difficulties, Cromwell called a third and last Parliament, and instituted a House of Peers; but before they ever met in Parliament, the Protector was seized with a quartan ague, which, after a few weeks’ illness, brought him to the grave at the age of fifty-nine years. His reign was momentous, short, and arbitrary; yet less severe than would be supposed in the circumstances in which he placed himself. His severity was chiefly directed against the cavalier party, who never ceased to plot against his person and his power. But his vengeance, though strict, was not bloody, his punishments seldom exceeding confiscation, fine, or imprisonment. There are some instances of his packing juries, and some of his diverting the ordinary course of justice by other means. His parliaments were elected unconstitutionally; it could hardly be otherwise, when the power that brought them together was usurped and absolute. But his main object seems to have been the general happiness, virtue, and honour of his people. Few of England’s hereditary kings had governed so well or so mildly; scarcely any so bloodlessly. His prayer on his death-bed was as follows:—“Lord! I am a poor, foolish creature; this people would fain have me live; they think that it will be best for them, and that it will redound much to thy glory. All the stir is about this. Others would fain have me die. Lord, pardon them, and pardon thy foolish people; forgive their sins, and do not forsake them; but love, and bless, and bring them to a consistency, and give them rest; and give me rest, for Jesus Christ’s sake; to whom, with thyself and the Holy Spirit, be all honour and glory.” He died Sept. 3, 1658, on the anniversary of his victories at Dunbar and Worcester. Some hours before his death he declared his eldest son Richard to be his successor in the Protectorate. He was buried with the pomp that became his high place, and his remains were interred amidst those of England’s kings. The empty spite of the minions of the Restoration was wreaked on his dead body, which was disinterred, hanged at Tyburn, and burnt. This was the only revenge that the courtly followers of Charles could take on the man, the terror of whose name still made them tremble.