glish
hands, with some assurances for his safety, and early in February 1647
crossed Tweed with their thirty-six cartloads of money. The act was
hateful to very many Scots, but the Estates, under the command of the
preachers, had refused to let the king, while uncovenanted, cross into
his native kingdom, and to bring him meant war with England. But _that_
must ensue in any case. The hope of making England presbyterian, as
under the Solemn League and Covenant, had already perished.

Leslie, with the part of the army still kept up, chased Colkitto, and, at
Dunavertie, under the influence of Nevoy, a preacher, put 300 Irish
prisoners to the sword.

The parties in Scotland were now: (1) the Kirk, Argyll, the two Leslies,
and most of the Commons; (2) Hamilton, Lanark, and Lauderdale, who had no
longer anything to fear, as regards their estates, from Charles or from
bishops, and who were ashamed of his surrender to the English; (3)
Royalists in general. With Charles (December 27, 1647) in his prison at
Carisbrooke, Lauderdale, Loudoun, and Lanark made a secret treaty, _The
Engagement_, which they buried in the garden, for if it were discovered
the Independents of the army would have attacked Scotland.

An Assembly of the Scots Estates on March 3, 1648, had a large majority
of nobles, gentry, and many burgesses in favour of aiding the captive
king; on the other side Argyll was backed by the omnipotent Commission of
the General Assembly, and by the full force of prayers and sermons. The
letter-writer, Baillie, now deemed "that it were for the good of the
world that churchmen did meddle with ecclesiastical affairs only." The
Engagers insisted on establishing presbytery in England, which neither
satisfied the Kirk nor the Cavaliers and Independents. Nothing more
futile could have been devised.

The Estates, in May, began to raise an army; the preachers denounced
them: there was a battle between armed communicants of the preachers'
party and the soldiers of the State at Mauchline. Invading England on
July 8, Hamilton had Lambert and Cromwell to face him, and left Argyll,
the preachers, and their "slashing communicants" in his rear. Lanark had
vainly urged that the west country fanatics should be crushed before the
Border was crossed. By a march worthy of Montrose across the fells into
Lanarkshire, Cromwell reached Preston; cut in between the northern parts
of Hamilton's army; defeated the English Royalists and Langdal