most decorous consideration, and respectful deportment, from these public functionaries. The words 'no regard will be shewn to the result of any trial made of them in any other way:' though nominally addressed to William Harrison, they knew it would be his duty to report as early as he could at Buckingham House; where they might be correctly rendered—that a trial under His Majesty's immediate and assiduous inspection was not worth a kickshaw—that if he had any reliance on the service he might do the Claimant by such a proceeding, he might as well have given him a rope to hang himself;—that they troubled not themselves about any proceedings he might think proper to adopt, with regard to the Timekeeper; and that—he was welcome to have his labour for his reward, if he chose!
Such a demonstration in the seventeenth century would have been worthy the pens of
Withers, Prynn and Vickers,
Inspir'd with ale, or viler liqours:
and nearer our time might be thought to savour more of Jacobin insolence than of that loyalty, which yet, the parties concerned, no doubt, like erst the good subjects of Richard Cromwell, would have professed in all due form.[1]How Montesqieu
- ↑ Richard Cromwell in his retirement at Cheshunt, or at Hursley, under an assumed name, was difficult of access to the neighbouring gentlemen. The desire to know a person who had experienced such an extraordinary reverse of fortune
