learn that there is now no Letter, only a mere selvage of paper, and a leaf wanting between two leaves. It was stolen, none knows when; but stolen it is;—which forces me to continue my Introduction some nine years farther, instead of ending it at this point. Did some zealous Oxford Doctor cut the Letter out, as one weeds a hemlock from a parsley-bed; that so the Ashmole Museum might be cleansed, and yield only pure nutriment to mankind? Or was it some collector of autographs, eager beyond law? Whoever the thief may be, he is probably dead long since; and has answered for this,—and also, we may fancy, for heavier thefts, which were likely to be charged upon him. If any humane individual ever henceforth get his eye upon the Letter, let him be so kind as send a copy of it to the Publishers of this Book, and no questions will be asked.[1]
1627
A Deed of Sale, dated 20th June 1627, still testifies that Hinchinbrook this year passed out of the hands of the Cromwells into those of the Montagues.[2] The price was 3000l.; curiously divided into two parcels, down to shillings and pence,—one of the parcels being already a creditor’s. The Purchaser is ‘Sir Sidney Montague, Knight, of Barnwell, one of his Majesty’s Masters of the Requests.’ Sir Oliver Cromwell, son of the Golden Knight, having now burnt out his splendour, disappeared in this way from Hinchinbrook; retired deeper into the Fens, to a place of his near Ramsey Mere, where he continued still thirty years longer to reside, in an eclipsed manner. It was to this house at Ramsey that Oliver, our Oliver, then Captain Cromwell in the Parliament’s service, paid the domiciliary visit much talked of in the old Books. The reduced Knight, his Uncle, was a Royalist or Malignant; and his house had to be searched for arms, for munitions, for furnishings of any sort, which he might be
