naval combat. In the first
meeting of the two fleets the Dutch were defeated, and the mercury of
Parliamentarian pride rose. In the next combat Van Tromp, the veteran
Dutch admiral, drove Blake with a shattered fleet into the Thames. Van
Tromp swept the Channel in triumph, with a broom at his mast-head. The
hopes of the members went down to zero. They agreed to disband in
November. Cromwell promised to reduce the army. But Blake put to sea
again, fought Van Tromp in a four days' running fight, and won the
honors of the combat. Up again went the mercury of Parliamentary hope
and pride. The members determined to continue in power, and not only
claimed the right to remain members of the new Parliament, but even to
revise the returns of the elected members, and decide for themselves if
they would have them as fellows.

The issue was now sharply drawn between army and Parliament. The
officers met and demanded that Parliament should at once dissolve, and
let the Council of State manage the new elections. A conference was held
between officers and members, at Cromwell's house, on April 19, 1653. It
ended in nothing. The members were resolute.

"Our charge," said Haslerig, arrogantly, "cannot be transferred to any
one."

The conference adjourned till the next morning, Sir Harry Vane engaging
that no action should be taken till it met again. Yet when it met the
next morning the leading members of Parliament were absent, Vane among
them. Their absence was suspicious. Were they pushing the bill through
the House in defiance of the army?

Cromwell was present,--"in plain black clothes, and gray worsted
stockings,"--a plain man, but one not safe to trifle with. The officers
waited a while for the members. They did not come. Instead there came
word that they were in their seats in the House, busily debating the
bill that was to make them rulers of the nation without consent of the
people, hurrying it rapidly through its several stages. If left alone
they would soon make it a law.

Then the man who had hurled Charles I. from his throne lost his
patience. This, in his opinion, had gone far enough. Since it had come
to a question whether a self-elected Parliament, or the army to which
England owed her freedom, should hold the balance of power, Cromwell was
not likely to hesitate.

"It is contrary to common honesty!" he broke out, angrily.

Leaving Whitehall, he set out for the House of Parliament, bidding a
company of musketeer