[p. 343] Lady Fleetwood. Bridget, eldest daughter of Oliver Cromwell, was married first to Ireton, who died 26 November, 1651, and secondly, in 1652, to Fleetwood. She did not live long after the Restoration, and was buried at S. Anne’s, Blackfriars, 1 July, 1662.
[p. 343] Lady Cromwell. Cromwell married Elizabeth, daughter of Sir James Bourchier, 22 August, 1620. She survived her husband seven years, dying 19 November, 1665. After the Restoration she lived in great seclusion at Norboro’, Northamptonshire, the house of her son-in-law, John Claypoole.
[p. 343] Clement’s Parish. Probably St. Clements, Eastcheap. This church, described by Stow as being ‘small and void of monuments’, was destroyed in the Great Fire and rebuilt 1686. The old church of St. Clement Danes, Strand, being in a ruinous condition, was pulled down in 1680 and built again on the same site. The Puritans always omitted the prefix ‘St.’ and spoke of churches as ‘Paul’s’, ‘Mary’s’, ‘Bartholomew’s’, ‘Helen’s’ and the like.
The above Note refers to the male character Ananias Goggle, but is printed after the Commentary on the four main female characters.
Act I: Scene i
[p. 344] Gad and the Lord Fleetwood. Fleetwood, even in an age of Tartuffes, was especially distinguished for the fluency of his canting hypocrisy and godliness. He was a bitter persecutor of Catholics, a warm favourer of Anabaptists and the extremer fanatics of every kidney.
[p. 345] Vane. Sir Harry Vane (1613-62), the prominent Parliamentarian and a leading member of the Committee of Safety was executed as a regicide, June, 1662.
[p. 345] Fifth Monarchy. The Fifth Monarchy men were a sect of wild enthusiasts who declared themselves ‘subjects only of King Jesus’, and held that a fifth universal monarchy (like those of Assyria, Persia, Greece, and Rome) would be established by Christ in person, until which time no single person must presume to rule or be king.
[p. 346] Haslerig. Sir Arthur Heselrige, one of the Five Members whom Parliament refused to yield to Charles I in January, 1642, was a republican of the most violent type. He died a prisoner in the Tower, 7 January, 1661.
[p. 349] an errant Heroick. A term for a cavalier or Royalist, cf. Edward Waterhouse’s A Short Narrative of the late Dreadful Fire in London (1667, 12mo): ‘Even so, O Lord, rebuke the evil spirit of these Sanballats, and raise up the spirit of the Nehemiahs and other such Heroicks of Kindness and Ability to consider London.’ Tatham, in The Rump (4to, 1660; 1661), Act ii, 1, has ‘The very names of the Cromwells will become far more odious than ever Needham could make the Heroicks’.