The welcome with which Charles was received amounted to frenzy. Bonfires were made all over the City; up went the maypoles again; the church bells rang; the mob paraded rumps of beef, which they afterwards roasted and devoured; they made everybody drink the health of the King upon their knees; they broke the windows of leading Puritans; they made Monk’s soldiers drunk. It was not only the King who had come to his own again; it was the return of merriment, feasting, dancing, singing, mumming, sports, music, laughing, the pride of the eye, the delight of the ear, the joy of the world, the careless, reckless, headlong happiness of youth in the things that belong to youth. The kingdom of God upon the earth had been attempted. Perhaps the Puritans mistook the nature of that kingdom; perhaps they were only wrong in believing that the time was ripe for the advent of that kingdom. [Illustration: MOB AT TEMPLE BAR From the Crace Collection in British Museum] But let us begin this reign with the words of those who looked on at the Restoration:— “Mem. that Threadneedle Street was all day long and late at night crammed with multitudes crying out, ‘A free Parliament!—A free Parliament!’ that the air rang again with their noise. One day, he, coming out on horseback, they were so violent that he was almost afraid of himself, and so, to satisfy them (as they used to do to importunate children), said, ‘Pray be quiet, ye shall have a Free Parliament!’ This was about seven, or rather eight, as I remember, at night; immediately a loud halloa and shout was given, all the bells in the city ringing; and the whole city looked as if it had been in a flame by the bonfires, which were prodigiously great and frequent, and ran like a train over the city; and I saw some balconies that began to be kindled. They made little gibbets, and roasted rumps of mutton; nay, I saw some very good rumps of beef. Health to K. Charles II. was drunk in the streets, by the bonfires, even on their knees.” And Pepys writes:—