[Footnote 1:  The papers given in during this treaty may be seen in the Lords’ Journals, x. 474-618.  The best account is that composed by order of the king himself, for the use of the prince of Wales.—­Clarendon Papers, ii. 425-449.  I should add, that a new subject of discussion arose incidentally during the conferences.  The lord Inchiquin had abandoned the cause of the parliament in Ireland, and, at his request, Ormond had been sent from Paris by the queen and the prince, to resume the government, with a commission to make peace with the Catholic party.  Charles wrote to him two letters (Oct. 10, 28.—­Carte, ii.  App. xxxi. xxxii.), ordering him to follow the queen’s instructions, to obey no commands from himself as long as he should be under restraint, and not to be startled at his concessions respecting Ireland, for they would come to nothing.  Of these letters the houses were ignorant; but they got possession of one from Ormond to the Irish Catholics, and insisted that Charles should order the lord lieutenant to desist.  This he eluded for some time, alleging that if the treaty took effect, their desire was already granted by his previous concessions; if it did not, no order of his would be obeyed.  At last he consented, and wrote the letter required.—­Journals, x. 576-578, 597, 618.  Clarendon Papers, ii. 441, 445, 452.]

[Sidenote a:  A.D. 1648.  Nov. 5.] [Sidenote b:  A.D. 1648.  Sept. 11.]

or compulsion; that the proceedings in law should be shortened, and the charges ascertained; that tithes for the support of the clergy, and perpetual imprisonment for debt, should be abolished; and that the parliament “should lay to heart the blood spilt, and the rapine perpetrated by commission from the king, and consider whether the justice of God could be satisfied, or his wrath be appeased, by an act of oblivion.”  This instrument is the more deserving of attention, because it points out the political views which actuated the leaders of the party.[1]

In the army, flushed as it was with victory, and longing for revenge, maxims began to prevail of the most dangerous tendency in respect of the royal captive.  The politicians maintained that no treaty could be safely made with the king, because if he were under restraint, he could not be bound by his consent; if he were restored to liberty, he could not be expected to make any concessions.  The fanatics went still further.  They had read in the book of Numbers that “blood defileth the land, and the land cannot be cleansed of the blood that is shed therein, but by the blood of him that shed it;” and hence they inferred that it was a duty, imposed on them by the God who had given them the victory, to call the king to a strict account for all the blood which had been shed during the civil war.  Among these, one of the most eminent was Colonel Ludlow, a member of parliament, who, having persuaded himself that the anger of God could be appeased only by the death of Charles, laboured, though in vain, to make Fairfax a convert to his opinion.  He proved more successful with Ireton, whose regiment petitioned[a] the commander-in-chief,