How, after many battles had been fought, King Charles went to Scotland; how the Scots sold him to the English parliament; how the army got the King into their power, and appointed judges to try him, who condemned him to death; how, after a sad parting from two of his children, he was beheaded. A book twice as big as our little History would not hold all the story of the Civil Wars. England, Scotland, and Ireland were all engaged in them; and many dreadful battles were fought, where Englishmen killed one another, and a great deal of blood was shed. The first great battle was fought at Edgehill, where many of the king’s officers were killed: then, at a less fight at Chalgrove, the parliament lost that great and good man Mr. Hampden. The battles of Newbury, of Marston Moor, and of Naseby, are all sadly famous for the number of brave and good Englishmen that were killed. During this civil war, the parliament sent often to the king, in hopes of persuading him to make peace: and I believe that the parliament, and the king, and the real English lords and gentlemen on both sides, truly desired to have peace, and several times the king had promised the parliament to do what they lawfully might ask of him. But, unhappily, the queen had come back to England, and the king trusted her and took her advice, when he had much better have followed his own good thoughts. Now, the queen and Prince Rupert, the king’s nephew, and some of the lords, were of James the First’s way of thinking, and would not allow that subjects had any right even to their own lives, or lands, or money, if the king chose to take them: and so they persuaded the king to break his word so often with the people and parliament, that at last they could not trust him any longer. When the king found that the parliament would not trust him again, he determined to go to the Scottish army that had come to England to help the parliament, and he hoped that the Scots would take his part and defend him. But he had offended the Scots by meddling more than they liked with their religion, and some other things, and the leaders of their army agreed to give him up to the English parliament. You will hardly believe, however, that those mean Scots actually sold the king to the English parliament: but they did so. The unhappy king was sent back to England, and was now obliged to agree to what the parliament wished, and there seemed to be an end of the Civil War. It was not long, however, before it began again; and this second time it ended in Cromwell and the other generals of the army becoming the most powerful men in England. These men now drove away almost all the lords and gentlemen from parliament, so there was nobody but the generals who had any power. The wisest of the generals, Lord Essex, was dead. The next, General Fairfax, was a good man, but neither so clever nor so cunning as some of the others, particularly one whose name was Oliver Cromwell.