quiet. The same written engagement had been exacted from
Hasilrig and Scott.--But what of the Army, the original maker of the
Commonwealth, its defender and preserver through good report and bad
report for eleven years, and with strength surely to maintain it yet,
or make a stand in its behalf? The question is rather difficult. It
may be granted that something of the general exhaustion, the fatigue
and weariness of incessant change, the longing to be at rest by any
means, had come upon the Army itself. Not the less true is it that
Republicanism was yet the general creed of the Army, and that, could
a universal vote have been taken through the regiments in England,
Scotland, and Ireland, it would have kept out Charles Stuart. Nay, so
engrained was the Republican feeling in the ranks of the soldiery,
and so gloomily were they watching Monk, that, could any suitable
proportion of them have been brought together, and could any fit
leader have been present to hold up his sword for the Commonwealth,
they would have rallied round him with acclamations. Precisely to
prevent this, however, had been Monk's care. One remembers his advice
from Scotland to Richard Cromwell nineteen months ago, when Richard
was entering on his Protectorate. It was to cashier boldly. Not an
officer in the Army, he had said, would have interest enough, if he
were once cashiered, to draw two men after him in opposition to any
existing Government. The very soul of Monk lies in that maxim, and he
had been acting on it himself. Not only, as we have seen, had he
reofficered his own army in Scotland with the utmost pains before
venturing on his march into England; but, since his coming into
England, he had still been discharging officers, and appointing or
promoting others. He had done so while still conducting himself as
the servant of the Restored Rump; and he had done so again very
particularly after he had become Commander-in-chief for the
Parliament of the Secluded Members. The consequence was most apparent
in that portion of the Army which was more especially his own,
consisting of the regiments he had brought from Scotland, and that
were now round him in London. The officers--Knight, Read, Clobery,
Hubblethorn, &c.--were all men accustomed to Monk, or of his latest
choosing. His difficulty had been greater with the many dispersed
regiments away from London, once Fleetwood's and Lambert's. Not only
was there no bond of attachment between them and Monk;