Thus Cromwell, by a deliberate course of fraud, compassed the death of men, who might otherwise have lived void of offence against his government. He next proceeded to delude all his subjects by means of the sham conspiracy by which he had ensnared his victims on to the scaffold. This development in Cromwell's course of deception brings us back to the ordinary path of history. Every historical text-book mentions that Cromwell, within a few months after the Insurrection of March 1655, subjected England to the authority, almost unlimited, of twelve Major-Generals. To each one a separate province was allotted, with power to imprison, fine, or sell as slaves, all that he might select. The Major-Generals also were directed by Cromwell to pay themselves, and the soldiers under them, by the levy of a tax of ten per cent. on the incomes of all but the poorest Royalists, which he imposed for that purpose. As historians have believed in the reality of the Insurrection of March 1655, they hold that Cromwell, therefore, 'found himself compelled to divide England into districts, over which he set Major-Generals,' and to inflict upon the Royalists the tax, 'known by the name of the Decimation.' Yet, curiously enough, these hearty believers in Cromwell have ignored that solemn confirmation of their opinion, which he addressed to his subjects, namely, the 'Declaration of his Highness, by the advice of his Council, showing the Reasons of their Proceedings for Securing the Peace of the Commonwealth, upon occasion of the late Insurrection and Rebellion,--October 31, 1655.'