1.  The ordinances had distinguished two classes of delinquents, the one religious, the other political.  The first comprised all Catholic recusants, all persons whomsoever, who, having attained the age of twenty-one, should refuse to abjure upon oath the doctrines peculiar to the Catholic creed.  These were reputed papists, and had been made to forfeit two-thirds of their real and personal estates, which were seized for the benefit of the kingdom by the commissioners of sequestration appointed in each particular county.  The second comprehended all persons who were known to have fought against the parliament, or to have aided the royal party with money, men, provisions, advice, or information; and of these the whole estates, both real and personal, had been sequestrated, with the sole exception of one-fifth allotted for the support of their wives and children, if the latter were educated in the Protestant religion.—­Elsynge’s Ordinances. 3, 22, et seq.

2.  These sequestrated estates not only furnished a yearly income, but also a ready supply on every sudden emergency.  Thus when Colonel Harvey refused to march till his regiment had received the arrears of its pay, amounting to three thousand pounds, an ordinance was immediately passed to raise the money by the sale of woods belonging to Lord Petre, in the county of Essex.—­Journals, vi, 519.  When a complaint was made of a scarcity of timber for the repairs of the navy, the two houses authorized certain shipwrights to fell two thousand five hundred oak trees on the estates of delinquents in Kent and Essex.—­Ibid, 520.  When the Scots demanded a month’s pay for their army, the committee at Goldsmiths’ Hall procured the money by offering for sale such property of delinquents as they judged expedient, the lands at eight, the houses at six years’ purchase.—­Journals of Commons, June 10, 24, 1644.

3.  But the difficulty of procuring ready money by sales induced the commissioners to look out for some other expedient; and when the sum of fifteen thousand pounds was wanted to put the army of Fairfax in motion, it was raised without delay by offering to delinquents the restoration of their sequestrated estates, on the immediate payment of a certain fine.—­Commons’ Journals, Sept. 13, 1644.  The success of this experiment encouraged them to hold out a similar indulgence to such persons as were willing to quit the royal party, provided they were not Catholics, and would take the oath of abjuration of the Catholic doctrine.—­Ibid.  March 6, August 12, 1645; May 4, June 26, Sept. 3, 1646.  Afterwards, on the termination of the war, the great majority of the royalists were admitted to make their compositions with the committee.  Of the fines required, the greater number amounted to one-tenth, many to one-sixth, and a few to one-third of the whole property, both real and personal, of the delinquents.—­(See the Journals of both houses for the years 1647, 1648.)

NOTE C, p. 241.