s that they would support his cause. With their aid
Charles thought himself strong enough to strike a blow at the Government
in Edinburgh; and the Irish Catholics promised to support by their
landing in Argyleshire a rising of the Highlanders under Montrose. None
of the king's schemes proved so fatal to his cause as these. On their
discovery officer after officer in his own army flung down their
commissions, the peers who had fled to Oxford fled back again to London,
and the Royalist reaction in the Parliament itself came utterly to an
end. Scotland, anxious for its own safety, hastened to sign the
Covenant; and on the twenty-fifth of September 1643 the Commons, "with
uplifted hands," swore in St. Margaret's church to observe it. They
pledged themselves to "bring the Churches of God in the three Kingdoms
to the nearest conjunction and uniformity in religion, confession of
faith, form of Church government, direction for worship, and
catechizing; that we, and our posterity after us, may as brethren live
in faith and love, and the Lord may delight to live in the midst of us";
to extirpate Popery, prelacy, superstition, schism, and profaneness; to
"preserve the rights and privileges of the Parliament, and the liberties
of the Kingdom"; to punish malignants and opponents of reformation in
Church and State; to "unite the two Kingdoms in a firm peace and union
to all posterity." The Covenant ended with a solemn acknowledgement of
national sin, and a vow of reformation. "Our true, unfeigned purpose,
desire, and endeavour for ourselves and all others under our power and
charge, both in public and private, in all duties we owe to God and man,
is to amend our lives, and each to go before another in the example of a
real reformation."

[Sidenote: Pym's plan for 1644.]

The conclusion of the Covenant had been the last work of Pym. He died on
December 6, 1643, and a "Committee of the Two Kingdoms" which was
entrusted after his death with the conduct of the war and of foreign
affairs did their best to carry out the plans he had formed for the
coming year. The vast scope of these plans bears witness to his amazing
ability. Three strong armies, comprising a force of fifty thousand men,
appeared in the field in the spring of 1644, ready to co-operate with
the Scots in the coming campaign. The presence of the Scottish army
indeed changed the whole face of the war. With Lord Leven at its head,
it crossed the Border in January "in a great