[Illustration: STRANGE NEWS FROM EXETER, 1643.]
In an account of the defence of Plymouth against the Royalists there is a very elaborate map showing the fortifications of the town, 'with the workes and approaches of the enemy at the last siege.' The account of the siege is very long, but the following passage may be quoted:--'One remarkable passage of God's providence to us we must with all thankfulnesse remember and acknowledge, that after the Towne had been a long time strictly beseiged and no fresh victuall either flesh or fish could be had, whereby the poore people were grievously punished, there came in an infinite multitude of Pilchards into the Harbour, within the Barbican, which the people took up with great ease in baskets, which did not only refresh them for the present, but a great deal more were taken, preserved, and salted; whereby the poore got much money; such a passage hath not happened before.
'We cannot forget the humanity of the good women of Plymouth, and their courage in bringing out strong waters, and all sorts of provisions in the midst of all our skirmishes for refreshing of our souldiers, though many shot through the cloathes.'
I have already made the remark that the military atrocities of recent times were equalled, if not exceeded, during the Civil War in England and Ireland. In a tract of 1644, containing various items of news, the following woodcut is given as an illustration of recent events. The same woodcut is found in another tract entitled '_Terrible and bloody Newes from the disloyall Army in the North_:'--'The proceedings of the Scots and Irish appears more visible and inhumane than formerly; their actions are tyrannical, their ways most insufferable, and executeth nothing but blood thirstinesse and cruelty tending only to utter ruin and desolation; they have burned down divers stately buildings in these parts, executed some of my Lord Wharton's tenants, and threatens others, which causeth the Country to rise and joyn with Lieu. Gen. Cromwell, insomuch that there will be a sudden engagement.'
The sect called the 'Levellers' is thus alluded to in the same tract:--'Colonel Martin's approach with his Levellers in these parts hath alarmed the Country and put themselves into a posture to receive them, and for preservation of their ancient rights and liberties against their new design of levelling, who by their strange, politick, and subtill delusions have wrought into the hearts of divers people to ingage with them, especially among those who are of a desperate fortune, and mean condition, the basest and vilest of men resorting to them. They rob and plunder exceedingly wheresoever they come, saying they will levell all sorts of people, even from the highest to the lowest, and that he that hath the most shall be equall with him that hath the least.'