would tell this story to the sailors, and gain their good-will, it might
save future trouble.

Charles entered freely into this conspiracy, went on deck, talked
affably with the crew, told them the story concocted by the captain, and
soon had them so fully on his side, that they joined him in begging the
captain to change his course and land his passengers in France. Captain
Tattersall demurred somewhat at this, but soon let himself be convinced,
and headed his ship for the Gallic coast.

The wind was fair, the weather fine. Land was sighted before noon of the
16th. At one o'clock the prince and Lord Wilmot were landed at Fecamp, a
small French port. They had distanced the bloodhounds of the Parliament,
and were safe on foreign soil.

_CROMWELL AND THE PARLIAMENT._

The Parliament of England had defeated and put an end to the king; it
remained for Cromwell to put an end to the Parliament. "The Rump," the
remnant of the old Parliament was derisively called. What was left of
that great body contained little of its honesty and integrity, much of
its pride and incompetency. The members remaining had become infected
with the wild notion that they were the governing power in England, and
instead of preparing to disband themselves they introduced a bill for
the disbanding of the army. They had not yet learned of what stuff
Oliver Cromwell was made.

A bill had been passed, it is true, for the dissolution of the
Parliament, but in the discussion of how the "New Representative" was to
be chosen it became plainly evident that the members of the Rump
intended to form part of it, without the formality of re-election. A
struggle for power seemed likely to arise between the Parliament and the
army. It could have but one ending, with a man like Oliver Cromwell at
the head of the latter. The officers demanded that Parliament should
immediately dissolve. The members resolutely refused. Cromwell growled
his comments.

"As for the members of this Parliament," he said, "the army begins to
take them in disgust."

There was ground for it, he continued, in their selfish greed, their
interference with law and justice, the scandalous lives of many of the
members, and, above all, their plain intention to keep themselves in
power.

"There is little to hope for from such men for a settlement of the
nation," he concluded.

The war with Holland precipitated the result. This war acted as a
barometer for the Parliament. It was a