hadowy meeting on
Marston Moor evidently caused Cromwell much vexation. As his dupes
refused to exhibit themselves, and as not a soldier was near at hand,
paragraphs in the News Letters, 'some pistols scattered' on the heath,
and 'a led horse, with a velvet saddle,' were all the proofs that
Cromwell could show that aught had happened on Marston Moor, during the
night of the 8th of March. Nor could he solemnize the event, as he
desired, by the appearance on the scaffold of a single Yorkshireman.

He sent, for that purpose, to York as Judges, Baron Thorpe, Mr. Justice
Newdigate, and Mr. Serjeant Hutton; but they refused to obey his
bidding. They declined to try upon a capital charge the men that had
been arrested by the Protector's informers, not in arms nor on
horseback, nor even on the highway, but in their own houses. The judges
were doubtful 'whether in point of law,' a possible midnight ride could
be declared by them 'to be treason.' It was in vain that Colonel
Lilbourne used 'diligence' to 'pick up such as are right,' to serve on
the jury. The judges even left York altogether, objecting that due
notice, under which they could try that 'great affair,' had not been
given.

Pressure was renewed upon Newdigate and Hutton; they were despatched
back to York, to undertake the trial of the Marston Moor prisoners.
Cromwell's law officer, however, found them at Doncaster, on their
return to London, and in a very contrary state of mind. They again
refused to act; and they based their refusal on an objection, which
affected not those prisoners alone, but all Cromwell's prisoners. They
asserted, evidently reckoning on Baron Thorpe's concurrence, that they
could not, as judges, put in force the Ordinance, by which Cromwell had
adapted the Statute Law of England to meet the crime of high treason
against himself, because it was of no validity! They thus anticipated,
in the most unpleasant way, Mr. Coney's refusal to pay taxes imposed,
not by an Act of Parliament, but by an 'Ordinance.' Cromwell was forced
to yield; the Yorkshiremen preserved their lives, but not their liberty
or their estates; and almost immediately, 'Judges Thorpe and Newdigate
were put out of their places, for not observing the Protector's pleasure
in all his commands.'[44]

Cromwell's 'pleasure' was, however, served by Mr. Serjeant Glyn and Mr.
Recorder Steele, and by the jurymen, 'such as were right,' over whom
they presided, in the trial of the Salisbury in