t, unfortunate indeed, but
brave and noble; I will not reproach you with your father's faults. His
prosperity, the trust he exercises under the Usurper, are in my eyes
reasons, if not of hating you, at least of resolving not to unite myself
to principles so opposite to those I have ever cherished."

Sedley thanked her for allowing him an opportunity of explaining the
past. It was most true, that at their first interview he felt the power
of her fortitude and generous regard to others, nor did he overlook the
complacency with which she received his services. Though at that time
hearty in the Parliamentary cause, it was owing to the advice (or he
should rather say, the commands) of Barton, under whose guidance he was
placed by his father, that he deputed him to execute the plan he had
formed for the safe conduct of the Beaumonts through the seat of war,
instead of being himself their escort, as he at first intended. The same
interference had again prevented him from renewing an acquaintance with
them, on the rescue of Constantia. The principles he had imbibed from
Barton forbade every deviation from the path of honour; and an alliance
with a conspicuous royalist, would either have estranged him from his
family or exposed them to ruin. Isabel inquired if the same impediments
did not still exist. "A great change has taken place," replied Lord
Sedley; "I am now like you, a child of misfortune; but were it not so,
'Love is become the lord of all,' and when he reigns, he reigns
unrivalled."

He proceeded to inform her, that the violent feuds of the predominant
factions had infected the privacies of domestic life. His mother was
warmly attached to Cromwell's party, while his father adhered to that of
the Presbyterian republicans; the differences between whom were now
grown irreconcileable. He knew that the command intrusted to Lord
Bellingham was given him as a snare, and that he was so surrounded by
spies, as to be virtually in the power of any common serjeant, who, in
the two-fold capacity of Agitator and Preacher, could denounce his
general at the drum-head, and under the pretence of his having
sacrificed the Lord's cause, and the rights of the army, to an ungodly
Parliament, could send him prisoner to London. Lord Sedley confessed,
with shame, that his mother, by giving information that his father was
in secret not well disposed to Cromwell, had caused him to be placed in
a situation where the greatest circumspection could