CHARACTER OF CROMWELL.

CHARACTER OF CROMWELL.

Source.—Sir Philip Warwick's Memoirs, 1701. P. 247.

I have no mind to give an ill character of Cromwell; for in his conversation towards me he was ever friendly; tho' at the latter end of the day finding me ever incorrigible, and having some inducements to suspect me a tamperer, he was sufficiently rigid. The first time that ever I took notice of him, was in the very beginning of the Parliament held in November, 1640, when I vainly thought myself a courtly young Gentleman: (for we Courtiers valued our selves much upon our good clothes). I came one morning into the House well clad, and perceived a Gentleman speaking (whom I knew not) very ordinarily apparelled; for it was a plain cloth suit, which seemed to have been made by an ill country-tailor; his linen was plain, and not very clean; and I remember a speck or two of blood upon his little band, which was not much larger than his collar; his hat was without a hat-band: his stature was of a good size, his sword stuck close to his side, his countenance swoln and reddish, his voice sharp and untunable, and his eloquence full of fervour; for the subject matter would not bear much of reason; it being in behalf of a servant of Mr. Prynne's, who had dispersed libells against the Queen for her dancing and such innocent and courtly sports; and he aggravated the imprisonment of this man by the Council Table unto that height, that one would have believed the very Government itself had been in great danger by it. I sincerely profess it lessened much my reverence unto that great council; for he was very much hearkened unto. And yet I lived to see this very Gentleman, whom out of no ill will to him I thus describe,—by multiplied good successes, and by real (but usurped) power, (having had a better tailor, and more converse among good company)—in my own eye, when for six weeks together I was a prisoner in his Serjeant's hands, and daily waited at Whitehall, appear of a great and majestic deportment and comely presence. Of him therefore I will say no more, but that verily I believe, he was extraordinarily designed for those extraordinary things, which one while most wickedly and facinorously he acted, and at another as successfully and greatly performed.

UNWIN BROTHERS, LTD., PRINTERS, LONDON AND WOKING.