was done by the Parliamentarians, in the person of Sir John Hotham, who refused, as “governor to the Parliament,” to open the gates of Hull. It is at this juncture that the Earl of Derby, in absolute fact still only Lord Strange, first came forth from his retirement to bear his loyal, unswerving part on the King’s side of the contention. He was one of the first to present himself at the Court at York, prepared in deed as by word to give his life’s blood and the last penny in his purse for his royal master and the legitimate cause. It was now proposed to form a royal guard at York from among the nobility of the neighbourhood. Fifty gentlemen refused to join his company, and at their head was Sir Thomas Fairfax, who further contrived, at great risk of being crushed by the feet of the King’s horse, to fasten upon the pommel of Charles’ saddle a widely-signed petition against war, and an entreaty that his Majesty would live in peace with his Parliament. On the 1st June the propositions for accommodation arrived at York from Westminster. They embodied demands for the complete abolition of royal prerogative, and exercise of supreme power for the Parliament. “If I granted your demands,” cried the King, in a burst of indignation, “I should be nothing but an image—the vain shadow of a king;” and he refused to listen further. The very terms rendered it obvious that the Parliamentarians expected no other response, any more than they desired it. Forty members only of the Lower House voted against war, and one member, the Earl of Portland, in the Lords. An army of the Parliamentarian party was at once organised, over which Lord Essex was nominated commander-in-chief. On the King’s side, his faithful subjects rallied quickly round him; and Lord Strange appears in their foremost ranks with a contingent of three thousand well-accoutred and well-provisioned men, raised from among his own people. On finding however, that the King, isolated as it were at York, was destitute of all assistance, and knew not where to obtain weapons, Lord Strange placed at his disposal everything the arsenals of his mansions contained.