[Sidenote a: A.D. 1650. May 13.]
[Sidenote b: A.D. 1650. June 2.]
[Sidenote c: A.D. 1650. June 23.]
[Sidenote d: A.D. 1650. June 4.]

in the state. After repeated applications, the duke of Buckingham, the
Lord Wilmot, and a few English servants, who took the covenant, obtained
permission to remain with the king; many of the Scottish exiles embraced
the opportunity to withdraw from notice into the western isles, or the more
distant parts of the country.[1]

It was the negotiation between the Scots and their nominal king that
arrested Cromwell in the career of victory, and called him away from the
completion of his conquest. The rulers of the commonwealth were aware of
the intimate connection which the solemn league and covenant had produced
between the English Presbyterians and the kirk of Scotland, whence they
naturally inferred that, if the pretender to the English were once
seated on the Scottish throne, their own power would he placed on a very
precarious footing. From the first they had watched with jealousy the
unfriendly proceedings of the Scottish parliament. Advice and persuasion
had been tried, and had failed. There remained the resource of war; and
war, it was hoped, would either compel the Scots to abandon the claims of
Charles, or reduce Scotland to a province of the commonwealth. Fairfax,
indeed (he was supposed to be under the influence of a Presbyterian wife
and of the Presbyterian ministers), disapproved of the design;[2] but
his disapprobation, though lamented in public, was privately hailed as a
benefit by those who were acquainted with the aspiring designs of Cromwell,
and built on his elevation the flattering hope of their own greatness. By
their means, as soon as the