gentlemen who fought for the
Parliament were from being London apprentices; but the words soon passed
into nicknames for the whole mass of royalists and patriots.

[Sidenote: Seizure of the Five Members.]

From nicknames the soldiers and apprentices soon passed to actual
brawls; and the strife beneath its walls created fresh alarm in the
Parliament. But Charles persisted in refusing it a guard. "On the
honour of a king" he engaged to defend them from violence as completely
as his own children, but the answer had hardly been given when his
Attorney appeared at the bar of the Lords, and accused Hampden, Pym,
Holles, Strode, and Haselrig of high treason in their correspondence
with the Scots. A herald-at-arms appeared at the bar of the Commons, and
demanded the surrender of the five members. All constitutional law was
set aside by a charge which proceeded personally from the king, which
deprived the accused of their legal right to a trial by their peers, and
summoned them before a tribunal that had no pretence to a jurisdiction
over them. The Commons simply promised to take the demand into
consideration. They again requested a guard. "I will reply to-morrow,"
said the king. He had in fact resolved to seize the members in the House
itself; and on the morrow, the 4th of January 1642, he summoned the
gentlemen who clustered about Whitehall to follow him, and, embracing
the Queen, whose violent temper had urged him to this outrage, promised
her that in an hour he would return master of his kingdom. A mob of
Cavaliers joined him as he left the palace, and remained in Westminster
Hall as Charles, accompanied by his nephew, the Elector-Palatine,
entered the House of Commons. "Mr. Speaker," he said, "I must for a time
borrow your chair!" He paused with a sudden confusion as his eye fell
on the vacant spot where Pym commonly sate: for at the news of his
approach the House had ordered the five members to withdraw.
"Gentlemen," he began in slow broken sentences, "I am sorry for this
occasion of coming unto you. Yesterday I sent a Sergeant-at-arms upon a
very important occasion to apprehend some that by my command were
accused of high treason, whereunto I did expect obedience and not a
message." Treason, he went on, had no privilege, "and therefore I am
come to know if any of these persons that were accused are here." There
was a dead silence, only broken by his reiterated "I must have them
wheresoever I find them." He again paused,