derided his misfortunes. cruelly sinned against, Edward of Caernarvon was laid in his untimely grave in the forty-third year of his age. A weak and frivolous man, Thus ended the Barons' Wars, no patriotic resistance of an opposition who used sword and lance instead of the tongue and the pen, but the factious jealousy of men who became ferocious in their hatred of favouritism. (To be continued.) ROYAL ROSE-BUDS. CHAPTER IX. THE MARTYR'S CHILDREN. 'Thou seem'st a rose-bud born in snow, A flower of purpose sprung to bow And yet, as balm-trees gently spend Thou didst not murmur nor revile, But drank'st thy wormwood with a smile.' H. Vaughan. You, my Katharine, have already learned something of the Great Rebellion, which shook all England two hundred years ago. Some of the sweetest Rose-buds that ever graced our English crown, put up their fair heads at this stormy time. Three of these, two sisters and a brother, the children of Charles the First, I will now bring to your notice. The little Princess Anne, third daughter of Charles and his queen, Henrietta of France, was born in the spring of 1637. She died, to the great grief of her parents, before she had completed her fourth year. An old writer, Fuller, says, that she was above her tender years in sense and knowledge. She had always been very fragile, and troubled with cough and feverishness, and at length she wasted slowly away. Just before her death, being bidden by those about her to call upon God. "I am not able," saith she, "to say my long prayer, (meaning the Lord's Prayer,) but I will say my short one: "Lighten mine eyes, that I sleep not in death." This done, the little lamb gave up the ghost.' Thus was this dear child taken from the evil to come; housed,' as a good man of our own day has said, 'before the pelting of the pitiless storm.' Her sister Elizabeth, two years older than herself, was born on the Feast of the Holy Innocents, 1635, the earth being at that time clad with snow, and the sufferings of the people from cold, very severe. Her childish years were happy ones, for the royal children were warmly attached to each other, and to their parents. of England had not yet burst forth, and frequently snatched a few hours from the and spent them with his little ones. Great was the joy whenever he visited his nursery, the children trooping round him, sitting on either side of him at meals and making him right merry with their childish prattle. The troubles King Charles cares of state, Elizabeth was in her sixth year, and her baby-brother, Henry, only a few months old when the storm broke over England. I hope, my dear children, when you are older. to read with you a most beautiful account* of this sad civil war, written by one who took a leading part in it, and was among the wisest of Charles's counsellors; but at present you are much too young to understand the subject; indeed, grown-up people, who have weighed it well, can scarcely tell where the blame rests, or whether the Great Rebellion could in any way have been prevented. Probably not, for the spirit of discontent had been brewing for many years. The Tudor monarchs had been very haughty and fond of power, none more so than Elizabeth, the last of that race. She owned no law but her own will, laid on * Clarendon's History. taxes as she chose, and never allowed the members of the House of Commons to address her but on their knees. Had she not been a wonderfully clever woman, and ruled her people well and gloriously, they would probably have risen against her; but she possessed the firm and daring spirit which carries all before it. Her successor, James I., followed the same policy, and greatly increased the general discontent. In 1625, Charles I. came to the throne at the age of twenty-five. He was a high-minded, excellent man, a true son of our Church, pure in heart, and spotless in life. None could be more temperate, frugal, and selfdenying, while at the same time he loved both learning and the fine arts, practised hospitality, and kept up a fitting degree of regal state. Unhappily, he had been trained to the same high notions of kingly power which his father held, and he thought it his duty rather to die than to give them up. His parliament met him in a sullen and disloyal spirit, and refused even his just demands; he broke it up, and called another, and another, hoping to find them more loyal; but they proved otherwise. Many of them were Puritans, a sect whose aim was to overthrow both Church and State. Their leaders were very clever men, more keen-sighted, 'wiser in their generation,' alas! than the unhappy king who tried to cope with them. He grew angry, and tried to raise money without their consent, for the needful expenses of government, and for putting the navy on a good footing. The Parliament at this became furious. You remember how in 1641, they accused his faithful adviser, Lord Strafford, of high treason, and how, in a weak moment, ever remembered by him with bitter anguish, Charles yielded him up to die. In 1642 the king quitted London and retired to York. He and the Parliament both prepared for war, and their first battle was fought at Edgehill, in Warwickshire, in the autumn of that year. And now the royal family dispersed to meet again no more, The king moved from place to place, wherever the head-quarters of his gallant little army chanced to be; Queen Henrietts also led a wandering life, sometimes joining her husband: sometimes pleading his cause at foreign courts. Their two elder sons, the Prince of Wales and Duke of York, were sent abroad for safety, and lived much with their sister Mary, who had married the Prince of Orange. Meanwhile the little Elizabeth and Henry had remained in the hands of the Parliament, and led a wandering life, subject to many hardships, and often badly supplied with the comforts which their tender age and Elizabeth's weak health required. This was a great trouble to their father, and though he could ill spare it, he used frequently to send money from his private purse, to supply their wants. In 1643, such of their servants as remained true to the king were sent away, and so great was Elizabeth's grief at this, that, though only eight years old, she wrote the following sorrowful letter to the "Right Honourable Lords and Peers of Parliament:' 'My Lords, 'I account myself very miserable that I must have my servants taken from me and strangers put to me. You promised you would have a care of me, and I hope you will show it by preventing so great a grief as this would be to me. I pray, my Lords, consider of it, and give me cause to thank you, and to rest your loving friend, 'ELIZABETH.' This piteous entreaty was not penned in vain, for the Lords henceforward took up the cause of the captive children, and we find them better attended to, and more kindly used. Hard-hearted, indeed, must he have been, who could behave harshly to so meek and loveable a child as the Princess Elizabeth. She is described as small for her age, and very pale, with fair curls, and dark heavy eyes. Deprived of most of the amusements of childhood, she took great delight in books, and learned remarkably fast. She was chiefly trained by a tutor, who grounded her in what are called the dead languages, Greek, Latin, and Hebrew. She loved to read the Holy Bible, and was so much affected by its truths, and by the glorious hopes it holds out, as to have exclaimed one day, 'I would rather be a beggar here, than miss of going to Heaven!' After the death of her governess, Lady Dorset, which took place when she was ten years old, Elizabeth was placed in the hands of the kind-hearted Earl of Northumberland and his Countess. They established her with her little brother, in their mansion of Sion House, on the banks of the Thames. In 1646, James, Duke of York, the king's second son, joined her there. Tired of a rambling life abroad, and pinched by poverty, James had asked his father's leave to give himself up to the Parliament. His sister received him with great joy, yet had she penetration enough to lament his having thrown himself into the hands of his father's enemies, and many times she told him half in jest, that were she a boy, she would not long remain a captive, even in gilded chains! After a bloody struggle which lasted four years, the king's cause became desperate; seeing this, he resolved to stop further bloodshed, by giving himself up into the hands of the Scots, having first secured honourable terms for his brave Cavaliers. The Scots shortly after sold him to the leaders of the Parliament, now become more rabid and lawless than ever, and split up into fierce contending parties. Of these, the Independents, a new sect, led by Oliver Cromwell, soon became the strongest, and by a bold stroke they contrived to get the king into their own hands. In 1647 Charles obtained leave to see his three captive children for a few hours. The time of meeting was to be the 16th of July, the place, Caversham, a pleasant village in Oxfordshire, on the banks of the Thames. That morning the children rose early, in a state of great excite |