death between the Commonwealth and Spain, war in the new world and war in the old, and Spain was thus naturally to adopt the cause of Charles II., and employ exiled English Royalism everywhere as one of her agencies,—­Of the consciousness of the Lord-Protector and the Council of this increased complexity of the foreign relations of the Commonwealth in consequence of the rupture with Spain there is a curious incidental illustration.  “That several volumes of the book called The New Atlas be bought for the use of the Council, and that the Globe heretofore standing in the Council Chamber be again brought thither,” had been one of the Council’s instructions to Thurloe at their meeting of Oct. 2.  Thenceforth, doubtless, both the Globe and the Atlas were to be much in request.—­More important, however, than such fixed apparatus in the Council Room was the moving instrumentality of envoys and diplomatists in the chief European cities and capitals.  Above all, an able ambassador in Paris was now an absolute necessity.  Nor was the fit man wanting.  Among the former Royalists of the Presbyterian section that had become reconciled to the Commonwealth, and attached to the Protector by strong personal loyalty, was the Scottish WILLIAM LOCKHART, member for Lanarkshire in the late Parliament.  He had been trained to arms in France in his youth, and had since then served as a Colonel among the Scots.  In this capacity he had been in Hamilton’s Army of the Engagement, defeated by Cromwell at Preston, and in David Leslie’s subsequent Army for Charles II., defeated at Dunbar.  Having received some insults from Charles, of such a kind that he had declared that “no King on earth should use him in that manner,” he had snapped his connexion with the Stuarts before the Battle of Worcester; and for some time after that battle he had lived moodily in Scotland, meditating a return to France for military employment.  A visit to London and an interview with Cromwell had retained his talents for the service of the Protectorate, and his affection for that service had been confirmed by his marriage, in 1654, with Robina Sewster, the orphan niece of the Protector.  Altogether Cromwell had judged him to be the very man to represent the Protectorate at Paris, and be even a match for Mazarin.  He was now thirty-four years of age.  He was nominated to the embassy in December 1655; but he did not go to his post till the following April.—­Hardly a less important appointment was that, in January 1655-6, of young Edward Montague to be one of the Admirals of the Fleet.  Blake, who had been cruising off Cadiz, and on whom there was the chief dependence for action against the Spaniards at sea, had felt the responsibility too great, and had applied for a colleague.  Penn, being in disgrace, was out of the question; and Montague, then a member of the Protector’s Council, was chosen.  He had been one of Cromwell’s favourites and disciples since the days of Marston Moor and Naseby, when, though hardly out of his teens, he had distinguished himself highly as a Parliamentary Colonel.  Henceforth the sea was to be his chief element; and, as Admiral or General at sea, he was to become very famous.[1]