CHAPTER X.
CHAPTER X.
PUBLIC CHARACTERS.
“So violent did I find parties in London, that I was assured by several that the Duke of Marlborough was a coward, and Mr. Pope a fool.”—Voltaire.
In dealing with the public characters at the time of the Restoration, the two men who were mainly instrumental in bringing that event about—Monk and Montagu—must needs be given a prominent place.
George Monk, Duke of Albemarle, was a singularly unheroic character. He was slow and heavy, but had a sufficient supply of good sense, and, in spite of many faults, he had the rare good fortune to be generally loved.[275] He was so popular that ballads were continually being made in his praise. Pepys said there were so many of them that in after times his fame would sound like that of Guy of Warwick.[276]
Aubrey tells us that Monk learned his trade of soldiering in the Low Countries, whence he fled after having slain a man. Although he frequently went to sea in command of the fleet, he always remained a soldier, and the seamen laughed behind his back when instead of crying “Tack about,” he would say “Wheel to the right or left.” Pepys tells a story of him to the same effect: “It was pretty to hear the Duke of Albemarle himself to wish that they would come on our ground, meaning the French, for that he would pay them, so as to make them glad to go back to France again; which was like a general, but not like an admiral.”[277]