"Stop, sir! hitherto you see I have only played with you and done you no hurt; but if you come at me with the broadsword, I will take your life."
The alarmed fencing-master cried out:
"Who can you be? You must be either Goffe, Whalley, or the devil, for there are no others in England who could beat me."
In order to fully explain the meaning of the fencing-master's words, we beg leave to step aside from our story for a moment and recall some historical events which have a bearing upon it. Of the judges who tried and condemned Charles I. three escaped to America. One was Edward Whalley, who had first won laurels in the field at Naseby, had even enjoyed the confidence of Cromwell, and remained a friend of the Independents; one was William Goffe, a firm friend of the family of Cromwell, a good soldier and an ardent partisan, but ignorant of the true principles of freedom. Endicott was governor when these two arrived in Boston. Goffe, with his child, came first, but was known as soon as he entered the town, and lodging was refused him at every house until he came to the home of the kind Puritan, Mathew Stevens, who sheltered the man and his child, though it might endanger his own head.
Charles II. pursued the murderers of his father with unrelenting fury. Whalley and Goffe both had been generals in the army of Cromwell and were men of undoubted courage. When warrants came for them from England, they hurried across the country to New Haven, where it was esteemed a crime against God to betray a wanderer or give up an outcast; yet such diligent search was made for them, that they never knew security. For a time they went in secrecy from house to house, for awhile concealing themselves in a mill, sometimes in clefts of rocks by the seaside, and for weeks together, and even for months, they dwelt in a cave in the forest. Great rewards were offered for their apprehension. Indians as well as English were urged to scour the woods in quest of their hiding-place.
John Dixwell, the third regicide, was more fortunate. He was able to live undiscovered and, changing his name, was absorbed among the inhabitants of New Haven. He married and lived peacefully and happily. Raleigh's history of the world, written during his imprisonment, while he was under sentence of death, was his favorite study. It is said that to the day of his death he retained a firm belief that the spirit of English liberty would demand a new revolution, which was achieved in England while he was on his death-bed.
Another victim of the restoration, selected for his genius and integrity, was Sir Henry Vane, the benefactor of Rhode Island. This ever faithful friend of New England and liberty adhered with undaunted firmness to "the glorious cause" of popular liberty, and, shunned by every one who courted the returning monarch, he became noted for his unpopularity. When the Unitarians were persecuted, not as a sect but as blasphemers, Vane interceded for them. He also pleaded for the liberty of the Quakers, and as a legislator he demanded justice in behalf of the Roman Catholics. When monarchy was overthrown and a Commonwealth attempted, Vane reluctantly filled a seat in the council, and, resuming his place as a legislator, amidst the floating wrecks of the English constitution, he clung to the existing parliament as to the only fragment on which it was possible to rescue English liberty. His ability enabled Blake to cope with Holland on the sea.
[Illustration: SIR HENRY VANE.]
After the restoration, parliament had excepted Sir Henry Vane from the indemnity, on the king's promise that he should not suffer death. It was resolved to bring him to trial, and he turned his trial into a triumph. Though he had always been supposed to be a timid man, he appeared before his judges with animated fearlessness. Instead of offering apologies for his career, he denied the imputation of treason with scorn, defended the right of Englishmen to be governed by successive representatives, and took glory to himself for actions which promoted the good of England and were sanctioned by parliament as the virtual sovereign of the realm. "He spoke not for his life and estate, but for the honor of the martyrs to liberty that were in their graves, for the liberties of England, for the interest of all posterity to come." When he asked for counsel, the solicitor said:
"Who will dare speak for you, unless you can call down from the gibbet the heads of your fellow-traitors?"