of Bristol to the Parliamentary army, and the dispersion
of the last force Charles could gather from Wales in an attempt to
relieve Chester, were followed in September by news of the crushing and
irretrievable defeat of the "Great Marquis" at Philiphaugh. In the wreck
of the royal cause we may pause for a moment over an incident which
brings out in relief the best temper of both sides. Cromwell, who was
sweeping over the southern counties to trample out the last trace of
resistance, "spent much time with God in prayer before the storm" of
Basing House, where the Marquis of Winchester had held stoutly out
through the war for the king. The storm ended its resistance, and the
brave old Royalist was brought in a prisoner with his house flaming
around him. He "broke out," reports a Puritan bystander, "and said,
'that if the king had no more ground in England but Basing House, he
would adventure it as he did, and so maintain it to the uttermost,'
comforting himself in this matter 'that Basing House was called
Loyalty.'" Of loyalty such as this Charles was utterly unworthy. The
seizure of his papers at Naseby had hardly disclosed his earlier
intrigues with the Irish Catholics when the Parliament was able to
reveal to England a fresh treaty with them, which purchased no longer
their neutrality, but their aid, by the simple concession of every
demand they had made. The shame was without profit, for whatever aid
Ireland might have given came too late to be of service. The spring of
1646 saw the few troops who still clung to Charles surrounded and routed
at Stow. "You have done your work now," their leader, Sir Jacob Astley,
said bitterly to his conquerors, "and may go to play, unless you fall
out among yourselves."

CHAPTER X

THE ARMY AND THE PARLIAMENT

1646-1649

[Sidenote: The new struggle.]

With the close of the Civil War we enter on a time of confused
struggles, a time tedious and uninteresting in its outer details, but of
higher interest than even the war itself in its bearing on our after
history. Modern England, the England among whose thoughts and sentiments
we actually live, began, however dimly and darkly, with the triumph of
Naseby. Old things passed silently away. When Astley gave up his sword
the "work" of the generations which had struggled for Protestantism
against Catholicism, for public liberty against absolute rule, in his
own emphatic phrase, was "done." So far as these contests were
concerne