Turbarunt fontes, et fusis pax perit undis,

Moestaque coelestes obruit umbra dies.

Duret ut integritas tamen, et pia gloria, partem

Me nullam in tanta strage fuisse, scias;

Credidimus nempe insonti vocem esse cruori,

Et vires quae post funera flere docent.

Hinc castae, fidaeque pati me more parentis

Commonui, et lachrimis fata levare meis;

Hinc nusquam horrendis violavi sacra procellis,

Nec mihi mens unquam, nec manus atra fuit.

The natural interpretation of this certainly is that Vaughan took no share in the disturbances of his time, except to grieve over them in retirement. Yet, in the first place, the lines may have been written before he took up arms in 1645, and, in the second, they may only mean that he had no share in bringing about the troubles of England, or in shedding innocent blood. Similarly when elsewhere, as in Abel's Blood (vol. i. p. 254), and in the prayer to be quoted below, he expresses horror of blood-guiltiness, this need not necessarily be taken as extending to the man who fights in a righteous cause.

Miss Morgan, I may add, suggests that Vaughan was at Rowton Heath, not as a combatant, but as a[xxxi] physician. The description which he gives of the battle reads like that of a man who saw it from some commanding point of view, but was not himself engaged. I think it not improbable that Vaughan was one of the garrison of Beeston Castle, which is described to me as "a sort of grand stand for the battle-field." Beeston Castle was invested by the Parliamentarians in the course of September 1645. On the approach of Charles the troops were drawn off on 19th September to Chester.[14] Charles no doubt took the opportunity to strengthen the garrison. After Rowton Heath Beeston Castle was again besieged, and on November 16th it surrendered. 

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