carried even there without a violent debate, which lasted till two o'clock in the morning, the house having sate that day eighteen hours—the longest debate ever known in parliament, and the heat to which it was carried was such, that Sir Philip Warwick says, "We had sheathed our swords in each others' bowels, had not the sagacity and calmness of Mr. Hampden, by a soft speech, prevented it." Cromwell is reported by Clarendon to have said to lord Falkland as they came out, that had it not been carried, he would have sold all and gone to America. "So near," he adds, "was the poor kingdom at that time to its deliverance."
And yet this famous remonstrance was only carried by a majority of nine, according to Clarendon; according to others, by eleven. It was as Clarendon describes it, "A very bitter representation of all the illegal things that had been done from the first hour of the king's coming to the crown, to that minute." It consisted of two hundred and six clauses—The war against the French protestants; the innovations in the church; the illegal imposition of ship-money; forced loans; the cruelties of the Star-chamber and High Commission: the forcing of episcopacy on Scotland; the forcing of it on the Irish by Strafford, and all the other illegal proceedings there; all the opposition of the king and his ministers to necessary reforms; and the plotting of the queen with the papists at home and abroad. It went on to remind the king of what they had done in puling down his evil counsellors, and informed him that other good things were in preparation.
The king the next day delivered his answer in the house of lords, protesting, as usual, his good intentions, telling the commons before he removed evil counsellors, they must point out who they were, and bring real facts against them; at the same time he significantly reminded them that he had left Scotland in perfect amity with him, so that they might infer that they were not to look for support against him there, and calling on them to stir themselves in aiding him to put down the rebellion in Ireland. Matters continued getting worse every day betwixt the king and parliament. From the 8th to the 20th of December there was a sullen humour betwixt them. So far from granting the parliament the usual guard, Charles had posted a guard of his own near the commons. They sent and summoned the commander of the guard before them, pronounced their being placed there a breach of their privileges, and demanded that they be removed. On the 14th of December Charles objected to their ordering the impressment of soldiers from Ireland, that being his prerogative, but that he would permit it for the time on the understanding that his right was not thereby affected. The next day the commons passed an order for the printing and publishing their remonstrance, which they had failed to carry on the day on which it was carried itself. This had a great effect with the public, and the king, in a restless, angry humour, prevailing in nothing against the house, sought to strengthen himself by getting a lieutenant into the Tower of his own party. But in this movement he was equally injudicious and equally unfortunate. He dismissed Sir William Balfour, who had so honestly resisted his warrant and the bribe of Strafford to effect that great culprit's escape; but to have deprived the commons of any plea for interfering in what was unquestionably his own prerogative, he should have replaced him by a man of character. Instead of that, he gave the post to colonel Lunsford, a man of desperate fortunes, and the most unprincipled reputation; outlawed for his violent attacks on different individuals, and known to be capable of executing the most lawless attempts. The city immediately petitioned the commons against the Tower being in the hands of such a man; the commons called for a conference with the lords on the subject, but the lords refused to meddle in what so clearly was the royal prerogative. The commons then called on them to enter the protest they had made on their books; but the lords took time to consider it. On Thursday, December 23rd, a petition was addressed to the commons, purporting to be from the apprentices of London, against papists and prelates, who, they contended, caused the destruction of trade by their plots, and the fears which thence unsettled men of capital, whereby they, the apprentices, "were nipped in the bud," on entering the world. The corporation waited on his majesty on Sunday the 26th, to assure him that the apprentices were contemplating a rising, and meant to carry the Tower by storm, unless Lunsford were removed; and that the merchants had already removed all their bullion from the Mint for fear of him, and the owners of ships coming in with new would not carry it there. That evening Charles sent and took the keys from his new lieutenant, and appointed Sir John Byron in his place.
And now, notwithstanding the reluctance of the lords, they were compelled to entertain this question, for they found lord Newport, the constable of the Tower, also brought into question by the king. It appeared that during Charles's absence in Scotland, at a meeting of a number of the peers and members of the commons at Kensington, regarding some rumour of plots against parliament, lord Newport was reported to have said, "Never mind, we have his wife and children." Newport stated in the house that he had waited on the queen at the time, and assured her that no such words had been spoken; yet on Friday last the king had reminded him of it, and intimated his belief of it. It was now the turn of the lords to call for a conference with the commons. This was granted on Monday, and whilst it was sitting, the house of parliament was surrounded by tumultuous mobs, crying, "Beware of plots! No bishops! no bishops!"
Poor Williams, made archbishop of York on the 4th of this month, was surrounded by this mob and no little frightened; but got away unhurt, any further than in his feelings, from the execrations heaped on the bishops; but one David Hide, a ruffian officer, who had been in the army in the north, and was now appointed to the service in Ireland, drew his sword, and swore that "he would cut the throats of those roundhead dogs that bawled against bishops," and by that expression, says Clarendon, gave the first utterance to the name roundhead, which was immediately universally applied to the parliamentary party; the term cavillers soon being introduced to designate the royalists. The same day Lunsford had the insolence to go through Westminster Hall with thirty or forty of his partisans at his back. The mob fell on them, and they drew their swords and cut right and left among the crowd. Presently there came pouring down to Westminster hundreds of
