[CHAPTER IV]
THE PARLIAMENT'S COMMISSION
While Monk lay thus honour-bound in the Tower the New Model had done its work. The war was practically over, and Parliament turned its attention to clearing the prisons. On April 9th, 1646, a return was ordered of all soldiers of fortune then prisoners to the Parliament who were desirous of going abroad, with the intention that on taking the negative oath they should be permitted to do so. Under this order Monk must have applied, and on July 1st he got leave to go beyond the seas.
Besides the oath there was a further condition that he was to leave the country within a month of his release, but his friends seem to have had influence enough to get the time extended. With the close of the war Parliament was able to devote its energies to Ireland, and each party was scheming to appoint the Lord Lieutenant, in order to secure for itself the prestige of avenging the Protestant blood that had been shed. During Monk's imprisonment the situation there had changed considerably. Ormonde still held Dublin and the greater part of Leinster for the King, but Lord Inchiquin in a fit of pique had gone over to the Parliament, and from Cork was administering Munster as president in its name. The Scotch in the Ulster garrisons and plantations were also on the side of the Parliament. The rest of the island was in the hands of the Papal Nuncio, and recognised no authority either of King or Parliament. He had succeeded in uniting the Anglo-Irish under Preston and the native Irish under Owen O'Neill into one ultra-Catholic party, with vague aims at an independent state under the protectorate of Spain or the Pope.
Parliament saw something must be done to keep Inchiquin from returning to his allegiance and joining Ormonde; and being still unable to agree upon a definite appointment, they determined to send out Lord Lisle for a year. He immediately offered the command of his regiment to Monk. There was now no reason why he should not accept it. The war for which he had engaged was at an end, and the new service that was offered to him was one which he had been bred to think as noble as a crusade. It was against an enemy in open rebellion against England and in secret league with Spain.
But though perfectly willing to accept the negative oath, to which as a merely military precaution he had no objection, he utterly refused to take the Covenant. Till he did he was not qualified for a parliamentary commission.
By the end of September, however, Ormonde found it was impossible to hold out much longer, and rather than let Dublin fall into the hands of the Catholics, he offered to surrender it to the Parliament. At the same time he urged them to send out Monk and the Irish officers to take command of the army of occupation. The difficulties about the recusant colonel's appointment began to vanish like magic. The Presbyterians, who, it must be remembered, were in theory Royalist, and practically becoming so every day in a greater degree, naturally were only too glad to accept a nomination of Ormonde's. Monk was sent for by the Irish committee of the Council of State sitting at Derby House. There he pledged his honour that he would faithfully serve the Parliament in the Irish war, and announced himself ready to start at a day's notice. What was said about the Covenant is a mystery, but the committee reported to the House that he was ready to take it. That he did not take it is certain, for this was the chief ground on which the Ulster-Scotch quarrelled with him three years afterwards. It is difficult even to believe that honest George said he was ready to do so. The ambiguous expression looks strangely like an ingenious piece of jockeying on the part of Lisle, who was a member of the Derby House committee, to make it easy for the Presbyterians to consent to Monk's appointment. At all events it had the desired effect, and with only one dissentient voice it was voted that Colonel Monk should be employed as the committee directed.
Lord Lisle was less successful in his own case. Not till Christmas did he get his route, and still there were obstacles which prevented him sailing till the middle of February. Even then he did not go to Dublin. Ormonde and the parliamentary commissioners had not been able to agree on the details of the surrender, and Lisle had to land in Cork. It was the 21st of the month before he reached his command, and his commission would expire on April 15th. Barely two months remained of his term of office, and that time was spent in incessant wrangling between Lord Inchiquin and the newly arrived officers. It is needless to say that the expedition was an entire failure, and on the first of May Monk and his friends found themselves once more back in London.
It shows plainly how Monk had kept himself clear of any political taint that he did not share in his chief's fall. The force which had been sent to occupy Dublin on the first overtures of Ormonde had been ordered on to Ulster pending the completion of the negotiations. On the eventual signing of the treaty of rendition, as a strong force was on its way from England, only a small part of the original army of occupation had been ordered to Dublin, and an officer was required to command the regiments which remained in Ulster. Everything pointed to Monk as the man. His appointment was strongly urged by his friends in the House, and probably by Cromwell himself, and in July he was gratified with a commission as Major-General over all the forces both Scotch and English, in the counties of Down and Antrim and all those parts of Ulster which were not in the command of Sir Charles Coote.
Michael Jones was supreme in Dublin, and with a man like Monk to second him he soon set the tide running back. Early in August he inflicted a crushing defeat on Preston, and O'Neill alone remained to be dealt with. But that was different. He was a wary old Low Country officer who had been long in the Spanish service. He knew his power lay in guerilla warfare, and nothing would entrap him into an engagement. He was a foe worthy of the new commanders' steel, but they knew the game as well as he. All through August and the two following months Monk and Jones were raiding up and down, sometimes in concert, sometimes apart, burning, ravaging, plundering, and collecting provisions.