and no other than he usually wore. Harrison, addressing himself particularly to him, admonished them all, that now the nations sent to them, they should labour to shine before them in wisdom, piety, righteousness, and justice, and not in gold and silver, and worldly bravery, which did not become saints; and that the next day, when the ambassadors came, they should not set themselves out in gorgeous habits, which were unsuitable to holy professions. The colonel, although he was not convinced of any misbecoming bravery in the suit he wore that day, which was but of sad-coloured cloth trimmed with gold, and silver points and buttons; yet, because he would not appear offensive in the eyes of religious persons, the next day he went in a plain black suit, and so did all the other gentlemen; but Harrison came that day in a scarlet coat and cloak, both laden with gold and silver lace, and the coat so covered with clinquant (foil), that one scarcely could discern the ground, and in this glittering habit he set himself just under the Speaker's chair; which made the other gentlemen think that his godly speeches the day before were but made that he alone might appear in the eyes of strangers. But this was part of his weakness. The Lord at last lifted him above these poor earthly elevations, which then and some time afterwards prevailed too much with him."

Colonel Hutchinson and his wife were naturally too highminded and refined in manners ever to fall into the littlenesses practised by some of their party; but they participated in their political passions and infatuation, and endured its mournful destiny. The colonel was one of the judges of Charles I., and signed the sentence of his condemnation—a great moral iniquity, and detestable piece of policy, for which the republic and its partisans suffered a just punishment. Of all the men who took part in this fatal act, no one was more sincere, disinterested, and courageous than Hutchinson. He did not even claim the honour of courage. "It is certain,' says Mrs. Hutchinson, "that all men herein were left to their free liberty of acting, neither persuaded nor compelled; and as there were some nominated on the commission who never sat, and others who sat at first but durst not hold on, so all the rest might have declined if they would."+ Hutchinson did not decline to sit, but persevered in the deplorable course on which he had entered. Soon, however, all the power of * Memoirs of Colonel Hutchinson, pp. 348-349. † Ibid., p. 335.

the revolution, the Long Parliament, Cromwell, the army, the Rump, had successively failed in their attempts to esta blish the republic in England. The restoration of Charles II. became a fatal necessity, as well as the evident wish of the nation. "The last remnant of the House of Commons," says Mrs. Hutchinson herself, was divided into miserable factions, among whom some would then have violently set up an oath of renunciation of the king and his family. The colonel, thinking it a ridiculous thing to swear out a man, when they had no power to defend themselves against him, vehemently opposed that oath, and carried against Sir Arthur Haslerig and others, who as violently pressed it, urging very truly that those oaths that had been formerly imposed had but multiplied the sins of the nation by perjuries; instancing how Sir Arthur and others, in Oliver's time, coming into the House, swore on their entrance they would attempt nothing in the change of that government, which, as soon as ever they were entered, they laboured to throw down. Many other arguments he used, whereupon many honest men, who thought till then he had followed a faction in all things and not his own judgment, began to meet often with him, and to consult what to do in these difficulties, out of which their prudence and honesty would have found a way to extricate themselves; but that the end of our prosperity was come, hastened on partly by the mad, rash violence of some that, without strength, opposed the tide of the discontented, tumultuous people; partly by the detestable treachery of those who had sold themselves to do mischief; but chiefly by the general stream of the people, who were as eager for their own destruction as the Israelites of old for their quails."

In the history of the republicans at this period, I cannot find any other example of so much mental vigour and patriotic disinterestedness, combined with no disavowal of his past conduct or forgetfulness of his personal dignity. Colonel Hutchinson for some time reaped the benefit of his courageous moderation. Several distinguished members of the Royalist party laboured zealously to exempt him from the measures taken against the other regicides; and his wife displayed admirable energy and presence of mind in her efforts to serve him in this emergency. He was allowed to retire to Owthorpe, his patrimonial estate, and to live there in peace for three * Memoirs of Colonel Hutchinson, pp. 393-396.

years, in the bosom of his family, and occupied only by the care of his domestic interests. But revolutions are pitiless in their reactions; the vices of the Restoration speedily developed themselves; party animosities and court factions sprang up once more; and popular conspiracies were framed in secret. Notwithstanding the combined efforts of his friends and enemies to bring him once more into public life, Hutchinson kept aloof from all these movements; but he took no pains to conceal his opinions, and perhaps even, his hopes. He was consequently closely watched, subjected to continual annoyances, and, on the 11th of October, 1663, arrested in his house at Owthorpe, and confined, first in that same Tower of London in which his wife had been born, and afterwards in Sandown Castle, on the sea coast, near Deal, in Kent. His wife vainly entreated that she might be imprisoned with him; but being refused, she established herself at Deal, with her son and daughter, and walked to Sandown to dine with the colonel, returning to Deal in the evening. Ten months elapsed, during which Colonel Hutchinson's confinement was aggravated by the dampness of the place, the severity of the winter, the avarice of the governor of the castle, and the society of another prisoner whom he suspected of being a spy upon him. Hutchinson preserved his composure unruffled, spent his time in reading pious books, affectionately sustained the courage of his wife, who was very anxious about his health, and gave these last counsels to his son Thomas, as they walked together on the sea-shore: "The courses which the king and his party take to establish themselves," he said, "will be their ruin; the ill-management of the State will cause discontented wild parties to mutiny, and rise against the present powers; but they will only put things in confusion; it must be a sober party that must then arise and settle them. Let not my son, how fairly soever they pretend, too rashly engage with the first, but stay to see what they make good, and engage with those who are for settlement, who will have need of men of interest to assist them."* How sensible and touching is this anxiety of the father to guard his son against those errors into which he could not help feeling that he had fallen himself!

The winter now drew near; the colonel's health became gradually more impaired; Mrs. Hutchinson was obliged to go * Memoirs of Colonel Hutchinson, p. 475.

to Owthorpe to fetch her younger children, and some furniture, which she required, for her husband's use. She felt very unwilling to take this journey, for she was a prey to melancholy presentiments. The colonel, on the contrary, was full of hope and gaiety; he gave his wife written instructions regarding his plantations at Owthorpe, and the arrangement of his house and gardens. "You give me," said she, "these orders, as if you were to see that place again." "If I do not," said he, "I thank God I can cheerfully forego it; but I will not distrust that God will bring me back again, and therefore I will take care to keep it while I have it."*

Mrs. Hutchinson went to Owthorpe, leaving her husband under the care of his daughter and his brother, George Hutchinson. A few days afterwards his disease grew rapidly worse, and death became imminent, so that his physician, a pious man like himself, told him of his danger, and asked him if his peace were made with God. "The will of the

Lord be done," said the colonel. "I am ready for it. I hope you do not think me so ill a Christian, to have been thus long in prison, and have that to do now!" Then they asked him where he would be buried? He told them in his vault at Owthorpe. His brother told him it would be a long way to carry him; he answered, "Let my wife order the manner of it as she will, only I would be there. I would have spoken to my wife and son, but it is not the will of God. Let my wife, as she is above other women, show herself, on this occasion, a good Christian, and above the pitch of ordinary women.' He passed the day, on the 11th of September, 1644, in profound repose, speaking occasionally to those who stood by him. Towards the evening he ceased to speak; one of those present mentioned Mrs. Hutchinson's name to him, and said," Alas! how will she be surprised!" The colonel moved slightly, fetched a sigh, and expired.†

Mrs. Hutchinson was not overwhelmed by her loss; her soul was as strong as it was passionate, and sustained by that deep religious faith which changes hope into certainty, and converts the pangs of death into the privations of absence. Sure of being once more united to her much-loved husband, her chief care now was to hold him up as an example to her children, and to perpetuate his memory. "They who dote on † Ibid., pp. 478-480.

* Memoirs of Colonel Hutchinson, pp. 475-476.

mortal excellences," she says, "when by the inevitable fate of all things frail, their adored idols are taken from them, may let loose the winds of passion to bring in a flood of sorrow; whose ebbing tides carry away the dear memory of what they have lost; and when comfort is essayed to such mourners, commonly all objects are removed out of their view, which may, with their remembrance, renew the grief; and in time these remedies succeed, and oblivion's curtain is by degrees drawn over the dead face, and things less lovely are liked, while they are not viewed together with that which was most excellent. But I, that am under a command not to grieve at the common rate of desolate women, while I am studying which way to moderate my woe, and if it were possible to augment my love, can for the present find out none more just to my dear husband, nor consolatory to myself, than the preservation of his memory."*

It was with these feelings, and in order to discharge this duty, that Mrs. Hutchinson wrote her Memoirs. They remained unknown for nearly a century and a half among the family papers of Colonel Hutchinson's descendants; but were discovered and published, in 1806, by the Rev. Julius Hutchinson.

Rather less than a century before Colonel Hutchinson and his wife assumed a place in the annals of their country, France contained a household similar to theirs, more illustrious in worldly rank, and assuredly more pious and virtuous in the sight of God: Philip Duplessis Mornay, long the intimate friend and ever the faithful servant of Henry IV., and Charlotte Arbaleste de la Borde, his wife.† Madame de Mornay, more fortunate in this respect than Mrs. Hutchinson, had not the sad fate of surviving her husband; she was the first to take her departure to everlasting rest. But like Mrs. Hutchinson, she had wished to write the Memoirs of her husband, with a view to the instruction of her son. She addressed them to him expressly in a letter written from Saumur, on the 25th of April, 1595; he was then scarcely sixteen years of age, having been born on the 20th of July, 1579. "I see you," she says, "ready to depart to go and

*Memoirs of Colonel Hutchinson, pp. 19-20.

Philippe de Mornay, Lord of Plessis-Marly, was born on the 5th of November, 1549, and died on the 11th of November, 1623. Charlotte Arbaleste de la Borde, his wife, was born in 1550, and died on the 15th of May,

1607.