after Scott and Robinson had joined him, in generalities which would have been thought crusty and uncivil, had not Gumble, or Price, or the physician Dr. Barrow, been always at hand to explain privately to disappointed persons that the General’s way was peculiar.  Only in one matter was he explicit himself.  He would not permit the least insinuation that he designed to bring in Charles.  At York he had caned one of his officers for having said something imprudent to that effect.[1]

[Footnote 1:  Skinner and Phillips ut supra; Letter of M. de Bordeaux to Mazarin, of date Jan. 21, in Guizot, II. 336-340.]

On the 30th of January, with whatever reluctance, the House did comply with Monk’s request, by issuing orders for the removal of Fleetwood’s regiments from London; and on the 1st of February the way was farther cleared by the appointment of Clarges to be commissary-general of the musters for England and Scotland.  There was a mutiny among Fleetwood’s soldiers on account of the disgrace put upon them, and also on account of their dislike of country quarters after the pleasures of London; but the mutiny only quickened the desire to get rid of them.  They were marched out by their officers; and on Friday the 3rd of February, Monk, who had come on to Barnet the day before, marched in with his army, by Gray’s Inn Lane, Chancery Lane, and the Strand.  They appeared to the citizens a very rough and battered soldiery indeed after their month’s march through the English snows, the horses especially lean and ragged.  That night, and all Saturday and Sunday, Monk was in quarters at Whitehall, receiving distinguished visitors.  Though asked to take his seat in the Council of State on Saturday, he declined to do so till he should see his way more clearly on the disputed question of the abjuration oath.[1]

[Footnote 1:  Commons Journals of dates; Skinner, 199-206; Phillips, 680-682.]

On Monday, Feb. 6, the House was assembled in state to see Monk introduced into it by Messrs. Scott and Robinson.  His designation among them was only “Commissioner Monk”; for, though he had been appointed Commander-in-Chief of all the Forces of England, Scotland, and Ireland, by a secret commission sent him by Hasilrig and a few other members of the old Council of State during the late interruption, that commission did not now hold, and he had really no other authority than that implied by his appointment before Lambert’s coup d’etat to be fellow-commissioner with Fleetwood, Ludlow, Hasilrig, Walton, and Morley for the regulation of the Army.  The last three of these, as still acting in the commission, were nominally his equals.  But every care was taken to testify to Monk the sense of his extraordinary services.  A chair was set for him opposite the Speaker; at the back of which, as he declined the invitation to be seated, he stood while the Speaker addressed him in a harangue of glowing thanks.  Then, with his hand on the chair, he spoke in return