The dissolution of the Rump had been connected with a determination to call together a new Parliament to meet on the 25th of April. The preparatory elections evoked the efforts of all parties--the Presbyterians, the Episcopalians, and the "sects," as Congregationalists and other Nonconformists were termed. The last of these three parties--mostly anxious for a Republican form of government--did what they could to return representatives holding extreme democratical opinions. The second of them, where they dared to appear, in some cases, from a too fervent zeal, overshot the mark, and by their violence alienated the constituences which they canvassed. The first of these parties, the Presbyterians,--who, after the dissolution of Parliament, had held the administration of affairs in their own hands, and with whom, for the time being, Monk, their betrayer in the end, was in co-operation,--used such methods as their executive powers afforded, to sway the elections in favour of their own views. The Presbyterians, including different shades of opinion, uniting with the more moderate Episcopalians and Cavaliers, succeeded in obtaining a large majority. [Sidenote: 1660.] The persons who had been elected members of the Convention began to assemble in St. Stephen's Chapel upon the 25th of April. The Presbyterian leaders, Hollis, Pierrepoint, and Lewis, secured immediately the office of Speaker for Sir Harbottle Grimston, of whose decided Presbyterianism there could be no doubt. This critical movement was accomplished in an irregular manner, before even forty members had taken their seats. The preachers appointed to address the Commons were Gauden, Calamy, and Baxter,--all three at that time Presbyterian Conformists. In the House of Peers, where only ten members at first resumed their places, the Presbyterian Earl of Manchester was chosen to preside. Two Presbyterian ministers, Reynolds and Hardy, were selected to preach to their Lordships. Before proceeding to describe the revived loyalty displayed by the Convention, we must notice the violent manifestation of opposite feelings by a portion of the Commonwealth Army. Lambert, one of Cromwell's officers, escaped on the 9th of April from the Tower, where he had been imprisoned, and, gathering around him some of his comrades, marched into the Midland Counties, hoping successfully to raise a standard in support of Republicanism. Ludlow and Scott had before this been preparing for such a movement; and, it is said, that despondency of success alone prevented Haselrig from drawing his sword.[74] The French Ambassador, writing on the 3rd of May to Cardinal Mazarin, thus describes the actual outbreak which followed:--[75] [Sidenote: PROGRESS OF RESTORATION.]