Amongst the many addresses I observed one from Sussex or
Surrey, complaining of the rudeness of their soldiers, from which I
only observed that there were disorders among them as well as among
us, only with this difference, that they, for reasons I mentioned
before, were under circumstances to prevent it better than the
king. But I must do the king's memory that justice, that he used all
possible methods, by punishment of soldiers, charging, and sometimes
entreating, the gentlemen not to suffer such disorders and such
violences in their men; but it was to no purpose for his Majesty to
attempt it, while his officers, generals, and great men winked at it;
for the licentiousness of the soldier is supposed to be approved by
the officer when it is not corrected.
The rudeness of the Parliament soldiers began from the divisions among
their officers; for in many places the soldiers grew so out of all
discipline and so unsufferably rude, that they, in particular, refused
to march when Sir William Waller went to Weymouth. This had turned to
good account for us, had these cursed Scots been out of our way, but
they were the staff of the party; and now they were daily solicited to
march southward, which was a very great affliction to the king and all
his friends.
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