had betrayed, and by the Royalists whose king he had beheaded.

Soon after he had assumed the title of Lord High Protector, a
most daring pamphlet, openly advocating his assassination, was
circulated in vast numbers throughout the kingdom. It was
entitled "Killing no Murder," and was dedicated in language
outrageously bold to His Highness Oliver Cromwell. "To your
Highness justly belongs the honour of dying for the people," it
stated, "and it cannot but be an unspeakable consolation to you,
in the last moments of your life, to consider with how much
benefit to the world you are likely to leave it. It is then
only, my lord, the titles you now usurp will be truly yours; you
will then be, indeed, the deliverer of your country, and free it
from a bondage little inferior to that from which Moses delivered
his, you will then be that true reformer which you would now be
thought; religion shall then be restored, liberty asserted, and
Parliaments have those privileges they have sought for. All this
we hope from your Highness's happy expiration. To hasten this
great good is the chief end of my writing this paper; and if it
have the effects I hope it will, your Highness will quickly be
out of the reach of men's malice, and your enemies will only be
able to wound you in your memory, which strokes you will not
feel."

The possession of life becomes dearest when its forfeiture is
threatened, and therefore Cromwell took all possible means to
guard against treachery--the only foe he feared, and feared
exceedingly. "His sleeps were disturbed with the apprehensions
of those dangers the day presented unto him in the approaches of
any strange face, whose motion he would most fixedly attend,"