At last the queen landed safely at a port near the Hague, having lost two of her ships. After two days' rest she again set sail, and made a quick voyage to Burlington, where, guarded by a thousand cavaliers on land, and Von Tromp at sea, she went ashore. The next morning, at dawn, five ships-of-war, that had entered the bay during the night, began a cannonade on the house where the queen was sleeping. She was obliged to rise in haste, put on her clothes, and seek shelter in a ditch some distance from the town of Burlington. Bullets fell thick about her as she hurried on foot to the place of shelter, and one of her servants was killed. Nevertheless, when Henrietta remembered that her favorite lap-dog had been left behind, she ran back, hastily climbed the stairs to her bed-chamber, caught up the animal, and carried it off in safety. One ball grazed the edge of the ditch where the royal party were concealed, and covered them with earth and stones. At night the attacking ships retreated, much to her majesty's relief, for she then remained quietly for ten days in the neighborhood of Burlington. While there she distributed arms to those gentlemen who seemed loyally disposed, and thus gained many friends for the king. A captain of one of the ships that had bombarded the queen's house on the morning after her arrival was caught on shore, tried by a military tribunal, and sentenced to be hung. The queen happened to meet the procession when the prisoner was being conducted to execution, and inquired what was the matter. She was told that King Charles's loyal subjects were about to punish a man who had aimed at her. {166}"Ah," replied the queen, "but he did not kill me, and he shall not be put to death on my account." The captain was then set at liberty, and so deeply was he touched by Henrietta's generosity that he came over to the royal cause, and persuaded several of his shipmates to do likewise. [[A.D. 1644.]] Previous to the battle of Newbury, so fatal to his cause, Charles escorted his wife to Abington, and there this devoted couple parted never to meet again. The queen was ill when the Earl of Essex advanced with his army to besiege the city in which she had taken refuge; but rising from her bed she escaped in disguise with one lady, one gentleman, and her confessor, leaving behind her an infant only a few weeks old. She hid for two days in a hut by the roadside three miles from Exeter, and lay couched under a heap of rubbish when the parliamentary soldiers marched by. She heard them say "that they meant to carry the head of Henrietta to London, and receive for it a reward of fifty thousand crowns." As soon as they were gone she stole out of her hiding-place, and with her three companions travelled on to a wood, which became the rendezvous that night for all her faithful attendants. Geoffrey Hudson, the dwarf, was of the number, and everybody was in disguise.