mysticism invested his rugged, broad-hatted majesty with a character or impress transcendentally mysterious. Even his enemies felt this vague shadow of the supernatural over and around him, for Sir Richard Huddleston, in watching him on Naseby's field, had cried out passionately, "Who will find King Charles a leader like him? He is not a man; he is one of the ancient heroes come out of Valhalla."
But be the day glad or sad, time runs through it, and the shadows of evening found the whole city worn out with their own emotions. Mrs. Swaffham and Jane were glad to return to the quiet of their home—"Not but what we have had a great day, Jane," said the elder woman; "but, dear me, child, what a waste of life it is! I feel ten years older. It would not do to spend one's self this way very often."
"I am tired to death, mother. May I stay in my room this evening? I do not want to hear any more about the Cromwells, and I dare say Doctor Verity will come home with father, and they will talk of nothing else."
"You are fretting, Jane, and fretting is bad for you every way. Why will you do it?"