stances considered, this war was managed with as much humanity on both sides as could be expected, especially also considering the animosity of parties.

CHAPTER XI.

COMICAL ADVENTURES, IN WHICH A FEMALE CAPTAIN IS VICTORIOUS-BRAVERY OF THE PARLIAMENT TROOPS AT BRENTFORD THE WINTER SPENT IN FRUITLESS TREATIES · -I AM WOUNDED IN A SKIRMISH WITH THE ENEMY -FARTHER PROCEEDINGS OF THE ARMIES.

BUT to return to the prince; he had not always the same success in these enterprises; for sometimes we came short home. And I cannot omit one pleasant adventure which happened to a party of ours, in one of these excursions into Buckinghamshire. The major of our regiment was soundly beaten by a party, which, as I may say, was led by a woman; and, if I had not rescued him, I know not but he had been taken prisoner by a woman. It seems our men had besieged some fortified house about Oxfordshire, towards Tame, and the house being defended by the lady in her husband's absence, she had yielded the house upon a capitulation; one of the articles of which was to march out with all her servants, soldiers, and goods, and to be conveyed to Tame; whether she thought to have gone no farther, or that she reckoned herself safe there, I know not; but my major, with two troops of horse, meets with this lady and her party, about five miles from Tame, as we were coming back from our defeated attack of Aylesbury. We reckoned ourselves in an enemy's country, and had lived a little at large, or at discretion, as it is called abroad; and these two troops with the major were returning to our detachment from a little village, where, at the farmer's house, they had met with some liquor, and truly some of his men were so drunk they could but just sit upon their horses. The major himself was not much better, and the whole body were but in a sorry condition to fight. Upon the road they meet this party; the lady having no design of fighting, and being, as she thought, under the protection of the articles, sounds a parley, and

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desired to speak with the officer. The major, as drunk as he was, could tell her, that by the articles she was to be assured no farther than Tame, and being now five miles beyond it, she was a fair enemy, and therefore demanded to render themselves prisoners. The lady seemed surprised; but being sensible she was in the wrong, offered to compound for her goods, and would have given him 300l., and, I think, seven or eight horses. The major would certainly have taken it, if he had not been drunk; but he refused it, and gave threatening words to her, blustering in language which he thought proper to frighten a woman, viz., that he would cut them all to pieces, and give no quarter, and the like. The lady, who had been more used to the smell of powder than he imagined, called some of her servants to her, and, consulting with them what to do, they all unanimously encouraged her to let them fight; told her it was plain that the commander was drunk, and all that were with him were rather worse than he, and hardly able to sit their horses; and that therefore one bold charge would put them all into confusion. In a word, she consented, and, as she was a woman, they desired her to secure herself among the waggons; but she refused, and told them bravely, she would take her fate with them. In short, she boldly bade my major defiance, and that he might do his worst, since she had offered him fair and he had refused it; her mind was altered now, and she would give him nothing, and bade his officer that parleyed longer with her, begone; so the parley ended. After this, she gave him fair leave to go back to his men; but before he could tell his tale to them, she was at his heels, with all her men, and gave him such a homecharge as put his men into disorder; and, being too drunk to rally, they were knocked down before they knew what to do with themselves; and in a few minutes more they took to a plain flight. But what was still worse, the men, being some of them very drunk, when they came to run for their lives, fell over one another, and tumbled over their horses, and made such work, that a troop of women might have beaten them all. In this pickle, with the enemy at his heels, I came in with him, hearing the noise; when I appeared, the pursuers retreated, and, seeing what a condition my people were in, and not knowing the strength of the enemy, I contented myself with bringing them off without pursuing

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the other; nor could I hear positively who this female captain was. We lost seventeen or eighteen of our men, and about thirty horses; but, when the particulars of the story was told us, our major was so laughed at by the whole army, and laughed at everywhere, that he was ashamed to show himself for a week or a fortnight after.

But, to return to the king. His majesty, as I observed, was at Maidenhead addressed by the parliament for peace, and Windsor being appointed for the place of treaty, the van of his army lay at Colnbrook. In the meantime, whether it were true, or only a pretence, but it was reported the parliament-general had sent a body of his troops, with a train of artillery,. to Hammersmith, in order to fall upon some part of our army, or to take some advanced post, which was to the prejudice of our men; whereupon, the king ordered the army to march, and, by the favour of a thick mist, came within half a mile of Brentford before he was discovered. There were two regiments of foot, and about six hundred horse in the town, of the enemy's best troops; these taking the alarm, posted themselves on the bridge at the west end of the town. The king attacked them with a select detachment of his best infantry, and they defended themselves with incredible obstinacy. I must own, I never saw raw men, for they could not have been in arms above four months, act like them in my life. In short, there was no forcing these men; for, though two whole brigades of our foot, backed by our horse, made five several attacks upon them, they could not break them, and we lost a great many brave men in that action. At last, seeing the obstinacy of these men, a party of horse was ordered to go round from Osterly; and, entering the town on the north side, where, though the horse made some resistance, it was not considerable; the town was presently taken. I led my regiment through an enclosure, and came into the town nearer to the bridge than the rest, by which means I got first into the town; but I had this loss by my expedition, that the foot charged me before the body was come up, and poured in their shot very furiously; my men were but in an ill case, and would not have stood much longer, if the rest of the horse coming up the lane had not found them other employment. When the horse were thus entered, they immediately dispersed the enemy's horse, who fled away towards London,

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and falling in sword in hand upon the rear of the foot, who were engaged at the bridge, they were all cut in pieces, except about two hundred, who, scorning to ask quarter, desperately threw themselves into the river Thames, where they were most of them drowned.

The parliament, and their party, made a great outcry at this attempt; that it was base and treacherous while in a treaty of peace; and that the king, having amused them - with hearkening to a treaty, designed to have seized upon their train of artillery first, and, after that, to have surprised both the city of London and the parliament. And I have observed since, that our historians note this action as contrary to the laws of honour and treaties; though, as there was no cessation of arms agreed on, nothing is more contrary to the laws of war than to suggest it.

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That it was a very unhappy thing to the king and whole nation, as it broke off the hopes of peace, and was the occasion of bringing the Scots' army in upon us, I readily acknowledge; but that there was anything dishonourable in it, I cannot allow for, though the parliament had addressed to the king for peace, and such steps were taken in it, as before; yet, as I have said, there was no proposal made on either side for a cessation of arms; and all the world must allow, that in such cases the war goes on in the field, while the peace goes on in the cabinet, And if the war goes on, admit the king had designed to surprise the city or parliament, or all of them, it had been no more than the custom of war allows, and what they would have done by him, if they could. The treaty of Westphalia, or peace of Munster, which ended the bloody wars of Germany, was a precedent for this. That treaty was actually negotiating seven years, and yet the war went on with all the vigour and rancour imaginable, even to the last: nay, the very time after the conclusion of it, but before the news could be brought to the army, did he that was afterwards King of Sweden, Carolus Gustavus, take the city of Prague, by surprise, and therein an inestimable booty. Besides, all the wars of Europe are full of examples of this kind; and, therefore, I cannot see any reason to blame the king for this action as to the fairness of it. Indeed, as to the policy of it, I can say little; but the case was this, the king had a gallant army, flushed with success, and things hitherto had gone on very prosperously, both with his own

army and elsewhere; he had above thirty-five thousand men in his own army, including his garrisons left at Banbury, Shrewsbury, Worcester, Oxford, Wallingford, Abingdon, Reading, and places adjacent. On the other hand, the parliament army came back to London in but a sorry condition*; for, what with their loss in their victory, as they called it, at Edgehill, their sickness, and a hasty march to London, they were very much diminished; though at London they soon recruited them again. And this prosperity of the king's affairs might encourage him to strike this blow, thinking to bring the parliament to better terms, by the apprehensions of the superior strength of the king's forces.

But, however it was, the success did not equally answer the king's expectation; the vigorous defence the troops posted at Brentford made as above, gave the Earl of Essex opportunity, with extraordinary application, to draw his forces out to Turnham-green; and the exceeding alacrity of the enemy was such, that their whole army appeared with them, making together an army of twenty-four thousand men, drawn up in view of our forces, by eight o'clock the next morning. The city regiments were placed between the regular troops, and all together offered us battle; but we were not in a condition to accept it. The king indeed was sometimes of the mind to charge them, and once or twice ordered parties to advance to begin to skirmish, but, upon better advice, altered his mind; and indeed, it was the wisest counsel to defer the fighting at that time. The parliament generals were as unfixed in their resolutions on the other side, as the king: sometimes they sent out parties, and then called them back again. One strong party, of near three thousand men, marched off towards Acton, with orders to amuse us on that side, but were countermanded. Indeed, I was of the opinion we might have ventured the battle; for, though the parliament's army were more numerous, yet the city trained bands, which made up four thousand of their foot, were not much esteemed, and the king was a great deal stronger in horse than they; but the main reason that hindered the engagement was want of ammunition, which the king having duly weighed, he caused the carriages and cannon to draw off first, and then the foot,

* General Ludlow, in his Memoirs, p. 52, says, "their men returned from Warwick to London, not like men who had obtained a victory, but like men that had been beaten."