manifesto, their good-will and even their reverence for London, assuring them that the traffic should not be for an instant interrupted, their purpose being to make friends and not enemies. We learn that this declaration produced the desired effect[198]. After the step taken by the Lords, preparations were immediately made in the city to present a petition similar to theirs. The Privy Council sent a letter to the Lord Mayor and Aldermen, warning them against this proceeding; saying that the city had from the earliest times been treated as the King’s chamber, even as his own house, [A.D. 1640.] to which he would entrust his wife and children[199]: that they ought not to press him about grievances which he was ever labouring to remove, and that this course was inconsistent with the customs and charters of the city. But the Aldermen refused to interfere: still less could they be induced to do what was suggested to them--address to the King a petition of contrary tenour[200]. These ideas of a special connexion vanished before the general religious and political motives of action in the Commons as well as in the Lords. The King was requested, in the name of his capital also, to summon a Parliament as soon as possible, for the removal of grievances to which, as experience proved, the usual course of justice did not extend. This was the demand which had been repeated for more than ten years in stronger or weaker language, which the King had evaded as often as possible, but which nevertheless had often been pressed upon him. Once he had taken steps in that direction, in the hope that complications abroad might in the interval occur to check opposition at home: but he was most bitterly disappointed. Should he now after all decide on this course? The need of Parliamentary aid was more pressing than ever, the cry for a Parliament louder: and the impression which this demand had made was deepened by another motive, the fear of worse consequences in case of refusal. The idea gained ground that if the King delayed to call a Parliament, the associated Lords would take steps towards that end[201]. A Parliament had already been held in Scotland without the King’s participation. What else did the threats mean that Bedford and Hertford had uttered before the assembled Privy Council? It was asserted that the Queen, who was close at hand at Hampton Court, and was taking counsel on the state of affairs with her confidants in the Privy Council, had been induced by the impending [A.D. 1640.] dangers to advise the King to summon Parliament immediately; and if he would not do this--so she was reported to have written with the concurrence of some of the ministers--that at least he should not lose an instant in returning to London, otherwise irreparable disasters would be imminent[202]. Hereupon the King adopted the resolution which of all others was most repugnant to him, and that immediately; no extraneous influence could have led him to it.