On the very day on which Charles I issued his summons for the Magnum Concilium to meet at York, the two Earls of Bedford and Hertford appeared in London before the Privy Council, laid their petition before it, and moved for its concurrence in their prayer. The Earls said that they themselves were ready to pay true obedience to the King under all circumstances, but that they could not answer for the friends by whom they were commissioned, and that if their request was rejected, they would not be held answerable for the mischiefs that might ensue[195]. The obvious question was asked, who were their associates: and they replied, many other lords and a great part of the gentry in all parts of the country. The news of the summoning of the Great Council was communicated to them: they received it without attaching much importance to the fact, remarking that this council durst not take any steps towards the granting of money, nor allow any injury to the commons and their rights. Lord Arundel referred to the religious portion of their petition, saying that they seemed to wish to join the Scots for the purpose of effecting a reform in the Church[196], but that the result might be, under the pretext of liberty and religion to make England a prey to the Scots. The two Earls were asked if there was not already in England an association similar to the Covenant: but this they denied. Without doubt such was the situation;--it is true that no popular religious union, either in England itself, or with the Scots, was actually formed: still that did not prevent the Scottish cause from being sure of general sympathy. [A.D. 1640.] Some saw in it the cause of God and of the only true religion, which the Scottish army had come to defend: others cared chiefly for the support which the presence of the Scots afforded to their own political attitude: in many both these motives for sympathy were united. From the beginning down to the present day, the exact understanding which had been entered into between the parties has continued in the profoundest obscurity. Tradition connects the memory of it, among other places, with Broughton Castle in Oxfordshire, the seat of Lord Say, and Fawley in Northamptonshire, the house of a son-in-law of John Hampden: there a table was pointed out, at which all the plans were concocted from which the civil troubles arose. In London it was at the house of John Pym, near Gray’s Inn, that the meetings were held and conferences took place, by which, as it was assumed, a close connexion with the Scots was maintained[197]. Moreover the well-considered and well-written manifesto of the Scots made a marked impression in their favour: it suggested points of view which every one could accept. They did not omit, after the capture of Newcastle, a place which was of the utmost importance to the English capital on account of the coal supply, to open communications with the city: they expressed in a special letter, as well as in their