could not be obliged to
fight but with advantage, the Parliament's forces being superior in
number, and therefore, when they attacked him, he galled them with
his cannon, and declining to come to a general battle, stood upon the
defensive, expecting Prince Rupert with the horse.

The Parliament's forces had some advantage over our foot, and took the
Earl of Cleveland prisoner. But the king, whose foot were not above
one to two, drew his men under the cannon of Donnington Castle, and
having secured his artillery and baggage, made a retreat with his foot
in very good order, having not lost in all the fight above 300 men,
and the Parliament as many. We lost five pieces of cannon and took
two, having repulsed the Earl of Manchester's men on the north side of
the town, with considerable loss.

The king having lodged his train of artillery and baggage in
Donnington Castle, marched the next day for Oxford. There we joined
him with 3000 horse and 2000 foot. Encouraged with this reinforcement,
the king appears upon the hills on the north-west of Newbury, and
faces the Parliament army. The Parliament having too many generals as
well as soldiers, they could not agree whether they should fight or
no. This was no great token of the victory they boasted of, for they
were now twice our number in the whole, and their foot three for one.
The king stood in battalia all day, and finding the Parliament forces
had no stomach to engage him, he drew away his cannon and baggage out
of Donnington Castle in view of their whole army, and marched away to
Oxford.

This was such a false step of the Parliament's generals, that all the
people cried shame of them. The Parliament appointed a committee to
inquire into it. Cromwell accused Manchester, and he Waller, and so
they laid the fault upon one another. Waller would have been glad to
have charged it upon Essex, but as it happened he was not in the army,
having been taken ill some days before. But as it generally is when a
mistake is made, the actors fall out among themselves, so it was here.
No doubt it was as false a step as that of Cornwall, to let the king
fetch away his baggage and cannon in the face of three armies, and
never fire a shot at them.

The king had not above 8000 foot in his army, and they above 25,000.
Tis true the king had 8000 horse, a fine body, and much superior to
theirs; but the foot might, with the greatest ease in the world, have
prevented the removing the cannon, an