rejected: Let us try yet again, and appoint a Committee, who may review our former Propofitions: And where they find the Matter of them (as our Affairs now are) fit to be altered, that they prefent the Alterations to the Houfe, and their Opinions; and that, as far as may stand with the Security of us and our Caufe, we may yield our Endeavours to prevent the Miferies which look Back upon us, and to fettle a good Accommodation, fo that there may be no Strife between us and the other Party, for we are Brethren.

The Lord WHARTON's Speech: Being an Account of Edge-hill Fight, in 1642.

MY Lords, and you the Aldermen, and

the Commons of this City, in a Bufinefs of this very great Confequence and Concernment, it was very well known to my Lord General, that you could not but be full of great Expectations; and my Lord had, according to his Duty, taken Čare for to give Information to the Parliament to those that had fent him, of what had proceeded: In the very next place, it was his particular Refpect to this City, to my Lord-Mayor, the Aldermen, the Common-Council, and all X 2 the

the Commons of this City, that they might likewife be acquainted with the Success of that Business, towards which they themselves had been at fo much Expences, and had fhewed fo much Love and Kindness in all the Proceedings of this Business, for that purpose because that Letters might be uncertain, and might mifcarry, there being great Interception of them, the Forces of the Armies being close together, my Lord thought fit to fend Mr. Strode, a Member of the House of Commons, and my felf, and certainly whatfoever fhall be related by us to you, it will be good News, or else we fhould not willingly have undertaken the bringing of it; and for the Truth of it, though we already hear that there are those that have fo much Malignity as to oppofe it, yet the Certainty of it will clear it felf; and therefore there fhall need no Apologies to be made, but that which fhall be faid to you, fhall be the Truth, and nothing but the Truth, in a very clear Way of Relation of what hath past.

Gentlemen, I fhall open to you as near as I can, as it comes within my Memory, those Things of Circumftance which are worthy the taking notice of, one in the first place fhall be, the Occafion why fo many of the Forces were not then upon the Place, which you will find to be upon very good Ground and Reason, for the Prefervation of the Countries that were behind, and of this City,

which is the particular Thing in the Care, and now under the Diligence of my Lord General, to preserve. There was left at Hereford, which lies upon the Confines of Wales, a Regiment of Foot, under the Command of my Lord of Stamford, and a Troop or two of Horfe, that the Power of Wales might not fall in upon Glocestershire, and upon the River of Severn, and fo upon the Weft. There was likewife left at Worcester (which you all know how it is feated upon the River of Severn, and what Advantage it hath to intercept all Force that fhall come from Shrewsbury down into the Weft) a Regiment of my Lord Saint John's, and Sir John Merrick's. There was for the fafety of Coventry (for that was a Town it was. likely the King might have fallen upon) the Regiment of my Lord Rochford, but it feems that his Excellence the Earl of Effex his Army did fo quickly come up to the King's, that the King thought it no way fit or advantagious for him to fpend any Time upon those Places, for certainly they would have very quickly been relieved, fo that the King flipt by Warwick and Coventry, which otherwife we conceive they were Towns he had as good an Eye upon as any other Towns in the whole Kingdom, excepting this. There was likewife occafion upon the fuddennefs of my Lord's March, two Regiments of Foot, one under the Command of a Gentleman you all

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know,

know, Col. Hambden, and the other under the Command of Col. Grantham, with fome ten or twelve Troops of Horfe, and these were but one Day's March behind, and upon the occafion of bringing up fome Powder, Ammunition, and Artillery, which my Lord would not ftay for, purpofely upon his Diligence and Defire that there fhould not be an Hour loft in the purfuing after that Army, and that he might make all hafte in coming up to this Town; and his Defiré to make hafte to keep with that Army was fuch, that he kept for two or three Days together a Day's March before that Army; and fo there being another Regiment lodged in Banbury, occafionally for their own Safety, there was with my Lord when this Battle was fought upon the Lord's Day, Eleven Regiments of Foot, and about the Number of thirty five, or thirty feven, or forty Troops of Horfe; that which makes me fay this to you, is partly for your Satisfactions, that you may know the Reasons of the Things are paft, and partly that you may give the more Glory to God for his Bleffing, and for his Prefervation of that Remnant of the Army which was together, being about eleven Regiments of Foot, and a matter of thirty five or forty Troops of Horse,

Upon the Saturday at Night, upon a verylong March, (for they came not in till nine or ten a Clock at Night) the Army came to

Kenton,

Kenton, and the next Morning, about seven a Clock, (though all that Night there was News came that the King was going to Banbury) we had certain Information he was coming down a Hill, which is called Edgehill, which hath fome Advantage by Nature for Forts and Breaft-works, and fuch Things as thofe are; and that Hill the King's Army came down at that time (that Army which goes under the Pretence of being raised for him, and by his Authority, for and against the Parliament) his Army coming down, my Lord of Effex prefently drew out into the Field, and drew his Army into a Place of as good Advantage as poffibly he could, though the other Army had Advantage of the Hill, which they were poffeffed of before, and at the beginning of the Day the Wind it was against us, and was the Advantage of the other Army. The Preparation on both Sides was for the making of them ready for fight; and the King's coming down the Hill was fo long, that there was nothing done till four in the Afternoon. And, Gentlemen, I fhall tell you the worst as well as the best, that you may know all, and that when you have known the worft, you may find it in your Judgments, to give the more Praise to God for his Mercy, after there was fo much Probability of having such an ill Success.

After that we had fhot two or three Pieces of Ordnance, they began for to fhoot some