nd presbyterian
forms of church government, and in charges and recriminations as to the
real authors of the distress and necessity which had led to the cessation
in Ireland. On the twentieth day nothing had been concluded. A proposal
to prolong the negotiation was rejected by the two houses, and the
commissioners returned to London and Oxford.[a] The royalists had, however,
discovered that Vane, St. John, and Prideaux had come to Uxbridge not
so much to treat, as to act the part of spies on the conduct of their
colleagues; and that there existed an irreconcilable difference of opinion
between the two parties, the Presbyterians seeking the restoration
of royalty, provided it could be accomplished with perfect safety to
themselves, and with the legal establishment of their religious worship,
while the Independents sought nothing less than the total downfall of the
throne, and the extinction of the privileges of the nobility.[1]

Both parties again appealed to the sword, but with very different prospects
before them; on the side of the royalists all was lowering and gloomy, on
that of the parliament bright and cheering. The king had

[Footnote 1: See Journals, vii. 163, 166, 169, 174, 181, 195, 211, 231,
239, 242-254; Clarendon, ii. 578-600.]

[Sidenote a: A.D. 1645. Feb. 22.]

derived but little of that benefit which he expected from the cessation in
Ireland. He dared not withdraw the bulk of his army before he had concluded
a peace with the insurgents; and they, aware of his difficulties, combined
their demands, which he knew not how to grant, with an offer of aid which
he was unwilling to refuse. They demanded freedom of religion, the repeal
of Poyning's law, a parliamentary settlement of their estates, and a
general amnesty, with this exception, that an inquiry should be instituted
into all acts of violence and bloodshed not consistent with the
acknowledged usages of war, and that the perpetrators should be punished
according to their deserts, without distinction of party or religion. It
was the first article which presented the chief difficulty. The Irish urged
the precedent of Scotland; they asked no more than had been conceded to the
Covenanters; they had certainly as just a claim to the free exercise of
that worship, which had been the national worship for ages, as the Scots
could have, to the exclusive establishment of a form of religion which had
not existed during an entire century. But Charles, in addition to