s,
outstripping the tardy Essex, to dare all and die. In vain does Gunter
perish beside his flag; in vain does Crosse, his horse being killed
under him, spring in the midst of battle on another; in vain does "that
great-spirited little Sir Samuel Luke" (the original of Hudibras) get
thrice captured and thrice escape. For Hampden, the hope of the nation,
is fatally shot through the shoulder with two carbine-balls, in the
first charge; the whole troop sees it with dismay; Essex comes up, as
usual, too late, and the fight at Chalgrove Field is lost.

We must leave this picture, painted in the fading colors of a far-off
time. Let us leave the noble Hampden, weak and almost fainting, riding
calmly from the field, and wandering away over his own Chiltern meadows,
that he loves so well,--leave him, drooping over his saddle, directing
his horse first towards his father-in-law's house at Pyrton, where once
he wedded his youthful bride, then turning towards Thame, and mustering
his last strength to leap his tired steed across its boundary brook. A
few days of laborious weakness, spent in letter-writing to urge upon
Parliament something of that military energy which, if earlier adopted,
might have saved his life,--and we see a last, funereal procession
winding beneath the Chiltern hills, and singing the 90th Psalm as the
mourners approach the tomb of the Hampdens, and the 43d as they return.
And well may the "Weekly Intelligencer" say of him, (June 27, 1643,)
that "the memory of this deceased Colonel is such that in no age to
come but it will more and more be had in honor and esteem; a man so
religious, and of that prudence, judgment, temper, valor, and integrity,
that he hath left few his like behind him."

And we must leave Rupert to his career of romantic daring, to be made
President of Wales and Generalissimo of the army,--to rescue with
unequalled energy Newark and York and the besieged heroine of Lathom
House,--to fight through Newbury and Marston Moor and Naseby, and many a
lesser field,--to surrender Bristol and be acquitted by court-martial,
but hopelessly condemned by the King;--then to leave the kingdom,
refusing a passport, and fighting his perilous way to the seaside;--then
to wander over the world for years, astonishing Dutchmen by his
seamanship, Austrians by his soldiership, Spaniards and Portuguese by
his buccaneering powers, and Frenchmen by his gold and diamonds and
birds and monkeys and "richly-liveried Blacka