2 to give them their pay with greater regularity in future.' It is undoubtedly true that there were several officers in the service of the Scots Parliament (the two Leslies and others) who had served under Gustavus Adolphus. But though in common and inaccurate language they may be said to have learnt the art of war under a great master, the art of war is an art which cannot be learnt under any teacher but nature. And events proved but too well that neither Alexander nor David Leslie was ever a master of it. One fact tells volumes against both. I have already mentioned the introduction of the use of the cartridge by Gustavus Adolphus as well as the fact that it was not generally used till near a century after. The deadly effect of the fire of the Scots brigades in the wars of Gustavus Adolphus in consequence of the advantage of the cartridge was often proved. And the first thing that a commander of any superior intelligence would have done would have been to introduce it wherever he commanded. That it was not introduced among the Scots troops sufficiently appears from one of the articles of the surrender of Edinburgh Castle to Cromwell, by which it is stipulated that the soldiers may depart "with their arms and baggage, with drums beating and colours flying, matches lighted at both ends, and ball in their mouths as they are usually wont to march." This clearly shows that the cartridges were not used, and that the ball was put loose or separately into the gun. It is a strange spectacle to observe the language which these two bodies of fanatics, each of which believed them 1 Records of the British ArmyPrinted by Authority- Historical Record of the First or Royal Regiment of Foot. Compiled by Richard Cannon, Esq., Adjutant-General's Office, Horse 2 Historical Record of the First Regiment of Foot. The selves the special and exclusive favourites and confidants of Heaven, held to each other. The Presbyterians declared the army commanded by Cromwell to be a union of the most perverse heretical sectaries of every different persuasion, agreeing in nothing but their desire to effect the ruin of the Christian Church, and the destruction of the Covenant, to which most of their leaders had sworn fidelity. Cromwell was Antichrist, over whose head the curse of God hung for murdering the king, and breaking the Covenant.1 He was Agag, and revelations had been made to them that he, with his army of sectaries and heretics, was delivered into their hands to be dealt with as Samuel had dealt with Agag and the Amalekites. Independents were by no means behind-hand in this war of words, though after their success at Dunbar they could afford to exhibit a little more profession than their adversaries of Christian charity, which was rather a scarce commodity everywhere in those days. They called Heaven and Earth to witness whether they had not cause to defend themselves by coming into Scotland with an army to hinder the Scots from taking their time and advantage to impose on them their grand enemy, whom the Scots had engaged to restore to the possession of England and Ireland.2 They declared that they valued the Christian Church ten thousand times more than their own lives; and that they were not only a rod of iron to dash asunder the common enemies, but a hedge (though unworthy) about the divine vineyard. As for the Covenant, were it not for making it an object of idolatry, they would be content to Relation of the Fight at Leith, p. 220, in Original Memoirs written during the Civil War. Edinburgh, 1806. 2 Declaration of the English Army, in Cromwelliana, p. 84. place it on the point of their pikes, and let God judge whether they or their opponents had best observed its obligations. Those, they said, that were acquainted with the secrets of God (meaning themselves) did clearly see the quarrel was betwixt Christ and the Devil, betwixt Christ's seed and the Devil's. The whore of Babylon had received her deadly wound; let the Devil be her chirurgeon. Their prayers for them (the Presbyterians) should be that the Lord would pity and forgive them, in that they knew not what they did; and that He would give them a clear sight of the great work He was then, in those latter days, carrying on. Their bowels did in Christ yearn after the godly in Scotland, and the arms of their Christian love were stretched out ready to embrace them, whenever God should incline their hearts to carry on and not to gainsay and oppose His work. If however God should still suffer their eyes to be blinded, so that seeing they would not see, and their hearts to be hardened, so as to persist in gainsaying and opposing the way of the Lord, whatever misery befell their nation, either through famine or sword, would lie heavy upon them.' Before the English army entered Scotland, an incident occurred which shows that if Gumble's statement that Monk was known among the soldiers as honest George Monk be true, the opinion of the soldiors must have changed from what it was at this time. At Newcastle Colonel Bright threw up his commission because the general would not give him a fortnight's time to go home to settle his private affairs.2 When the army was about Alnwick several colonels came to the head of Colonel 1 Relation of the Campaign in Scotland, pp. 331, 332, in Original Memoirs written during the Civil War; and Cromwell to the Governor of the Castle of Edinburgh, 12th Sept. 1650. 2 Captain Hodgson's Memoirs, p. 127. Bright's regiment, and telling the soldiers that the general was much troubled such a regiment should want a colonel, asked whom they would have for their colonel. The soldiers told them they had a good colonel, but he had left them, and they knew not whom they might have. The colonels asked if they would have Colonel Monk. "Colonel Monk!" said some of them," what! to betray us? We took him but not long since at Nantwich prisoner: we'll have none of him." The again, and asked if they Lambert to be their colonel. next day the colonels came would have Major-General At which they all threw up I their hats and shouted "a Lambert a Lambert!" In the whole of this affair, the refusal of the short leave of absence causing the resignation of Colonel Bright, and the proposal of Monk as his successor undoubtedly originating with Cromwell, may be clearly seen one very remarkable example of "weeding out the old officers and filling up their room with turn-coat cavaliers." Cromwell and Monk soon understood each other. Their abilities, though very different in some points, were very like in others. They were both essentially men of action. What was to be done they could do, from fighting a battle to quelling a mutiny, from raising an army and manning a fleet to keeping their men in efficient fighting condition by attention to the most minute details of the commissariat, even to furnishing their soldiers amid the bogs of Ireland and the mountains of Scotland with a sufficient supply of biscuit and cheese, frequently assisted by a portion of meat 1 Captain Hodgson's Memoirs, pp. 139, 140. Hodgson was then an officer in that very regiment of foot, as he afterwards was in Lambert's regiment of horse; for Lambert appears to have had a regiment of horse and a regiment of foot at the same time. See Hodgson's Memoirs, p. 140. As to the incident related in the text, see also Relation of the Fight at Leith, in the same collection, p. 205. 1 or fish, chiefly salmon; and when better medical advice was not to be had, they had their prescriptions and remedies for sickness and wounds. Nearly the same might be said as to the resemblance of their characters. Their faces also bore a not inconsiderable likeness to each other. The best original portraits of both exhibit the same massive structure of countenance and head, the same look of calm intelligence and invincible resolution in the eyes and mouth. Calm and indomitable courage, and strong practical good sense characterized both alike. But here the resemblance ends, for in Cromwell there was added an element of enthusiasm which gave to his courage more unbounded daring and to his ambition a loftier flight than suited Monk's phlegmatic temperament and unimaginative mind. For, after all, Monk did not rise above the common ranks of men. And yet he was a sort of Cromwell-with the courage and good sense without the genius,-without that enthusiastic element and that unerring instinct telling the exact moment when a blow is to be struck, which, when combined with courage and good sense, inspire a resistless energy into a man's actions. As regards the points of resemblance in the characters of these two men, it is also remarkable that Monk and Cromwell though both by birth gentlemen, were both characterized by a certain plainness, if not coarseness, a certain want of refinement in their tastes and habits, which not only shunned all approach to foppery but tended to the other extreme. We cannot imagine Monk or Cromwell in 1 It appears from various minutes in the Order Book of the Council of State, that salmon for the use of the troops in Ireland was purchased in Ireland at £15 per ton, a little more than three halfpence per pound. -Order Book of the Council of State, 25 Sept. 1649, and 23 Octob. 1649, à Meridie. MS. State Paper Office. 2 There were several original miniatures of Cromwell and one of Monk exhibited in the Loan Court of the South Kensington Museum in 1862. |