That tradition was Lord Linnaeus Clancharlie.

Linnaeus Baron Clancharlie, a contemporary of Cromwell, was one of the peers of England—­few in number, be it said—­who accepted the republic.  The reason of his acceptance of it might, indeed, for want of a better, be found in the fact that for the time being the republic was triumphant.  It was a matter of course that Lord Clancharlie should adhere to the republic, as long as the republic had the upper hand; but after the close of the revolution and the fall of the parliamentary government, Lord Clancharlie had persisted in his fidelity to it.  It would have been easy for the noble patrician to re-enter the reconstituted upper house, repentance being ever well received on restorations, and Charles II. being a kind prince enough to those who returned to their allegiance to him; but Lord Clancharlie had failed to understand what was due to events.  While the nation overwhelmed with acclamation the king come to retake possession of England, while unanimity was recording its verdict, while the people were bowing their salutation to the monarchy, while the dynasty was rising anew amidst a glorious and triumphant recantation, at the moment when the past was becoming the future, and the future becoming the past, that nobleman remained refractory.  He turned his head away from all that joy, and voluntarily exiled himself.  While he could have been a peer, he preferred being an outlaw.  Years had thus passed away.  He had grown old in his fidelity to the dead republic, and was therefore crowned with the ridicule which is the natural reward of such folly.

He had retired into Switzerland, and dwelt in a sort of lofty ruin on the banks of the Lake of Geneva.  He had chosen his dwelling in the most rugged nook of the lake, between Chillon, where is the dungeon of Bonnivard, and Vevay, where is Ludlow’s tomb.  The rugged Alps, filled with twilight, winds, and clouds, were around him; and he lived there, hidden in the great shadows that fall from the mountains.  He was rarely met by any passer-by.  The man was out of his country, almost out of his century.  At that time, to those who understood and were posted in the affairs of the period, no resistance to established things was justifiable.  England was happy; a restoration is as the reconciliation of husband and wife, prince and nation return to each other, no state can be more graceful or more pleasant.  Great Britain beamed with joy; to have a king at all was a good deal—­but furthermore, the king was a charming one.  Charles II. was amiable—­a man of pleasure, yet able to govern; and great, if not after the fashion of Louis XIV.  He was essentially a gentleman.  Charles II. was admired by his subjects.  He had made war in Hanover for reasons best known to himself; at least, no one else knew them.  He had sold Dunkirk to France, a manoeuvre of state policy.  The Whig peers, concerning whom Chamberlain says, “The cursed republic infected with its