the King passed, one of the soldiers, touched with respect and sympathy, exclaimed, "GOD bless you, Sire;" upon which Colonel Axtell, with savage insolence, struck the poor man sharply with his cane. "Methinks, Sir," was King Charles's mild reproof, "the punishment exceeds the offence."

On June 26, 1657, Oliver Cromwell, who on December 12, 1653, had been sworn in as Protector in the Chancery Court, was, amid all but regal honours, invested with that high office, which he had attained by the commission of so many crimes, and was so galling, being shorn of the crown and sceptre, which he vainly coveted.

Colonel Harrison's head, and those of Oliver Cromwell, Ireton, and Bradshaw, on January 30, 1660, according to the barbarism of the age, were set up on the north end of the Hall. In June 1684 the head of Sir Thomas Armstrong, who had been implicated in the so-called Rye-House Plot, was set up between those of Bradshaw and Cromwell. The head of the latter, after remaining there many years, was blown off during a stormy night, and was given to the Russell family.

On May 8, 1660, King Charles II. was proclaimed at the gate, while the Lords and Commons stood bareheaded beside the heralds. On May 28, 1661, the Act for the King's Trial was burned by the common hangman in the Hall while the Courts were sitting.

While the Great Fire was canopying all London with a flamy cloud, the terrified citizens filled the whole Hall with their most prized household goods and bales of merchandise. Pepys, in his quaint heartless way, says that he could not 66 find any place in Westminster to buy a shirt or pair of gloves; Westminster Hall being full of people's goods; those in Westminster having removed all their goods; and the Exchequer money put into vessels to carry to Nonsuch." The King removed his furniture from Whitehall. He makes this entry on November 9, which shows us the provocatives of the fears of "massacre and conflagration" then rife in Westminster,แ Going to dance again; and then comes news that Whitehall was on fire. And presently more particulars that the Horse

Guards was on fire. . . . And so we run up to the garret, and find it so: a horrid great fire. And by and by we saw and heard part of it blown up with powder. The ladies begun presently to be afraid: one fell into fits. The whole town is in alarm."

Anxiously, those terrible days and nights, must the keen watchers in Westminster have noted the wind's gusty course, as they stood in the intense reflected glare that told the doom of London to the traveller, while yet more than a score of miles lay between his steed and the distant gates. Sublimely grand must have been the scene-apparently to their fearful eyes hard at hand-beyond the Thames, ruddy in the fierce blaze, the wide sheet of living light overarched and belted in the devoted city, crested with a thousand flakes, bursting upward in tongues of flame as from some exploded magazine, then dropping like a rain of fire from the thick darkness over all,-here the red stream surged up along the ascents in lurid waves around the black ruins, falling with a crash of thunder, drowning for a moment the alarm-bells' ceaseless clamour, there wreathing like devouring serpents about tower and spire, St. Paul's yet standing out in strong relief above the burning mass, while the hoarse rushing sound of the conflagration attested its haste, and ever and anon the angry sky glowed like the molten brass of the furnace.

In 1680, 30 Charles II., Viscount Stafford was condemned, being impeached by the Commons, for participation with four Roman Catholic noblemen in a plot, the fabrication of the infamous Titus Oates. He defended himself with great composure and resolution, protesting his innocence to the block.

Abbey to Westmin-
The canopy of cloth

"As King James II. came from the ster Hall, the crown tottered extremely. of gold carried over the head of the King, by the Wardens of the Cinque Ports, was torn by a puff of wind as he came to Westminster: it hung lamentably. I saw it," says Aubrey.

An affecting scene here, in the latter end of June 1688, was the cause of a mighty revolution. King James II., with an excess of temerity, had imprisoned, upon their refusal to

read his insidiously-contrived "Indulgence in matters of Religion," seven Bishops, whose passage by water to the Tower was one long triumph, while they blessed the multitudes that made the banks ring with their prayers and cries of sympathy. The Primate, Sancroft; Lloyd of St. Asaph; Trelawney of Bristol; White of Peterborough; Turner of Ely; and the two brother-Wycchamists, Ken of Bath and Wells, and Lake of Chichester, on Friday, June 15, attended by an imposing procession of twenty-nine noblemen and crowds of gentry, were conducted to their trial. On their return from the Hall, the populace stayed them by crowding to gaze; and "Lloyd was detained by admirers, who struggled to touch his hands and kiss the skirt of his garment, until Clarendon with some difficulty rescued him," and conveyed him home by a by-path. Cartwright, it is said, was so unwise as to mingle with the crowd. Some person, who saw his episcopal habit, asked and received his blessing. A bystander cried out, "Do you know who blessed you?" "Surely," said he who had just been honoured by the benediction, "it was one of the Seven." "No," said the other; "it is the Popish Bishop of Chester." "Popish dog," cried the enraged Protestant, "take your blessing back again!" The King had retired into the tent of General Lord Faversham, after a review of the troops encamped upon Hounslow Heath: on a sudden a distant shout was heard, gathering strength as it spread nearer, continued from village to village, lit up with bonfires and echoing to the pealing bells, until it was taken up like a roar of thunder by the delighted soldiery, and told the King that the Bishops were acquitted, and the days of his dynasty numbered.

The Czar Peter the Great was taken into the Hall during Term-time, and was much amused by seeing what he described as "busy people in long black gowns and wigs with tails." He inquired what they were doing. Being told that they were lawyers," Lawyers!" replied the despot, half-questioning, "why I have but two in all my dominions, and I believe I shall hang one of them up the instant I get home again." The Czar would not have been so much offended, could he have anticipated his visit by some years; for in Michaelmas

Term, the fifth year of Queen Mary's reign, Stow says quite pathetically, "men might have seene at the King's Bench barre not two men of law before the Judges; there was but one, named Fostar, who looked about and had nothing to do, the Judges looking about them. In the Common Place no mo sergeants but one, which was Sergeant Boulouse, who looked about him. There was elbow-room enough, which made the lawyers complain of their miseries in that Terme.” What halcyon days of white gloves and Maiden Assize!

On March 28, 1699, 11 Wm. III., (Lord Somers being Lord High Steward,) Edward Earl of Warwick was convicted here of the manslaughter of Richard Coote, Esq., whom he killed with a rapier at Locket's Coffee-house in the Strand. A memorable criminal stood beside him, Lord Mohun, who in 1692 was acquitted, before the Marquis of Caermarthen, then Lord High Steward, of the murder of Mountford the actor. Again he escaped on this occasion, with a solemn warning from his Peers. A little while after he fell mortally wounded by the Duke of Hamilton, in a duel fatal to both.

Upon one side of the Hall, during the Protectorate, were hung all the colours torn from the gallant Cavaliers and the Scots who lay beneath the crimsoned turf of Worcester-field; after the Restoration they were wisely removed. On Wednesday, January 3, 1704, by the command of Queen Anne, a truer trophy was erected, the 121 standards and 179 regimental colours captured at Blenheim, well termed a second Cannæ to the enemy, having been carried about 'Change-time through the City, amidst the acclamations of multitudes who thronged the streets.

Dr. Sacheverell, having in two discourses, according to the opinion of the great majority of the Clergy, stood forth as the champion of the Church against the latitudinarian policy of the ministry of his day, and suspected of having pointed too pertinently at Lord Godolphin as "Volpone" (a character in Ben Jonson's plays), was impeached of high crimes here, on February 27, 1710. On March 23 he was suspended, by a judgment of the Peers, from preaching for three years, and his sermon to be burnt by the hangman. He was assisted by Dr. Smaldridge

and Dr. Atterbury at his trial. The Queen attended in a private cabinet; ladies of rank and gentlewomen following her example; and the people crowding the temporary galleries in such numbers as to raise alarm for the safety of the building. A bodyguard of tradesmen surrounded his chair; crowds followed with huzzas; and most persons that met him saluted him with marked respect. He set out for his living in Shropshire; the people lit bonfires and made great rejoicings all over the Kingdom; while his journey was one long triumph, enlivened by the courtesy of the gentry, and the welcoming of the people. The first sermon which he preached on his return to St. Saviour's, Southwark, was "The Christian Temple, or the Duty of Praying for our Enemies."

On June 10, 1716, 2 Geo. I., (William Lord Cowper being Lord High Steward,) were held the trials of the virtuous Viscount Kenmure and the Earl of Derwentwater, who, faithful to their loved master, soon after died headless upon the scaffold; the Earl of Cornwath, and the Lords Widdrington and Nairn, to be released after a year's imprisonment, with forfeited titles and estate; and Nithisdale, owing his romantic escape to the affection of his wife, disguising him in her woman's dress and riding-hood, and remaining in his gloomy cell in the Tower. "The very best thing a man could do in his condition!"such was the phlegmatic comment of his Majesty on the morrow morning, when he was informed of this incident.

On December 3, 1717, the Thames flowed one foot deep upon the floor; and on December 24, 1736, a high tide burst in at 5 o'clock in the afternoon, while at the same time it broke down the Horse-ferry bank, inundating houses and gardens as it passed.

Robert Harley, Earl of Oxford, and Premier, was tried here at his own petition, placed bareheaded at the bar, with the axe and headsman (as the custom was) beside him, on June 24, 1717, 3 Geo. I., (the Lord Chancellor Cowper presiding as High Steward,) in presence of the King. Having been a prisoner in the Tower for nigh two years, upon a charge of high treason, after the escape of Lord Bolingbroke, anxious to retire into private life, the patriotic statesman was now set free, on July 1,