y successively surrendered to
smaller parties of their pursuers. Many officers of distinction attempted,
single and disguised,

[Footnote 1: These were the earl of Cleveland, Sir James Hamilton, Colonel
Careless, and captains Hornyhold, Giffard, and Kemble.--Boscobel, 20.]

[Footnote 2: See Blount, Boscobel, 14-22; Whitelock, 507, 508; Bates, part
ii. 221; Parl. Hist. xx. 40, 44-55; Ludlow, i. 314. Nothing can be more
incorrect than Clarendon's account of this battle, iii. 409. Even Cromwell
owns that "it was as stiff a contest for four or five hours as ever he had
seen."--Cary's Memorials, ii. 356.]

to steal their way through the country; but of these the Scots were
universally betrayed by their accent, whilst the English, for the most
part, effected their escape.[1] The duke of Hamilton had been mortally
wounded on the field of battle; the earls of Derby, Rothes, Cleveland,
Kelly, and Lauderdale; the lords Sinclair, Kenmure, and Grandison; and the
generals Leslie, Massey, Middleton, and Montgomery, were made prisoners, at
different times and in separate places. But the most interesting inquiry
regarded the fortune of the young king. Though the parliament offered[a] a
reward of one thousand pounds for his person, and denounced the penalties
of treason against those who should afford him shelter; though parties of
horse and foot scoured the adjacent counties in search of so valuable a
prize; though the magistrates received orders to arrest every unknown
person, and to keep a strict watch on the sea-ports in their neighbourhood,
yet no trace of his flight, no clue to his retreat, could be discovered.
Week after week passed

[Footnote 1: Thus the duke of Buckingham was conducted by one Mathews, a
carpenter, to Bilstrop, and thence to Brooksby, the seat of Lady Villiers,
in Leicestershire; Lord Talbot reached his father's house at Longford in
time to conceal himself in a close place in one of the out-houses. His
pursuers found his horse yet saddled, and searched for him during four or
five days in vain. May was hidden twenty-one days in a hay-mow, belonging
to Bold, a husbandman, at Chessardine, during all which time a party of
soldiers was quartered in the house.--Boscobel, 35-37. Of the prisoners,
eight suffered death, by judgment of a court-martial sitting at Chester.
One of these was the gallant earl of Derby, who pleaded that quarter had
been granted to him by Captain Edge, and quarter ought to be respected by
a c