plot.

The Earl of Northumberland, being too great for prosecution, was
only once examined before the Lords. The Earl of Portland and Lord
Conway persisting to deny the charge, and no testimony but Waller's
yet appearing against them, were, after a long imprisonment,
admitted to bail. Hassel, the king's messenger, who carried the
letters to Oxford, died the night before his trial. Hampden
[Alexander] escaped death, perhaps by the interest of his family;
but was kept in prison to the end of his life. They whose names
were inserted in the commission of array were not capitally
punished, as it could not be proved that they had consented to their
own nomination; but they were considered as malignants, and their
estates were seized.

"Waller, though confessedly," says Clarendon, "the most guilty, with
incredible dissimulation affected such a remorse of conscience, that
his trial was put off, out of Christian compassion, till he might
recover his understanding." What use he made of this interval, with
what liberality and success he distributed flattery and money, and
how, when he was brought (July 4) before the House, he confessed and
lamented, and submitted and implored, may be read in the "History of
the Rebellion" (B. vii.). The speech, to which Clarendon ascribes
the preservation of his "dear-bought life," is inserted in his
works. The great historian, however, seems to have been mistaken in
relating that "he prevailed" in the principal part of his
supplication, "not to be tried by a council of war;" for, according
to Whitelock, he was by expulsion from the House abandoned to the
tribunal which he so much dreaded, and, being tried and condemned,
was reprieved by Essex; but after a year's imprisonment, in which