THE LONG PARLIAMENT. A.D. 1641--1649.
When Charles I. was obliged to call his Parliament, the House of
Commons met, angered at the length of time that had passed since
they had been called, and determined to use their opportunity. They
speedily put an end both to the payment of ship money and to the Court
of the Star Chamber; and they threw into prison the two among the
king's friends whom they most disliked, namely, Archbishop Laud and
the Earl of Strafford. The earl had been governor of Ireland, and
had kept great order there, but severely; and he thought that the
king was the only person who ought to have any power, and was always
advising the king to put down all resistance by the strong hand.
He was thought a hard man, and very much hated; and when he was tried
the Houses of Parliament gave sentence against him that he should be
beheaded. Still, this could not be done without the king's warrant;
and Charles at first stood out against giving up his faithful friend.
But there was a great tumult, and the queen and her mother grew
frightened, and entreated the king to save himself by giving up Lord
Strafford, until at last he consented, and signed the paper ordering
the execution. It was a sad act of weakness and cowardice, and he
mourned over it all the days of his life.
The Parliament only asked more and more, and at last the king thought
he must put a check on them. So he resolved to go down to the House
and cause the five members who spoke against his power to be taken
prisoners in his own presence. But he told his wife what he intended,
and Henrietta Maria was so foolish as to tell Lady Carlisle, one of
her ladies, and she sent warning to the five gentlemen, so that they
were not in the House when Charles arrived; and the Londoners rose up
in a great mob, and showed themselves so angry with him, that he took
the queen and his children away into the country. The queen took her
daughter Mary to Holland to marry the Prince of Orange; and there she
bought muskets and gunpowder for her husband's army--for things had
come to pass now that a civil war began. A civil war is the worst
of all wars, for it is one between the people of the same country.
England had had two civil wars before. There were the Barons' wars,
between Henry III. and Simon de Montfort, about the keeping of Magna
Carta; and there were the wars of the Roses, to settle whether York
or Lancaster should reign. This war between Charles I. and the
Parliament was to decide whether the king or the House of Commons
should be most powerful. Those who held with the king called
themselves Cavaliers, but the friends of the Parliament called them
Malignants; and they in turn nicknamed the Parliamentary party
Roundheads, because they often chose not to wear their hair in the
prevailing fashion, long and flowing on their shoulders, but cut
short round their heads. Most of the Roundheads were Puritans, and
hated the Prayer-book, and all the strict rules for religious worship
that Archbishop Laud had brought in; and the Cavaliers, on the other
hand, held by the bishops and the Prayer-book. Some of the Cavaliers
were very good men indeed, and led holy and Christian lives, like
their master the king, but there were others who were only bold,
dashing men, careless and full of mirth and mischief; and the
Puritans were apt to think all amusements and pleasures wrong,
so that they made out the Cavaliers worse than they really were.
I do not think you would understand about all the battles, so I shall
only tell you now that the king's army was chiefly led by his nephew,
Prince Rupert, the son of his sister Elizabeth. Rupert was a fiery,
brave young man, who was apt to think a battle was won before it
really was, and would ride after the people he had beaten himself
without waiting to see whether his help was wanted by the other
captains; and so he did his uncle's cause as much harm as good.
The king's party had been the most used to war, and they prospered
the most at first; but as the soldiers of the Parliament became more
trained, they gained the advantage. One of the members of Parliament,
a gentleman named Oliver Cromwell, soon showed himself to be a much
better captain than any one else in England, and from the time he came
to the chief command the Parliament always had the victory. The places
of the three chief battles were Edgehill, Marston Moor, and Naseby.
The first was doubtful, but the other two were great victories of the
Roundheads. Just after Marston Moor, the Parliament put to death
Archbishop Laud; and, at the same time, they forbade the use of the
Prayer-book, and turned out all the parish priests from the churches,
putting in their stead men chosen after their own fashion, and not
ordained by bishops. They likewise destroyed all they disliked in the
churches--the painted glass, the organs, and the carvings; and when
the Puritan soldiers took possession of a town or village, they would
stable their horses in the churches, use the font for a trough, and
shoot at the windows as marks.
After the battle of Naseby, King Charles was in such distress that he
thought he would go to the Scots, remembering that, though he had
offended them by trying to make them use the Prayer-book, he had been
born among them, and he thought they would prefer him to the English.
But when he came, the Scottish army treated him like a prisoner, and
showed him very few honors; and at last they gave him up to the
English Parliament for a great sum of money.
So Charles was a prisoner to his own subjects. This Parliament is
called the Long Parliament, because it sat longer than any other
Parliament ever did: indeed it had passed a resolution that it could
not be dissolved.