When the lease was enrolled the gang grew alarmed. Clotworthy, therefore, got Henry Cromwell to apply to his father’s secretary in London, John Thurloe, to cloak the fraud. In December, 1656, Henry implored Thurloe to obtain from his father a fresh Signet Letter sanctioning a grant which would include the Bann. Thurloe ignored his supplications, and thus the hypocrites were left in the plight of men who, to rob the City of London, had betrayed their master. The Commonwealth Charter, which restored the estate of the Corporation, including the Bann, was issued three months later, and thus two repugnant grants came into existence. The Dublin junta kept their secret to themselves. Thurloe also held his peace, and in the following year Cromwell died. Thurloe, however, carefully preserved the correspondence, and after the Restoration hid it behind the ceiling of a garret in his chambers at Lincoln’s Inn, with other Cromwellian literature. There it was found fifty years later—embalmed in the odour of sanctity. Cromwell’s death soon led to a flood of intrigue among his Anglo-Irish retainers. Each was intent on asserting one great principle—how best to hold on to the spoil with which confiscation had endowed them. If Republicanism would secure this, they were Republicans. If possession must be tempered by monarchy—then “Long live Charles II.” CHAPTER XXI. REBELLION REWARDED. The Irish Republicans quickly came to the conclusion that monarchical principles possessed a virtue which afforded the best guarantee for their interests. Their budding royalism was threatened with blight from one quarter only—the exiled Irish soldiers who had fought for Prince Charles at home and abroad. These unreasonables had to be reckoned with, for Gaelic swordsmen, gentle and simple, formed part of his bodyguard and influenced his decisions. He even sympathised with their religion while his exile lasted, for the Duke of Ormonde relates that he once found his Majesty secretly hearing Mass in Brussels in a fit of lonely piety. The Cromwellians, awake to these difficulties, and ready to jettison any inconvenient doctrines which blocked their way, held a Convention in Dublin in 1659-60, to debate “the situation.” First they seized Dublin Castle from the weaklings who represented the tottering Commonwealth, and next they imprisoned all Catholic loyalists who could be laid hands on, to prevent their having any credit in bringing back the King or earning his gratitude. Then they sent an embassy to Brussels to propose conditions to his Majesty. Sir Arthur Forbes (son of the “discoverer” of 1628) was their messenger, and on his return Forbes reported hopefully to their spokesmen, Sir Charles Coote and Lord Broghill (Boyle). On the 16th March, 1660, the exiled King wrote engaging that “whatever Coote should promise and undertake on his behalf (which it was in his power to perform) he would make good.”