Lord General Essex did at one time think of Oxford, but preferred to take Reading first; is lying now scattered about Thame, and Brickhill in Buckinghamshire, much drenched with the unseasonable rains, in a very dormant, discontented condition.[1] Colonel Hampden is with him. There is talk of making Colonel Hampden Lord General. The immediate hopes of the world, however, are turned on ‘that valiant soldier and patriot of his country’ Sir William Waller, who has marched to discomfit the Malignants of the West.
On the 4th of this May, Cheapside Cross, Charing Cross, and other Monuments of Papist Idolatry were torn down by authority, ‘troops of soldiers sounding their trumpets, and all the people shouting’; the Book of Sports was also burnt on the ruins of the same.[2] In which days, too, all the people are working at the Fortification of London.
The ‘great Service,‘ spoken of in this Letter, we must still understand to be the deliverance of Lincolnshire in general; or if it were another, it did not take effect. No possibility yet of getting over into Yorkshire to coöperate with the Fairfaxes,—though they much need help, and there have been speculations of that and of other kinds.[3] For the War-tide breaks in very irregular billows upon our shores; at one time we are pretty clear of Newark and its Northern Papists; and anon ‘the Queen has got into Newark,’ and we are like to be submerged by them. As a general rule, intricate perilous difficulties abound; and cash is scarce. The Fairfaxes, meanwhile, last week, have gained a Victory at Wakefield;[4] which is a merciful encouragement.
- ↑ Rushworth, v. 290; May, p. 192.
- ↑ Lithgow (in Somers Tracts, iv. 536); Vicars (date incorrect), p. 327.
- ↑ Old Newspapers (30th May—12th June 1643), in Cromwelliana, p. 6.
- ↑ 21st May 1643: Letter by Lord Fairfax (in Rushworth, v. 268); Short Memorials, by the younger Fairfax (in Somers Tracts, v. 380).
