the real source of their security, proved, however, a cause of constant solicitude to the leaders.  The pay of the officers and men was always in arrear; the debentures which they received could be seldom exchanged for money without a loss of fifty, sixty, or seventy per cent.; and the plea of necessity was accepted as an excuse for the illegal claim of free quarters which they frequently exercised.  To supply their wants, recourse was therefore had to additional taxation, with occasional grants from the excise, and large sales of forfeited property;[1] and, to appease the discontent of the people, promises were repeatedly made, that a considerable portion of the armed force should be disbanded, and the practice of free quarter be abolished.  But of these promises, the first proved a mere delusion; for, though some partial reductions were made, on the whole the amount of the army continued to increase; the second was fulfilled; but in return, the burthen of taxation was augmented; for the monthly assessment on the counties gradually swelled from sixty to ninety, to one hundred and twenty, and in conclusion, to one hundred and sixty thousand pounds.[2]

Another subject of disquietude sprung out of those principles of liberty which, even after the suppression of the late mutiny, were secretly cherished and occasionally avowed, by the soldiery.  Many, indeed, confided in the patriotism, and submitted to the judgment, of their officers; but there were also many who condemned the existing government as a desertion of the

[Footnote 1:  Journals, 1649, April 18, Oct. 4; 1650, March 30; 1651, Sept. 2, Dec. 17; 1652, April 7.]

[Footnote 2:  Journals, 1649, April 7, Aug. 1, Dec. 7; 1650, May 21, Nov. 26; 1651, April 15, Sept. 1, Dec. 19; 1652, Dec. 10; 1653, Nov. 24.]

good cause in which they had originally embarked.  By the latter Lilburne was revered as an apostle and a martyr; they read with avidity the publications which repeatedly issued from his cell; and they condemned as persecutors and tyrants the men who had immured him and his companions in the Tower.  Preparations had been made[a] to bring them to trial as the authors of the late mutiny; but, on more mature deliberation, the project was abandoned,[b] and an act was passed making it treason to assert that the government was tyrannical, usurped, or unlawful.  No enactments, however, could check the hostility of Lilburne; and a new pamphlet from his pen,[c] in vindication of “The Legal Fundamental Liberties of the People,” put to the test the resolution of his opponents.  They shrunk from the struggle; it was judged more prudent to forgive, or more dignified to despise, his efforts; and, on his petition for leave to visit his sick family, he obtained his discharge.[1]