was made; much noife, much tumult, much expence, much magnificence, much vain-glory; briefly, a great show, and yet, after all this, but an ill fight. At last (for it seemed long to me, and like his short reign too, very tedious) the whole fcene paffed by; and I retired back to my chamber, weary, and I think more melancholy than any of the mourners; where I began to reflect on the whole life of this prodigious man: and fometimes I was filled with horror and deteftation of his actions, and fometimes I inclined a little to reverence and admiration of his courage, conduct, and fuccefs; till, by these different motions and agitations of mind, rocked as it were asleep, I fell at last into this vifion; or if you please to call it but a dream, I fhall not take it ill, because the father of poets tells us, even dreams, too, are from God.

But fure it was no dream; for I was fuddenly tranfported afar off (whether in the body, or out of the body, like St. Paul, I know not) and found myself on the top of that famous hill in the island Mona, which has the profpect of three great, and not-long-fince most happy, kingdoms. As foon as ever I looked on them, the "not-long-fince" ftruck upon my memory, and called forth the fad representation of all the fins, and all the miferies, that had overwhelmed them thefe twenty years. And I wept bitterly for two or three hours; and, when my present stock of moisture was all wafted, I fell a fighing for an hour more; and, as foon as recovered from my paffion the use of speech and reafon, I broke forth, as I remember (looking upon England) into this complaint

Ah,

Ah, happy isle, how art thou chang'd and curs'd,

Since I was born, and knew thee first!

When peace, which had forfook the world around (Frighted with noise, and the fhrill trumpet's found) Thee for a private place of reft,

And a fecure retirement, chofe

Wherein to build her halcyon neft ;
No wind durft stir abroad, the air to discompose &

When all the riches of the globe beside
Flow'd in to thee with every tide;
When all, that nature did thy foil deny,
The growth was of thy fruitful industry ;
When all the proud and dreadful fea,
And all his tributary streams,

A constant tribute paid to thee;

When all the liquid world was one extended Thames :

When plenty in each village did appear,

And bounty was its steward there;

When gold walk'd free about in

open view,

Ere it one conquering party's prifoner grew;

When the religion of our state

Had face and substance with her voice,
Ere fhe, by her foolish loves of late,

Like Echo (once a Nymph) turn'd only into noise :

When men to men, respect and friendship bore,
And God with reverence did adore;
When upon earth no kingdom could have shown
A happier monarch to us, than our own:

And yet his fubjects by him were

(Which is a truth will hardly be
'Receiv'd by any vulgar ear,

A fecret known to few) made happier ev'n than he.

Thou doft a Chaos, and Confufion, now,
A Babel, and a Bedlam, grow,

And, like a frantic perfon, thou doft tear

The ornaments and cloaths which thou should't wear,

And cut thy limbs ; and, if we see

(Just as thy barbarous Britons did)

Thy body with hypocrify

Painted all o'er, thou think'ft thy naked flame is hid.

The nations, which envied thee erewhile,
Now laugh (too little 'tis to fmile);

They laugh, and would have pitied thee, alas!
But that thy faults all pity do furpafs.

Art thou the country, which didst hate
And mock the French inconftancy?

And have we, have we feen of late

Lefs change of habits there, than governments in thee? Unhappy ifle! no fhip of thine at sea,

Was ever toft and torn like thee.

Thy naked hulk loofe on the waves does beat,
The rocks and banks around her ruin threat;

What did thy foolish pilots ail,

To lay the compass quite afide ?
Without a law or rule to fail,

And rather take the winds, than heavens, to be their

guide?

Yet,

Yet, mighty God! yet, yet, we humbly crave,

This floating ifle from fhipwreck fave;

And though, to wash that blood which does it ftain,
It well deferve to fink into the main;

Yet, for the royal martyr's prayer

(The royal martyr prays, we know)
This guilty, perishing vessel spare ;

Hear but his foul above, and not his blood below!

I think I fhould have gone on, but that I was interrupted by a ftrange and terrible apparition; for there appeared to me (arifing out of the earth, as I conceived) the figure of a man, taller than a giant, or indeed than the fhadow of any giant in the evening. His body was naked; but that nakedness adorned, or rather deformed, all over, with feveral figures, after the manner of the ancient Britons, painted upon it: and I perceived that most of them were the reprefentation of the late battles in our civil wars, and (if I be not much mistaken) it was the battle of Nafeby that was drawn upon his breast. His eyes were like burning brafs; and there were three crowns of the fame metal (as I gueffed), and that looked as red-hot too, upon his head. He held in his right-hand a sword, that was yet bloody, and nevertheless the motto of it Pax quæritur bello;" and in his left hand a thick book, upon the back of which was written in letters of gold, Acts, Ordinances, Proteftations, Covenants, Engagements, Declarations, Remonftrances, &c.

was,

Though this fudden, unusual, and dreadful object might have quelled a greater courage than mine; yet

fo it pleased God (for there is nothing bolder than a man in a vifion) that I was not at all daunted, but asked him refolutely and briefly, " What art thou ?”. And he faid, "I am called the north-weft principality, his highness, the protector of the commonwealth of England, Scotland, and Ireland, and the dominions belonging thereunto; for I am that angel, to whom the Almighty has committed the government of those three kingdoms, which thon feest from this place." And I answered and faid, " If it be fo, Sir, it seems to me that for almost these twenty years paft, your, highness has been abfent from your charge: for not only if any angel, but if any wife and honest man, had fince that time been our governor, we fhould not have wandered thus long in these laborious and endless labyrinths of confufion, but either not have entered at all into them, or at least have returned back ere we had abfolutely loft our way; but, inftead of your highnefs, we have had fince fuch a protector, as was his predeceffor Richard the third to the king his nephew ; for he presently flew the commonwealth, which he pretented to protect, and fet up himself in the place of it a little lefs guilty indeed in one refpect, because the other flew an innocent, and this man did but murder a murderer. Such a protector we have had, as we would have been glad to have changed for an enemy, and rather received a conftant Turk, than this every month's apoftate; fuch a protector, as man is to his flocks, which he sheers, and fells, or devours himself, and I would fain know, what the wolf, which he pro

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