fly moved by a personal hatred of the favourite;[293] and their
real charges against him amounted to little more than pretences and
aggravations. The king, whose personal affections were always strong,
considered his friend innocent; and there was a warm, romantic feature
in the character of the youthful monarch, which scorned to sacrifice his
faithful companion to his own interests, and to immolate the minister to
the clamours of the commons. Subsequently, when the king did this in the
memorable case of the guiltless Strafford, it was the only circumstance
which weighed on his mind at the hour of his own sacrifice! Sir Robert
Cotton told a friend, on the day on which the king went down to the
house of lords, and committed the two patriots, that "he had of late
been often sent for to the king and duke, and that the king's affection
towards him was very admirable, and no whit lessened. Certainly," he
added, "the king will never yield to the duke's fall, being a young man,
resolute, magnanimous, and tenderly and firmly affectionate where he
takes."[294] This authentic character of Charles the First, by that
intelligent and learned man, to whom the nation owes the treasures of
its antiquities, is remarkable. Sir Robert Cotton, though holding no
rank at court, and in no respect of the duke's party, was often
consulted by the king, and much in his secrets. How the king valued the
judgment of this acute and able adviser, acting on it in direct
contradiction and to the mortification of the favourite, I shall
probably have occasion to show.

The commons did not decline in the subtle spirit with which they had
begun; they covertly aimed at once to subjugate the sovereign, and to
expel the minister! A remonstrance was prepared against the levying of
tonnage and poundage, which constituted half of the crown revenues; and
a petition, "equivalent to a command," for removing Buckingham from his
majesty's person and councils.[295] The remonstrance is wrought up with
a high spirit of invective against "the unbridled ambition of the duke,"
whom they class "among those vipers and pests to their king and
commonwealth, as so expressly styled by your most royal father." They
request that "he would be pleased to remove this person from access to
his sacred presence, and that he would not balance this one man with all
these things, and with the affairs of the Christian world."

The king hastily dissolved this _second_ parliament; and when the