[Footnote 2: The earl of Pembroke had the meanness to solicit and accept
the place of representative for Berkshire; and his example was imitated by
two other peers, the earl of Salisbury and Lord Howard of Escrick, who sat
for Lynn and Carlisle.--Journals, April 16, May 5 Sept. 18. Leicester's
Journal, 72.]

[Sidenote a: A.D. 1649. Feb. 13.]
[Sidenote b: A.D. 1649. Feb. 14.]

eighteen others, it was taken cheerfully, and without comment; by the
remaining twenty-two, with Fairfax at their head, it was firmly but
respectfully refused.[a] The peers alleged that it stood not with their
honour to approve upon oath of that which had been done in opposition to
their vote; the commoners, that it was not for them to pronounce an opinion
on judicial proceedings of which they had no official information. But
their doubts respecting transactions that were past formed no objection
to the authority of the existing government. The House of Commons was
in actual possession of the supreme power. From that house they derived
protection, to it they owed obedience, and with it they were ready to
live and die. Cromwell and his friends had the wisdom to yield; the
retrospective clauses were expunged,[b] and in their place was substituted
a general promise of adhesion to the parliament, both with respect to the
existing form of public liberty, and the future government of the nation,
"by way of a republic without king or house of peers."[1]

This important revolution drew with it several other alterations. A
representation of the House of Commons superseded the royal effigy on the
great seal, which was intrusted to three lords-commissioners, Lysle, Keble,
and Whitelock; the writs no longer ran in the name of the king, but of