first. Thus, Admirals
Blake and Montague were away with their fleets, off Spain and
Portugal. But Broghill did come up from Scotland to attend, and
Swinton and most of the other members of the Scottish Council with
him, leaving Monk once more in his familiar charge. Ambassador
Lockhart also had come over, or was coming.

[Footnote 1: List of the members returned for the Second Parliament
of the Protectorate in _Part. Hist._ III. 1479-1484.]

There were two rather important interventions between Dr. Owen's
opening sermon to the Parliament and their settling down to
business.

One was the Lord Protector's opening speech in the Painted Chamber,
now numbered as Speech V, of the Cromwell series. It was very long,
of extremely gnarled structure, but full of matter. The pervading
topic was the war with Spain. This was justified, with approving
references to the published Latin Declaration of Oct. 1655 on the
subject, entitled _Scriptum Domini Protectoris, &c._
(Milton's?), and with vehement expressions of his Highness's personal
abhorrence of Spain and her policy. He represented her and her
allies and dependents as the anti-English and anti-Christian Hydra of
the world, while France, though Roman Catholic too, stood apart from
all the other Catholic powers in not being under the Pope's lash and
so able to be fair and reasonable. He urged the most energetic
prosecution of the war that had been begun. But with the Spanish war
he connected the dangers to England from the Royalist risings and
conspiracies of the last two years, announcing moreover that he had
now full intelligence of a compact between Spain and Charles II., a
force of 7000 or 8000 Spaniards ready at Bruges in consequence, and
other forces promised by Popish princes, clients of Spain. There were
English agents of the alliance at work, he said, and one miscreant in
particular who had been an Anabaptist Colonel; and, necessarily, all
schemes and conspiracies against the present government would drift
into the Hispano-Stuartist interest. He acquitted some of the
opponents of his government, calling themselves "Commonwealth's men"
and "Fifth Monarchy men," from any intention of that conjunction; but
so it would happen. His arrests of some such had been necessary for
the public safety. He knew his system of Major-Generalships was much
criticised, and thought arbitrary; but that had been necessary too,
and a most useful invention. He had called this Parliament with a