The relief was not of long duration. The royalist towns were falling one by one into the power of Fairfax and Cromwell. Fifteen had surrendered or had been taken by assault within five months. Scarcely had Charles returned to Oxford, when he wrote to the Prince of Wales to hold himself in readiness to proceed to the Continent. At the same time he made overtures of peace to Parliament, demanding a safe-conduct for four negotiators.
Never had Parliament been less inclined towards peace. The hundred and thirty new members, who had replaced in the House of Commons those who had followed the king, had increased the power and daring of the Independents, though all did not belong to their party. The severities towards the Royalists were redoubled. The war everywhere became harsher, sometimes cruel. Fairfax alone still preserved the fine humanity which distinguished nearly all the leaders at the opening of the war. Misunderstandings broke out even between the Scots and the Houses. The former complained that their army was not paid; the latter, that an army of allies plundered and devastated, like a hostile body, the counties which it occupied. The strongest fermentation, the deepest hostility, the bitterest and most decisive measures on all hands, left little chance for peace to arrest or even suspend the rapid course of events.
The overtures of the king were rejected, and a safe-conduct was refused to the negotiators. Charles persisted, but without success, and as he proposed to repair to Westminster to negotiate in person with Parliament, his enemies solemnly declared that they at length possessed proof of the falsity of his words. The king had concluded a treaty of alliance with the Catholic Irishmen still in revolt. Ten thousand of these barbarians, under the orders of the Earl of Glamorgan, were soon to land at Chester. They had obtained, as the price of their assistance, the complete abolition of the penal laws against the Catholics, and the freedom of their worship. Ireland, in fact, was delivered up to the Papacy. For two months the Committee of the two kingdoms had known of the conspiracy and reserved the publication of it for an important occasion. The day had at length arrived.
The king was struck down by this discovery. For two years he had personally conducted this negotiation with the Earl of Glamorgan, the eldest son of the Marquis of Worcester. Brave, generous, thoughtless, passionately devoted to his master in danger, and to his oppressed religion, Glamorgan had plotted in every form, proceeding incessantly from England to Ireland, often entrusted with secret missions unknown to the Marquis of Ormond, lieutenant of the king in Ireland, and alone knowing to what point the concessions of the king might reach. The treaty had been concluded since the 20th of August preceding, and Parliament did not know all that Charles had promised in its name.
When it was learned in Dublin that the plot was known in London, Ormond easily saw what a blow the affairs of the king had sustained even among his own party. He immediately caused Glamorgan to be arrested as having exceeded his powers. The earl kept his counsel, and did not produce the secret documents signed "Charles," which he held in his hands. He even said that the king was not bound to ratify what he had thought himself able to promise for him. On his part, Charles hastened to disown the affair in the proclamation which he addressed to the Houses, as well as in his official letters to the Council of Dublin. Glamorgan, he said, had no other mission than to recruit soldiers and to second the efforts of the Lord Lieutenant. Neither Parliament nor the people believed this. Glamorgan, being soon released, recommenced his attempts to assemble an Irish army to proceed to England. In reply, the command of Cromwell, already several times renewed, was again prolonged, and the king found himself compelled to resume hostilities as though he had been in a position to sustain them.
The last remnants of the royalist armies still fought, but without ardor and without hope. When the Prince of Wales found himself abandoned by his generals, Goring and Grenville, he implored Sir Ralph, now Lord Hopton, to resume command of the troops in the west. "Your Highness," replied the brave soldier, "I cannot obey you without resigning myself to the sacrifice of my honor, for with the troops which you have entrusted to me how can I preserve it? Their friends alone fear them; their enemies despise them; they are only terrible on the day of pillage; and only determined when they are resolved to fly. However, since your Highness has judged it well to summon me, I am ready to follow you at the risk of losing my honor;" and he resumed the command of seven or eight thousand men who detested him, and to whom his discipline was odious. On the 16th of February he was defeated by Fairfax at Torrington, upon the borders of Cornwall. All the troops that had remained with him were dispersed. Fairfax pursued him, while the Prince of Wales, driven into a corner at the Land's End, in Cornwall, embarked for the Scilly Isles, being unwilling to leave English soil. Fairfax offered honorable conditions. Hopton, free from all anxiety as to the safety of the prince, desired to attempt once more to fight with the small corps which he had re-formed with great difficulty; but the soldiers called upon him to capitulate. "Bargain, then," said Hopton, "but not for me." He embarked with Lord Chapel to join the Prince of Wales. The king now possessed in the south-west only insignificant garrisons, scattered in a few towns.
Sir Jacob Astley was defeated at Stow, in Gloucestershire, as he was advancing with three thousand men to join the king, who had issued forth with fifteen hundred horse from Oxford to meet him. The rout was complete. The aged Astley resisted for a long while, then fell into the hands of the enemy. The soldiers, touched by his white hairs and his courage, brought him a drum. He sat down; then addressing the Parliamentary officers, he said, "Gentlemen, you may now sit down and play, for you have done all your work, if you fall not out among yourselves." The king had no longer any hope save in the dissensions which he might foment among his enemies. He had for a long while been maintaining secret relations with the Independents, especially with Vane. He wrote himself to the latter after Astley's disaster, "Be assured that everything shall come to pass according to my promise. By all that is dearest to a man, I implore you to hasten your good offices, for otherwise it will be too late, and I shall perish before gathering the fruit. Trust to me. I will fully reward your services. I have said all. If in four days I should not have an answer I shall be compelled to find some other expedient. May God direct you! I have done my duty." He at the same time addressed a message to the Houses, offering to disband his troops, to open all his towns, and to take up his residence again at Whitehall.
Great was the emotion at Westminster; all knew that if the king were at Whitehall he would no longer be the object of the disturbances if the city should break out, and all were equally determined not to fall into his power. All the necessary precautions were adopted to prevent Charles from appearing unexpectedly in the capital. Violent measures were taken against those who should negotiate secretly or who should maintain any relations with him. Vane left the letter of the king unanswered.
Meanwhile Fairfax advanced, and Oxford was about to be invested. The king made an offer to Colonel Rainsborough, who had already arrived before the town, to surrender to him on condition that he should conduct him to Parliament at once. The colonel refused. Charles was about to fall as a prisoner of war into the hands of his enemies. One resource only remained to him. For two months M. de Montreuil, the French ambassador, had been laboring to procure him an opportunity of taking refuge in the camp of the Scots. He thought himself secure of the personal safety of the king in the midst of an army which looked upon Charles as its legitimate sovereign. The queen, still in France, also kept up relations with the Scotch military leaders. She urged her husband to put trust in them. He still hesitated, but he issued forth from Oxford on the 27th of April, at midnight, followed only by his valet-de-chambre, Ashburnham, and a clergyman. Dr. Hudson, well versed in all the roads.