Of the settling of some portion of the Marquess of Worcester’s estates upon Cromwell, we take the following particulars from a popular writer of our own times:--“The Commons,” he observes, “now dealing with delinquents, do not forget to reward good servants--to ‘conciliate the grandees,’ as splenetic Walker calls it. For about two years (writing after the conclusion of the war) there has been talk and debate about settling £2,500 a year on Lieutenant-General Cromwell; but difficulties have arisen. First, they tried Basinghouse lands, the Marquis of Winchester’s, whom Cromwell had demolished; but the Marquis’s affairs were in disorder. It was generally found that the Marquis had only a life-rent there--only Abbotson and Itchin in that quarter could be realized. Order thereupon to settle lands of papists and delinquents to the requisite amount wheresoever convenient. To settle especially what lands the Marquis of Worcester had in that county of Southampton; which was done, though still with insufficient result. Then came the army quarrels, and an end of such business. But now, in the Commons’ Journals, March 7th, this is what we read:--‘An ordinance for passing unto Oliver Cromwell, Esquire, Lieutenant-General, certain lands and manors in the counties of Gloucester, Monmouth, and Glamorgan, late the Earl of <g>Worcester’s</g>, was this day read third time; and, upon the question, passed and ordered to be sent unto the Lords for their concurrence.’” <g>Oliver</g> himself, we shall find, has been dangerously sick; and the following is what Clement Walker reports upon the matter of the grant:--“The sixth of March brought an ordinance to settle two thousand five hundred pounds a year of land out of the Marquis of Worcester’s estate--the old Marquis of Worcester at Raglan--father of the Lord Glamorgan, who, in his turn, became Marquis of Worcester, and wrote the ‘Century of Inventions.’ But £2,500 a year out of the old Marquis’s estate upon Lieutenant-General Cromwell! I have heard some gentlemen, that knew the manor of Chepstow and the other lands, affirm that in reality they are worth £5,000, or even £6,000 a year. You see,” continues he, “though they have not made King Charles a ‘glorious king,’ they have settled a crown revenue upon Oliver, and have made _him_ as glorious a king as ever John of Leyden was.”[280] * * * * *