Parliament every satisfaction, he had thought it best not to incense the City by the extreme insult of unhinging the gates and wedging the portcullises.  The Rumpers were in ecstasies.  Monk had committed himself, and was irredeemably theirs.  “All is our own:  he will be honest,” said Hasilrig to the friends beside him.  In their triumph, they rose once more for a moment to the full height of Republican confidence.  It happened that a deputation of London citizens, headed by Mr. Praise-God Barebone, had come to the House that day with a petition and address, signed by some thousands of “lovers of the good old cause,” who were anxious to disclaim all connexion with the City tumults and with “the promoters of regal interest” in the City or elsewhere.  The petitioners demanded nothing less than that the House should at once impose an oath abjuring Charles Stuart upon all clergymen and other persons in public employment; but even this did not prevent the House from thanking them cordially.  As for the City generally, now that Monk had brought it to submission, the House would trample it under foot!  The Lord Mayor, having behaved discreetly through the tumults, was to be thanked; but it was voted that the present Common Council should be dissolved and a new one elected by such citizens only as the House should deem worthy of the franchise.  Nor was Monk to hesitate any longer about the city gates and portcullises.  Orders were sent to him, not only to unhinge the gates and wedge the portcullises, as the Council had already ordered, but to break them in pieces.  The City was to be overmastered utterly and finally, and Monk was to be the agent.—­Not even yet did Monk rebel.  The gates and portcullises were broken in pieces by his soldiers, and every other order was punctually carried out.  The soldiers were in indignation over their base employment, and the citizens were stupefied.  In vain were Clarges, Dr. Barrow, and others of Monk’s friends going about and assuring the Lord Mayor and Aldermen that the General was a man of very peculiar ways and must not be too hastily judged.  “Very peculiar ways indeed,” thought the citizens, mourning for their honours lost, and their broken gates and portcullises.  On the night of Friday, Feb. 10, when Monk returned to Whitehall, after his two days of rough work in the city, it was, as it seemed, with his reputation ruined for ever among the Londoners.  A few days before he had been the popular demigod, the man on whom all depended, and who had all in his power.  Now what was he but the slave and hireling of the Rump?[1]

[Footnote 1:  Commons Journals of dates; Phillips, 684-685; Skinner, 211-219; Whitlocke, IV. 394-396.]