Numbers of both Lords and Commons continued to steal away to the king, especially, says May, lawyers and clergy, "whose callings made them capable of easier and greater gratifications from the king than other men, and therefore apt to lean that way where preferment lies." The Commons summoned nine peers, who had gone away to York, to appear in their places in Westminster, and, on their refusing, impeached them of high treason. These were Spencer, Earl of Northampton, the Earls of Devonshire, Dover, Monmouth, and the Lords Howard of Charlton, Rich, Grey of Ruthven, Coventry, and Capel.
On the 2nd of June the Lords and Commons sent proposals to the king for an amicable arrangement of the national affairs on a permanent basis; but matters had so far changed with Charles, that he was in no mood to listen. On that very day, one of the ships, freighted by the queen in Holland with arms and ammunition, managed to elude the fleet and land supplies on the Yorkshire coast. With these, and the prospect of more, with a number of lords and courtiers around him, Charles at once dropped the humble and conciliatory tone, called the Parliament a nest of caballers and traitors, who had no right to dictate to him, the descendant of a hundred kings, and protested that he would never agree to their terms if he were bound and at their mercy.
From this moment all hope of accommodation was at an end, and king and Parliament went on preparing with all diligence for trying their strength at arms. The question to be decided was, whether England should be an abject despotism or a free nation. If the Parliament were worsted, then must England sink to the level of the rest of the king-ridden nations. On the part of the king, his adherents joined him in his solemn engagement to maintain the Protestant religion, and to claim nothing but his rightful prerogative; on the part of the Parliament, an avowal as solemn was, that they fought not against the king, but for him and his crown, as well as for the liberties and privileges of the people, which were endangered by the evil counsellors of the king.
[Illustration: LORD FALKLAND. (After the Portrait by Vandyke.)]