Lord General Cromwell came into the House, clad in plain
black clothes and gray worsted stockings, and sat down, as he
used to do, in an ordinary place.' For some time he listens to
this interesting debate on the bill, beckoning once to
Harrison, who came over to him, and answered dubitatingly.
Whereupon the Lord General sat still for about a quarter of an
hour longer. But now the question being to be put, That this
bill do now pass, he beckons again to Harrison, says, 'This is
the time; I must do it!' and so 'rose up, put off his hat, and
spake. At the first, and for a good while, he spake to the
commendation of the Parliament, for their pains and care of the
public good; but afterwards he changed his style, told them of
their injustice, delays of justice, self-interest, and other
faults,' rising higher and higher into a very aggravated style
indeed. An honourable member, Sir Peter Wentworth by name, not
known to my readers, and by me better known than trusted, rises
to order, as we phrase it; says, 'It is a strange language
this; unusual within the walls of Parliament this! And from a
trusted servant, too; and one whom we have so highly honoured;
and one--' Come, come,' exclaims my Lord General, in a very
high key, 'we have had enough of this'--and in fact my Lord
General, now blazing all up into clear conflagration, exclaims,
'I will put an end to your prating,' and steps forth into the
floor of the House, and 'clapping on his hat,' and occasionally
'stamping the floor with his feet,' begins a discourse which no
man can report! He says--Heavens! he is heard saying: 'It is
not fit that you should sit here any longer!' You have sat too
long here for any good you have been doing lately, 'You shall
now give place to better men! Call them in!' adds he, briefly,
to Harrison, in way of command; and some 'twenty or thirty'
grim musketeers enter, with bullets in their snaphances; grimly
prompt for orders; and stand in some attitude of carry arms
there. Veteran men: men of might and men of war, their faces
are as the faces of lions, and their feet are swift as the roes
upon the mountains; not beautiful to honourable gentlemen at
this moment!

"'You call yourselves a Parliament,' continues my Lord General,
in clear blaze of conflagration. 'You