of his Majesty's servants. An inquiry showed, however, that there was
no treasonable meaning in the matter, and the officers having confessed
that the first words came from them, the Justices contented themselves
with imposing a fine upon my father, and binding him over to keep the
peace for a period of six months.

I tell you these incidents that you may have an idea of the fierce and
earnest religion which filled not only your own ancestor, but most of
those men who were trained in the parliamentary armies. In many ways
they were more like those fanatic Saracens, who believe in conversion by
the sword, than the followers of a Christian creed. Yet they have this
great merit, that their own lives were for the most part clean and
commendable, for they rigidly adhered themselves to those laws which
they would gladly have forced at the sword's point upon others. It is
true that among so many there were some whose piety was a shell for
their ambition, and others who practised in secret what they denounced
in public, but no cause however good is free from such hypocritical
parasites. That the greater part of the saints, as they termed
themselves, were men of sober and God-fearing lives, may be shown by the
fact that, after the disbanding of the army of the Commonwealth, the
old soldiers flocked into trade throughout the country, and made their
mark wherever they went by their industry and worth. There is many a
wealthy business house now in England which can trace its rise to the
thrift and honesty of some simple pikeman of Ireton or Cromwell.

But that I may help you to understand the character of your
great-grandfather, I shall give an incident which shows how fervent
and real were the emotions which prompted the violent moods which I have
described. I was about twelve at the time, my brothers Hosea and
Ephraim were respectively nine and seven, while little Ruth could scarce