These pamphlets of Milton’s prove how little that solitary thinker ever knew of the real mind and temper of the English people.
The Lord Richard Cromwell was exactly the sort of eldest son a great soldier like Oliver, who had put his foot on fortune’s neck, was likely to have. Richard (1626-1712) was not, indeed, born in the purple, but his early manhood was nurtured in it. Religion, as represented by long sermons, tiresome treatises, and prayerful exercises, bored him to death. Of enthusiasm he had not a trace, nor was he bred to arms. He delighted in hunting, in the open air, and the company of sportsmen. Whatever came his way easily, and as a matter of right, he was well content to take. He bore himself well on State occasions, and could make a better speech than ever his father was able to do. But he was not a “restless” Cromwell, and had no faith in his destiny. I do not know whether he had ever read Don Quixote, in Shelton’s translation, a very popular book of the time; probably not, for, though Chancellor of the University of Oxford, Richard was not a reading man, but if he had, he must have sympathised with Sancho Panza’s attitude of mind towards the famous island.
“If your highness has no mind that the government you promised should be given me, God made me of less, and perhaps it may be easier for Sancho, the Squire, to get to Heaven than for Sancho, the Governor. In the dark all cats are gray.”
The new Protector took up the reins of power with proper forms and ceremonies, and at once proceeded to summon a Parliament, an Imperial Cromwellian Parliament, containing representatives both from Scotland and Ireland. In this Parliament Andrew Marvell sat for the first time as one of the two members for Kingston-upon-Hull. His election took place on the 10th of January 1659, being the first county day after the sheriff had received the writ. Five candidates were nominated: Thomas Strickland, Andrew Marvell, John Ramsden, Henry Smyth, and Sir Henry Vane, and a vote being taken in the presence of the mayor, aldermen, and many of the burgesses, John Ramsden and Andrew Marvell were declared duly elected.
Nobody to-day, glancing his eye over a list of the knights and burgesses who made up Richard Cromwell’s first and last Parliament, would ever guess that it represented an order of things of the most recent date which was just about to disappear. On paper it has a solid look. The fine old crusted Parliamentary names with which the clerks were to remain so long familiar as the members trooped out to divide were more than well represented.[1] The Drakes of Amersham were there; Boscawens, Bullers, and Trelawneys flocked from Cornwall; Sir Wilfred Lawson sat for Cumberland, and his son for Cockermouth; a Knightly represented Northamptonshire, whilst Lucys from Charlecote looked after Warwick, both town and county. Arthur Onslow came from Surrey, a Townshend from Norfolk, and, of course, a Bankes from Corfe Castle;[2] Oxford University, contented, as she occasionally is, to be represented by a great man, had chosen Sir Matthew Hale, whilst the no less useful and laborious Thurloe sat for the sister University. Anthony Ashley Cooper was there, but in opposition, snuffing the morrow. Mildmays, Lawleys, Binghams, Herberts, Pelhams, all travelled up to London with the Lord-Protector’s writs in their pockets. A less revolutionary assembly never met, though there was a regicide or two among them. But when the members found themselves alone together there was some loose talk.
On the 27th of January 1659 Marvell attended for the first time in his place, when the new Protector opened Parliament, and made a speech in the House of Lords, which was pronounced at the time to be “a very handsome oration.”
The first business of the Commons was to elect a Speaker, nor was their choice a very lucky one, for it first fell on Chaloner Chute, who speedily breaking down in health, the Recorder of London was appointed his substitute, but the Recorder being on his deathbed at the time, and Chute dying very shortly afterwards, Thomas Bampfield was elected Speaker, and continued so to be until the Parliament was dissolved by proclamation on the 22nd of April. This proclamation was Richard Cromwell’s last act of State.
Marvell’s first Parliament was both short and inglorious. One only of its resolutions is worth quoting:—
“That a very considerable navy be forthwith provided, and put to sea for the safety of the Commonwealth and the preservation of the trade and commerce thereof.”
It was, however, the army and not the navy that had to be reckoned with—an army unpaid, angry, suspicious, and happily divided. I must not trace the history of faction. There is no less exalted page in English history since the days of Stephen. Monk is its fitting hero, and Charles the Second its expensive saviour of society. The story how the Restoration was engineered by General Monk, who, if vulgar, was adroit, both on land and sea, is best told from Monk’s point of view in the concluding chapter of Baker’s Chronicle (Sir Roger de Coverley’s favourite Sunday reading), whilst that old-fashioned remnant, who still love to read history for fun, may not object to be told that they will find printed in the Report of the Leyborne-Popham Papers (Historical Manuscripts Commission, 1899, p. 204) a Narrative of the Restoration, by Mr. John Collins, the Chief Butler of the Inner Temple, proving in great and highly diverting detail how this remarkable event was really the work not so much of Monk as of the Chief Butler.