HISTORY REVISED.

Woodville Examiner, Volume 3, Issue 282, 10 September 1886, Page 2 (Supplement)

HISTORY REVISED.

NOTES BY THE BARON. At the dissolution of Oliver Cromwell, his son Richard, whom he had previously nominated Protector, stepped into his father’s shoes (literally, for he put them on). But he was a large-eyed, turned-down collar, pale-haired young man, the very antipodes of his father, and he seemed scarcely able to protect himself, let alone be the Protector of a Kingdom. He turned pale at the sight of a sword, was purturbed when told that he would have to keep track of the foreign possessions and see that none of them were pocketed in the night, and in fact he was only good at felling trees. The Ironsides, missing the Attila who had governed them so firmly for so long, grew mutinous, and bewildered Richard so much that ho resigned, and retired to his farm at Cheshunt. Now followed a year of anarchy ; then Monk, who commanded the army, and so could command what he chose, declared for a free Parliament, which, not being convoked by a King—because there was none — was a very free convention indeed. It met April 25, and five days later a messenger came from Charles, who thought ho might as well make a bid for this Kingdom, which was up for auction. The King’s messenger bore the declaration from Breda, in which Charles said that, having been Breda King, he did not feel equal to taking a back seat, that they might go further and fare worse, whereas by coming to him they would be cheated at once and get the thing over. This was so satisfactory that Monk, by general acclamation, despatched an invitation to Charles, requesting the pleasure of his company to tea any time he liked to drop round. On May 29th, King Charles 11. entered London. Gigantic preparations had been made to honour his entry. The roads bad been watered, despite the dismay of the city councillors at this lavish expenditure. Several maimed and mutilated Chelsea pensioners were rigged up to look as if they were old cavaliers who had fought at Nasoby. Oliver’s army was specially retained to take up an imposing position on Blackheath, where they were to look as if the Restoration had raised their gas-bills, while the “Lord High Executioner” in the background suggestively heightened the effect. The crowd was immense, and amidst stifled exclamations of “Where are yer shovin’ to?—why don’t yer put yer toes in yer pocket—give up that hat, yer wagabond! —there he is I —what are yer talking about ? —that’s his groom!” and other cries of a similar nature, expressive of the loyal feejings of the populace, Charles made his triumphal advent into the metropolis. The King was at the summit of his popularity, and he took care to stock his purse while the people were in this happy mood, even plunging into a war with Holland, it is believed, solely for the purpose of appropriating the supplies voted for it. In the first year a victory was gained, but the fleet was so leaky that the splendid ships of the Dutch gave it toko. De Ruyter destroyed Sheerness, set fire to the ships off Chatham, and actually fired some of the chops of the channel at .S/#head over the flames ; Drake would have gone out and sunk some of those vessels ; Charles concluded peace a week later.

In 1666, London witnessed several “Nichts wi’ Burns,” We allude, of course, to the great fire. It did what the population of London would never have done —purified the city. Five men, whose initials formed the word cabal, formed the cable which kept Charles’ dissolute bark from drifting into utter ruin. His voluptuous nature and habits, which have earned for‘him the name of the “Merry Monarch” (at others’ expense), were alienating him from the nation. The first evidence of this was the plot of Titus Oates, a young man who had sown some very * ‘ wild oats’ ’ in his youth and was now endeavoring to reap a substantial crop. He had taken orders, and was supposed to know the nature of an oath. As a matter of fact, so he did, but it was in the utterance more than the observance that he was versed. Thought-reading was in embryo then, but Titus Oates first brought it into prominence by the nefarious uses to which he extensively applied it, and owing to the self-invented and ingenious method by which he was enabled to guard against failure in his seances, This was to hide criminating papers in the secretary of a secretary, one Edward Coleman, and then to make a solemn deposition before a magistrate that a “Popish plot” was afoot, which had for its object the assassination of tho King and the elevation, doubtless, of a better man to his position. At the same time he prophesied that certain papers would be discovered in a certain place, relying upon that unerring rule, “ he who hides knows where to find.” It was not difficult for him to find men who would have perjured themselves beyond redemption for half-a-crown, and would have sold their souls to Satan —if that brimstone personage had been willing to deal in such worthless merchandize —for a whole one, and these eagerly confirmed his tale, with additional particulars more voluntary than veritable.

He also took the precaution to have the magistrate, SirEdmondabury Godfrey, before whom ho had filed his claim to a prominent position in Nick’s luoifer manufactory, murdered. This was probably due to a humble sense of his own vicious habits having made his unsupported evidence a subject of considerable doubt, and to be taken cum grano Sala; but the discovery of this body in a field, with a sword stowed away between its riba, seemed to afford incontesibla proof that he had been the victim of a conspiracy, for orderly and well-behaved bodies don’t, as a rule, throw themselves, like Saul, upon the point of their swords, unless they want to catch cold (steel). During all the time that Sir Edmondsbury had sat upon the bench, he had been known for his integrity and hatred of mendacity, but he was now, for the first time, obliged to lie upon a board.

For they lifted him up from hia flowery bed, Where he’d made his finishing flatter ; With two men at his feet, and two men at hia head, They carried him home on a shutter.

This was a clincher, and you might have thought that the people of London had been anointed with a certain pigment, which made them madder than they had ever been before. Shops were closed, business was at a standstill, and the sole engrossing topic was “Has anything more been found out?” which could not be, seeing that half London thronged the streets in resolute determination not to be found in on such an untoward occasion, Oates was implicitly believed, and, strange to say, it never occurred to anyone that he might be chaffing them ; he was hayled as a public benefactor, an unmerited honor which he was very willing to accept. A pension was awarded him, and rooms assigned him in Whitehall, whereas apartments in Whitefriars would have suited a man of his calibre infinitely better. Plots were now the rage. It became the fashion to go about, like a second Diogenes without the lantern, looking not for an honest man but for evidences of a dishonest one. Other news-mongers, following in the steps of Oates, sprang up like weeds ; Dangerfield, whose meal-tub plot was rendered famous by the contents of the receptacle in which he predicted the criminating papers would be found having been prematurely converted into bread, papers and all, before a search could be made; Bedloe, the terminating { syllable of whose name affords a brief yet ! ample description of hia character ; his was I the stoak-and-onions plot, I

When numbera of the Roman Catholics had prevented the state axe from rusting, that nine days wonder had subsided, and a new one took its place. In 1679 the Parliament erected a great bulwark of British freedom by passing the Habeas Corpus Act. The opening words of this famous writ, in the vernacular, arc : “ Habeas Corpus , ad faciendum, subjiciendum, et recipiendum," Hid., which, translated, means —“Have you the corpse? Dump it down, then ; and imbibe whatever the Court shall order.”