King Charles the Second straightway. His
proclamation, however, was of little use to him, for very few Royalists
appeared; and, on the very same day, two people were publicly beheaded on
Tower Hill for espousing his cause. Up came Oliver to Worcester too, at
double quick speed, and he and his Ironsides so laid about them in the
great battle which was fought there, that they completely beat the
Scottish men, and destroyed the Royalist army; though the Scottish men
fought so gallantly that it took five hours to do.

The escape of Charles after this battle of Worcester did him good service
long afterwards, for it induced many of the generous English people to
take a romantic interest in him, and to think much better of him than he
ever deserved. He fled in the night, with not more than sixty followers,
to the house of a Catholic lady in Staffordshire. There, for his greater
safety, the whole sixty left him. He cropped his hair, stained his face
and hands brown as if they were sunburnt, put on the clothes of a
labouring countryman, and went out in the morning with his axe in his
hand, accompanied by four wood-cutters who were brothers, and another man
who was their brother-in-law. These good fellows made a bed for him
under a tree, as the weather was very bad; and the wife of one of them
brought him food to eat; and the old mother of the four brothers came and
fell down on her knees before him in the wood, and thanked God that her
sons were engaged in saving his life. At night, he came out of the
forest and went on to another house which was near the river Severn, with
the intention of passing into Wales; but the place swarmed with soldiers,
and the bridges were guarded, and all the boats were made fast. So,
after lying in a hayloft covered over with hay, for some time, he came
out of his place, attended by COLONEL CARELESS, a Catholic gentleman who
had met him there, and with whom he lay hid, all next day, up in the
shady branches of a fine old oak. It was lucky for the King that it was
September-time, and that the leaves had not begun to fall, since he and
the Colonel, perched up in this tree, could catch glimpses of the
soldiers riding about below, and could hear the crash in the wood as they
went about beating the boughs.

After this, he walked and walked until his feet were all blistered; and,
having been concealed all one day in a house which was searched by the
troopers while he was there, went with LORD WIL