her hand, in
the east the prospects are most gloomy. There, the seven counties,
Norfolk, Suffolk, Essex, Cambridge, Herts, Lincoln, and Huntingdon, have
joined themselves into an association, and the king's followers dare not
lift their heads. At Lichfield, Lord Brook, a fierce opponent of bishops
and cathedrals, while besieging a party of Cavaliers who had taken
possession of the close, was shot in the eye and killed. These are the
only incidents that have taken place."

For some weeks no event of importance occurred. On the 22d of February
the queen, who had been absent on the Continent selling her jewels and
endeavoring to raise a force, landed at Burlington, with four ships,
having succeeded in evading the ships of war which the Commons had
dispatched to cut her off, under the command of Admiral Batten. That
night, however, the Parliament fleet arrived off the place, and opened
fire upon the ships and village. The queen was in a house near the
shore, and the balls struck in all directions round. She was forced to
get up, throw on a few clothes, and retire on foot to some distance from
the village to the shelter of a ditch, where she sat for two hours, the
balls sometimes striking dust over them, and singing round in all
directions. It was a question whether the small force which the queen
brought with her was not rather a hindrance than an assistance to the
royal cause, for the Earl of Newcastle, who had been sent to escort her
to York, was authorized by the king to raise men for the service,
without examining their consciences, that is to say, to receive
Catholics as well as Protestants. The Parliament took advantage of this
to style his army the Catholic Army, and this, and some tamperings with
the Papists in Ireland, increased the popular belief that the king
leaned toward Roman Catholicism, and thus heightened the feelings
against him, and embittered the religious as well as the political
quarrel.

Toward the end of March commissioners from the Parliament, under the
Earl of Northumberland, came to Oxford with propositions to treat. It is
questionable whether the offers of the Commons were sincere. But
Charles, by his vacillation and hesitation, by yielding one day and
retracting the next, gave them the opportunity of asserting, with some
show of reason, that he was wholly insincere, and could not be trusted;
and so the commission was recalled, and the war went on again.

On the 15th of April Parliament formal