treaty at Newcastle. For what had been the news, and continued to be
the news, post after post? Colonel Whetham, Governor of Portsmouth,
formerly Monk's associate in the Scottish Council, now in declared
cooperation with him, and holding the town for the Rump; Hasilrig,
Morley, and Walton, gone to Portsmouth to turn the revolt to
account; these and other members of the late Rump, such as Neville;
Scott, and Sir Anthony Ashley Cooper, openly resuming their functions
and issuing documents in which they declared General Monk, "the
ablest and most experienced commander in these nations," to be
"warranted in his present actings" by their express commission;
risings or threatenings of risings in various parts of England,
whether Royalist or Republican not known, but equally troublesome to
the existing powers; Admiral Lawson and his Fleet actually in the
Thames with an avowal at length of allegiance to the late Parliament
only, and resisting all Vane's persuasions the other way; the Army in
Ireland, which had seemed so safe, now in a confused ferment, with
Sir Hardress Waller, Sir Charles Coote, Colonel Theophilus Jones, and
others, promoting a general demonstration in Monk's behalf! Lambert's
own Army was infected. That part of it which was called the Irish
Brigade, as consisting of regiments that had been brought from
Ireland at the time of Sir George Booth's insurrection, sympathised
with Monk openly; the rest were dubious or listless. In the rear of
Lambert in Yorkshire, though he can hardly yet have known the fact,
Lord Fairfax was organising a movement, really with Royalist aims,
but to take the form of a concerted combination with Monk as soon as
Monk should advance. But it was in London itself, close round the
powers at Whitehall, that their weakness had become most notorious
and alarming. For some time the Lord Mayor, Aldermen, and Common
Council had been acting almost as an independent authority; the
citizens were resolute against the payment of taxes, and had formed
associations to resist their collection; all that was Cavalierish in
the city was astir, with all that was Republican, in daily displays
of contempt for the Wallingford-House junta and their soldiery.
Hewson's regiment, marching through the city, had been jeered at by
the apprentices and pelted with stones. In the centre of these London
tumults, Fleetwood, the Commander-in-chief, and the honorary head of
the Government, had shown himself incapable even o