pass that if he could be saved at all it could only be by the ruthless employment of despotic power, ‘loose and absolved from all rules of government;’ but he failed in this to secure the support of the king. As far as words could give power he had backing enough. On 3 Aug. a patent appointed him ‘captain-general over the army in Ireland, and of such in England as the king by his sign manual shall add thereunto to resist all invasions and seditious attempts in England, Ireland, and Wales, and to be led into Scotland there to invade, kill, and slay.’ He was to lead these troops into ‘any of the king's dominions, with power to suppress rebellion or commotions within any of the three kingdoms or Wales’ (Abstract of the patent in Carte MSS. i. 240).
This patent is the best comment on Strafford's declaration, ‘You have an army in Ireland you may employ here to reduce this kingdom.’ That army never crossed the sea. The English force broke down before the Irish one was in a position to move. On 8 Aug. Strafford once more pleaded with the Spanish ambassadors for a loan, if it were but of 50,000l. This time the ambassadors forwarded to the cardinal-infant at Brussels a recommendation that the request should be granted, but before an answer could be received Charles's military power had fallen into a condition in which it was no longer worth helping. On 20 Aug. it was known that the Scots had crossed the Tweed. Strafford persuaded himself that such a disgrace would rally England round the king. On the 27th he appealed to the gentry of his own county of Yorkshire, telling them that they were bound to resist invasion ‘by the common law of England, by the law of nature, and by the law of reason’ (Rushworth, ii. 12, 35). On the very next day, 28 Aug., the Scots defeated Conway at Newburn, and his beaten troops had afterwards to fall back on York, where the main body of the English army was gathering in a sullen mood.
That army was now virtually under Strafford's command, as he was himself lieutenant-general; and Northumberland, the general, had remained in the south in broken health. To the king Strafford maintained his wonted cheerfulness. To his bosom friend Sir G. Radcliffe he acknowledged the hopelessness of the situation. ‘Pity me,’ he wrote, ‘for never came any man to so lost a business. The army altogether necessitous and unprovided of all necessaries. That part which I bring now with me from Durham, the worst I ever saw. Our horse all cowardly; the country from Berwick to York in the power of the Scots; an universal affright in all; a general disaffection to the king's service; none sensible of his dishonour. In one word, here alone to fight with all these evils, without any one to help. God of his goodness deliver me out of this the greatest evil of my life’ (Whitaker, Life of Radcliffe, p. 203).
To some extent Strafford had been right in thinking that Englishmen would be roused by a Scottish invasion. On 13 Sept. he persuaded the Yorkshiremen to support their own trained bands, a success which Charles rewarded by making him a knight of the Garter. Other counties in the northern midlands seemed likely to follow the example of Yorkshire; but this feeling did not extend to the south, and London was clamouring for redress of grievances by means of an English parliament. On 24 Sept. the great council of peers having met at York, Charles announced to it that he had already issued writs for a parliament. In the great council Strafford urged the necessity of raising 200,000l. at once, and a deputation was sent to London to ask for a loan to that amount. With this Strafford's influence over affairs came to an end. On 6 Oct. he attempted in vain to inspirit the great council to resist the demands of the Scots, and on the 8th suggested in a private letter that the renewal of war might be marked by an attack of the Irish army upon the Scottish settlers in Ulster, with the object of driving them out of Ireland (ib. p. 206). By this time Strafford knew that the Scots were prepared to name him as a chief incendiary. When, on 28 Oct., the great council held its last session, even he did not venture to advise further resistance, and he knew enough of the temper of the new parliament which had by that time been elected to remain in Yorkshire when it met.
On 3 Nov. 1640 the Long parliament met, and Charles, either feeling the need of his counsel or moved by the intrigues of the personal enemies of the earl, sent for him, assuring him that if he came he ‘should not suffer in his person, honour, or fortune.’ Strafford set out on 6 Nov. ‘with more dangers beset, I believe,’ as he wrote, ‘than ever any man went out of Yorkshire’ (Whitaker, Life of Radcliffe, pp. 214, 228), reaching London on the 9th. On 10 Nov. the parliamentary committee on Irish affairs named a sub-committee to examine complaints that had reached it from Mountnorris and other of Strafford's enemies in Ireland. As this sub-committee was not to meet till the 12th, it was evident that the leaders of the House of Commons had no intention of acting in a
