* Whitlocke, p. 66. Rush. vol. vi. p. 152. Clarendon, vol.
iii. p. 151.

* Rush. vol. vi. D. 92, 100.

* Rush. vol. vi. p. 262.

[Illustration: 1-671-gloucester.jpg GLOUCESTER]

But the most memorable actions of valor during this winter season were
performed in the west. When Sir Ralph Hopton with his small troop,
retired into Cornwall before the earl of Bedford, that nobleman,
despising so inconsiderable a force, abandoned the pursuit, and
committed the care of suppressing the royal party to the sheriffs of the
county. But the affections of Cornwall were much inclined to the
king's service. While Sir Richard Duller and Sir Alexander Carew lay
at Launceston, and employed themselves in executing the parliament's
ordinance for the militia, a meeting of the county was assembled
at Truro; and after Hopton produced his commission from the earl of
Hertford, the king's general, it was agreed to execute the laws, and
to expel these invaders of the county. The train bands were accordingly
levied, Launceston taken, and all Cornwall reduced to peace and to
obedience under the king.

It had been usual for the royal party, on the commencement of these
disorders, to claim on all occasions the strict execution of the laws,
which, they knew, were favorable to them; and the parliament, rather
than have recourse to the plea of necessity, and avow the transgression
of any statute, had also been accustomed to warp the laws, and by forced
constructions to interpret them in their own favor.[*]

* Clarerdon, vol. iii. p. 130.

But though the king was naturally the gainer by such a method of
conducting war, and it was by favor of law that the train, bands were
raised in Cornwall, it appeared that those maxims were now prejudicial
to the royal party. These troops could not legally, without their
own consent, be carried out of the county; and consequently it was
impossible to push into Devonshire the advantage which they had
obtained. The Cornish royalists, therefore, bethought themselves of
levying a force which might be more serviceable. Sir Bevil Granville,
the most beloved man of that country, Sir Ralph Hopton, Sir Nicholas
Slanning, Arundel, and Trevannion undertook as their own charges to
raise an army for the king; and their great interest in Cornwall soon
enabled them to effect their purpose. The parliament, alarmed at this
appearance of the royalists, gave a commission to Ruthven, a Scotchman,
governo