Charles had, during the last summer, after every temporary success, proposed negotiations, thus showing his readiness to listen to accommodation, and throwing on the Parliament the odium of continued warfare. At the same time it must be confessed that he was by no means inclined to accept terms which would surrender altogether his prerogative, or sacrifice the interests of those who had ventured everything for him. He was constantly exhorted by the queen from France to make no peace inconsistent with his honour, or the interests of his followers. She contended that he must stipulate for a bodyguard, without which he could enjoy no safety, and should keep all treaty regarding religion to the last, seeing plainly the almost insuperable difficulty on that head; for since nothing would satisfy the Puritans but the close binding down of the Catholics, that would effectually cut off all hope of his support from Ireland, or from the Catholics of England. Charles, in fact, was in a cleft stick, and the contentions of his courtiers added so much to his embarrassments, that he got rid of the most troublesome by sending them to attend the queen in France. He then assembled his Parliament for the second time, but it was so thinly attended, and the miserable distractions which rent his Court were so completely imported into its debates, that he was the more disposed to accept the offer of negotiation with the Parliament. His third proposal, happening to be favoured by the recommendation of the Scots, was at length acceded to by Parliament, but the terms recommended by the Scots--the recognition of Presbytery as the national religion, and the demands of the Parliament of the supreme control not only of the revenue but of the army--rendered negotiations from the first hopeless. In November, 1644, the propositions of the Scots, drawn up by Johnston of Wariston, were sent to the king by a Commission consisting of the Earl of Denbigh, the Lords Maynard and Wenman, and Mr. Pierpoint, Denzil Holles, and Whitelock, accompanied by the Scottish Commissioners--Lord Maitland, Sir Charles Erskine, and Mr. Barclay. [Illustration: INTERVIEW BETWEEN CHARLES AND THE EARL OF DENBIGH. (_See p._ 36.)]