Chapter D: D. interpreting it of Cromwell, as was most natural at that

time. Garencières does the same, saying, “I never knew nor heard of anybody to whom this stanza might be better applied than to the late usurper Cromwell;” but unless it be a type of two handles, of the old ecclesiastical sort, I think it will apply still better to Napoleon; and I shall so apply it further on, giving the reasons why it is more appropriate to him than to the Protector. Further than this, as a general rule in regard to the succession of the quatrains in Nostradamus, they have no more affinity to each other than that they lie together, as one bean touches another in a bushel measure. Still, the next we shall treat is in sequence with the two preceding.

CHARLES II. AFTER THE BATTLE OF WORCESTER. (SEPTEMBER 3, 1651).

_Century VIII.—Quatrain 58._

Regne en querelle aux frères divisé,
Prendre les armes et le nom Britannique:
Titre Anglican sera tard avisé,
Surprins de nuict mener à l’air Gallique.

_Translation._

When a kingdom in quarrel divided between two brothers takes
up arms, and the name of Great Britain: The King (_Titre
Anglican_) too late advised, surprised at night (is forced) to
seek the air of France.

It is rather harsh, but to make sense of this we shall be forced to understand the two brothers to be England and Scotland, or simply civil war. When Charles at last made up his mind to visit Scotland and fight for his crown, it was already too late. The Parliamentary side had developed a strength that he was never equal to cope with. The loss of the battle of Dunbar was a disaster that settled the question. He might as well have quitted the field to Cromwell at once. Instead of that, on the 3rd of September—ominous day! being the anniversary of the Dunbar fight—he engages him again at Worcester. Charles was completely routed and his cause hopelessly broken. He managed, under the cover of night, to escape from the city of Worcester, and, flying from place to place for weeks, as most romantically chronicled in the Boscobel Tracts, he at last, on the 20th of October, got well shipped for Dieppe, and finally rejoined his mother safely at St. Germain.

DEATH OF CROMWELL (SEPTEMBER 3, 1658). KING CHARLES II.’S FLIGHT AND RESTORATION (SEPTEMBER 3, 1651-1660).

_Century X.—Quatrain 4._

Sur la minuict conducteur de l’armée
Se sauvera, subit esvanouy,
Sept ans après la fame non blasmée;
A son retour ne dira onc ouy.[203]

_Translation._

Upon the stroke of midnight, the leader of the army (King
Charles II.) shall save himself (by flight), and suddenly
evanish. For seven years longer that is, to a day, till the
death of Cromwell, his reputation will survive unchallenged; at
his Restoration no one will say anything but yes.

In other words, Nostradamus tells King Charles II. to continue to hope on, for that though he will have to fly by night from Worcester, his memory will be preserved without diminution till the death of his victor, seven years later to a day. Further, that when the day of his Restoration does come round, he will be received back with universal acclaim. Had it been given as _neuf ans_, it would have been more complete as regards Charles II. personally. But, as it is, the date to a day coinciding with the death of Cromwell, makes one suppose it to have been given to point to that interesting coincidence. It would have been no more wonderful than are many others amongst the quatrains, had this been intended; but whether it shall be so allowed or not rests with the reader,—now that he knows exactly how it stands,—to accept or to reject.

The French used always to engage in a battle willingly on St. Louis’s Day, April 11, and the English upon St. George’s Day, April 23. But September 3, St. Mansuetus’s Day, was ruinous to the Royalists and prosperous to Cromwell. The Battle of Worcester, so decisive in its consequences, was commenced at three o’clock in the afternoon on September 3, 1651; and at three o’clock in the afternoon of September 3, 1658, Cromwell died on what has been called his _Fortunate Day_: “Nature herself,” says his last chronicler in the ninth edition of the ‘Encyclopædia Britannica,’ “seeming to prophesy, in the voice of the great tempest that swept over England, that a great power had passed away.”[204] It was a tremendous tempest no doubt, and men at the time said the Devil had run away with Old Noll. Some say he died broken-hearted, when the last Parliament convened by him in January, 1658, refused to acknowledge his House of Peers. So great a burden “drank up his spirits,” said Maidston.

CROMWELL DECLARED PROTECTOR (DECEMBER 16, 1653).

_Century X.—Quatrain 22._

Pour ne vouloir consentir au divorce,
Qui puis après sera cogneu indigne,
Le Roy des isles sera chassé par force:
Mis à son lieu qui de Roy n’aura signe.

_Translation._

The King will agree to the divorce of his crown, which would
afterwards have been regarded as an unworthy action, and hence
will by force be expelled from the island. One who will have no
sign of kingship will be put in his place.

Garencières was alive to the true sense of this and its fulfilment. The Republicans murdered the king, gave the government, if not the crown, to Cromwell, and drove Charles II. into France.

CROMWELL THE FOX.

_Century VIII.—Quatrain 41._

Esleu sera Renard, ne sonnant mot,
Faisant le saint public, vivant pain d’orge,[205]
Tyrannizer après tant[206] à un cop,[207]
Mettant à pied des plus grands sur la gorge.[208]

_Translation._

A Fox shall be elected, uttering not a word, playing saint in
public and helping himself to other people’s property, in order
to tyrannize after a while by a _coup d’état_, placing his foot
on the throat of the greatest.

Garencières thinks this to apply to some Pope, but D. D. refers it much more aptly to Cromwell. If my proposed readings are allowed, the quatrain can fit no one so well, especially as it follows Quatrain 40, which we already have interpreted of the Commonwealth. D. D. reminds us that the Protector was a great Chiliast and Fifth Monarchy man, and certainly _Faisant le saint public_; even so as to gull, in this our late day, Thomas Carlyle, who allowed the heroism of violence, in this case, to dazzle him into the belief that the hypocrisy of Saintship was Godfearing. As to Cromwell, D. D. says truly, that he was moderate in diet. This he says to strengthen the barley bread, though I feel very strongly that it is differently intended. It might even mean that he got his bread by barley, or John Barleycorn, from the Huntingdon brewery. He was more given to ambition than to pleasure, says D. D., as is the case with men of his saturnine complexion. This may, by such as choose to use it so, connect him with Quatrain 40 and _les saturnins_. “His fortunate star, Mars,” writes D. D., “had brought him the glory of a valiant hero and general.”

Here D. D. entertains us, somewhat at large, upon his notion of a “_wig_, or _trimmer_, that is, a wavering man or hypocrite, from the original words to _wag_ and to _trim_ about.” We, however, know that this etymology is not worth very much.

Our next is a sequence of three quatrains, all of which seem to refer to English affairs.

THE FIRE OF LONDON—DUTCH WAR—PLAGUE (1665-1667).

_Century II.—Quatrains 51, 52, 53._

Le sang du juste à Londres fera faute,
Brulez par foudres[209] de vingt trois les six;
La dame[210] antique cherra[211] de place haute,
De mesme secte[212] plusieurs seront occis.

Dans plusieurs nuits la terre tremblera:
Sur le printemps deux effors suite:
Corinthe, Ephèse aux deux mers nagera,
Guerre s’esmeut par deux vaillans de luite.[213]

La grand peste de cité maritime
Ne cessera, que mort ne soit vengée
Du juste sang par pris damné sans crime,
De la grand dame[210] par feincte n’outragée.

_Translation._

The blood of the just shall be required of London, burnt by
fireballs in thrice twenty and six; the old Cathedral shall
fall from its high place, and many (edifices) of the same sort
shall be destroyed.

Through many nights the earth shall tremble; in the spring two
shocks follow each other; Corinth and Ephesus shall swim in the
two seas, war arising between two combatants strong in battle.

The great Plague of the maritime city shall not diminish
till death is sated for the just blood, basely sold (for
£2,000,000), and condemned for no fault. The great Cathedral
outraged by feigning (saints).

The first quatrain deals most remarkably with the great fire of London; noting the precise year, the burning of St. Paul’s, and other injury to the Protestant interest.

The second shows that a bloody sea-war shall rage, the earth quaking under the cannonade from the ships, shaking the cliffs. There was such a war in 1665, 1666, and 1667, between England and the seven united provinces of the Netherlands. Cruising within the narrow seas, he likens to the Ægean waters between Corinth for England, and Ephesus for Antwerp. He describes them as they really occurred, commencing afresh with every ensuing spring,—_sur le printemps_. D. D. remarks that they were so obstinately contested, all these fights, that they would last for days on a stretch, or, as Nostradamus says, _nights_: _plusieurs nuits la terre tremblera_, according to the English custom of reckoning by a _fortnight_, and not fourteen days. Now the French reckon the fortnight as a _quinzaine_, that is, up to the fifteenth day, which of course contains only fourteen nights; and you might say _la terre tremblera_, for the cannon reverberating between the cliffs would move them perceptibly. D. D. thinks that _la grande dame_ in the last quatrain is the great city of London, the metropolis, or mother-city; an Eastern way of speaking. In his learned way, he adds: “The great fire has only metamorphosed the city—_ex Ligneâ in Lateritiam_,” converting it from wood to brick.

The distance at which sounds may be heard seems variable. Captain Parry, in his “Third Voyage,” p. 58, relates, it is said, that at Port Bowen a conversation could be carried on distinctly at 6696 feet, which is over a mile. Dr. Clark, in his Travels (iii. 331), whilst sailing from the Gulf of Glaucus to Alexandria, heard the firing of the English upon the fortress of Rachmanie, upon the Nile. All on board heard it, at a distance of 130 miles. The earthquake at Sumbawn, in 1815, was heard 970 miles away (Elliot’s “Horæ Apoc.,” iv. 218). In Dereham’s “Physico-Theology” (i. p. 185, ed. 1786), a Dr. Hearn is quoted as certifying that guns fired at Stockholm in 1685 were heard at a distance of 180 English miles; and in the above Dutch war, 1672, the guns were heard above two hundred miles (_vide Philosophical Transactions_, No. 113.) I remember reading, though I have not noted where, that the guns employed at Waterloo were heard, at Hythe in Kent, on the Sunday morning, so that it was known Wellington and Napoleon had engaged in battle somewhere; the fact was confirmed by intelligence shortly after. The buzz of London traffic in 1820 could be heard by putting the ear to the ground on the top of Putney Hill, as Sir Richard Phillips relates in his “Morning’s Walk to Kew” (p. 152). But the whole south of Thames was then tricked out rurally in Nature’s emerald vest, and, herself at ease, the earth could transmit vibrations from the troubled town; but now she shudders with a like palsy of her own, and Putney is as rural as Clerkenwell Green. Much of the conveyance of sound depends upon the wind, no doubt. J. P. Malcolm (“Londinium Redivivum,” iii. p. 117) has some interesting remarks upon St. Paul’s bell. He lived in Somer’s Town, and with a strong north-east wind he could hear every hour tolled as clear as if only a quarter of a mile distant, but with the wind east, south-west, or north, not a sound could be heard. Now Somer’s Town is north-north-west from St. Paul’s, which, in a straight line, is two miles and a half away; so that a north-east wind should convey the vibrations to Lambeth. He found that this wind carried away all the smoke, and so left the air free for the sound to travel through it. A south wind overwhelmed him with noise. He could distinctly hear the guard at St. James’s Park beat the tattoo at eight, nine, ten, and eleven, to each distinct roll of the drum. One would judge from this that the wind was blowing nearly due east at Waterloo on that famous Sunday, the 18th of June. It was an east wind at Baalzephon that ruined Pharaoh. I have dwelt thus episodically upon sound to show, if possible, that this _tremblement de terre_ was an effect of sound arising on the waters but vibrating upon land, and not the convulsion of an earthquake.

Quatrain 80 of Century III. we have already treated of by the help of Le Pelletier, and interpreted it of Charles I., and we there made the bastard to stand for Cromwell. D. D. takes the alternative reading of _l’indigne_, and understands James II. The bastard then is naturally the Duke of Monmouth, natural son of Charles II.; but he was never _demy receu_; and had it been intended to portray him, he would not have been mentioned after, but before, the abdication. Hence we to prefer to leave it as we placed it at first.

WILLIAM III. AND THE REVOLUTION (1688).

_Century IV.—Quatrain 89._

Trente de Londres secret conjureront,
Contre leur Roy, sur le pont l’entreprise:
Leuy, satalites là mort de gousteront,[214]
Un Roy esleut[215] blonde, natif de Frize.

_Translation._

Thirty of London shall conspire secretly against their King;
upon the bridge the plot shall be devised. These Satellites
shall taste of death. A fair-haired King shall be elected,
native of Friesland.