Monk. Julian Stafford Corbett
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and George must have seen in the company of his uncle that latest born child of the sixteenth century and even heard his stirring adventures from his own lips. He would certainly have missed no opportunity of seeing the famous navigator. Raleigh was the hero of every lad with an English spirit or an ear for a tale. His Discovery of Guiana was a book that was in every one's hands, and George and his cousins must have known by heart its wonderful stories of El Dorado and the Amazons. At any rate the lad was old enough to have witnessed with eager eyes the setting forth of Sir Walter's last expedition to find the land of gold; to have heard with sinking heart how his uncle Stukeley had gone forth to arrest the hero upon his disastrous return; to mourn with all England when Raleigh's head fell on Tower Hill, and to burn with shame and anger when he heard the cry of execration that rose against his uncle, the treacherous friend who betrayed the last of the Elizabethans.
It is not difficult to imagine how a boy of George's nature, brought up in the midst of such surroundings, must have chafed to see his friends and kinsmen joining their colours while he was too young to be allowed to go. Richard Grenville, Sir Bevil's brother, whom George must have known well, was with the expedition, and George can have wished nothing better than to serve under him. Sir Richard Grenville, though he afterwards disgraced himself by his excesses in the Civil War, was then the very hero for a boy like George. He was a typical Low Country soldier. From an early age he had served with Prince Maurice, the first captain of his time, in the regiment of that pattern soldier Lord Vere. In a few years he had risen to the rank of captain, and was now commanding a company in the regiment of Sir John Borough, chief of the staff to the expedition. It was a splendid opportunity for George to begin his career, but it was not to be, and it must have been with mixed feelings that he heard the expedition was not to be delayed a year.
When the King came down it was of course impossible that a man of such a position as Sir Thomas Monk should not go and pay him his respects like the other county gentlemen. Unfortunately there was an annoying difficulty in the way. He was by this time hopelessly in debt, and so many judgments were out against him that he was little better than a prisoner at Potheridge. To appear in public meant certain arrest. There was but one escape from the dilemma, and that was to bribe the under-sheriff. The only question was to whom so delicate a mission was to be entrusted, and it cannot but raise our opinion of young George that he was chosen for the task. His mission was successfully carried out, and in due course Sir Thomas rode out to meet his sovereign with all the best blood in Devon. But before the royal party came in sight the proceedings were interrupted by a painful incident. Either the under-sheriff had blabbed, or George had been boasting of his diplomacy. At all events the rascally attorney had received a bigger bribe from the other side, and now at this solemn moment and in face of the whole county the villain came forward and arrested Sir Thomas.
George Monk was not a boy to sit down quietly under such an indignity. Without saying anything to anybody he took the first opportunity of slipping off into Exeter regardless of the plague. Once inside the gates he went straight to the perfidious attorney, and having told him in the plainest words what he thought of him, there and then proceeded to administer the cudgelling in the midst of which he has been already introduced, and which was to prove his introduction to an eventful career.
For George was in a desperate scrape. The bruised lawyer threatened merciless proceedings, and to cudgel an under-sheriff was an outrage of which the law was likely to take a very serious view. It was clear that the boy must be concealed till the storm blew over. There was only one way of doing it. The fleet was lying in Plymouth nearly ready to sail. Once there he would be safe. So George, to his intense delight we may be sure, was smuggled off and hurriedly engaged as a volunteer under his kinsman Sir Richard Grenville. Early in October the expedition sailed. The baffled attorney had to hang up his unserved writ on the office-files, and George Monk, by the force of the straitened circumstances of the family, found himself prematurely a soldier with the burden of an imperfect education to carry through life.
It is unnecessary to follow closely the disastrous expedition to Cadiz in 1625. Ill-planned, ill-disciplined, ill-officered, and ill-supplied, it was doomed from the first to failure. For young George Monk it was a bitter awakening from the dreams a boy will have of the glories of a soldier's life. The ship in which he sailed and the company in which he served, bad as it was, can hardly have been so bad as the rest. Grenville was at least a soldier by profession and a good officer. Borough's regiment must at least have tasted discipline. The veteran general was one of the most distinguished and scholarly soldiers of his time; a man who had seen grow up under the Veres that immortal English brigade which by patient effort and undaunted perseverance had wrested from the Spaniards their till then unchallenged claim to be the finest infantry in the world. He had seen more service than any man in the army, and in all questions of military science his word was law.
Thus George began his career under good masters, and two years later he was fortunate enough to bring himself again under their command. At the head of another expedition, as ill-found as the first, Buckingham early in June, 1627, effected a landing on the Isle of Rhé, and laid siege to St. Martin, the citadel of the island. Its capture proved a more difficult matter than he had expected. Already nearly a fortnight had been expended in fruitless attempts when Buckingham's anxieties were further increased by unwelcome news. A young gentleman was announced with an important verbal message from the lips of the King. It was George Monk, who at the risk of his life had made his way through France; though ignorant of the language he had penetrated the army which lay before Rochelle, and so reached Rhé with the intelligence that a large combined naval and military force was being prepared in France to relieve the island.
For this daring service, the risks of which it is difficult to exaggerate, Sir John Borough gave him a commission as ensign in his own regiment, of which Sir Richard Grenville was major, or sergeant-major, as the rank then was, a rank involving all the duties which are now performed by adjutants, as well as the command of a company. It was most probably his kinsman's colours that the young ensign carried, and this is why he always regarded Sir Richard as his father-in-arms. For now he had begun in earnest his career as a professional soldier, and it was with every opportunity of laying the foundations of that consummate technical knowledge which afterwards distinguished him. To enforce the sound teaching of his colonel came the appalling disaster with which the expedition closed. It was a lesson he never forgot, and long after he would often grieve over the iniquitous mismanagement with which the whole affair had been conducted.
In the following year he took part with his regiment, which was now commanded by Grenville, in the last half-hearted attempt to relieve Rochelle, and then followed a period of inactivity. Buckingham was dead, and Conway with his policy of non-intervention reigned in his stead. Richelieu had no desire to retaliate; Spain was too weak to strike a blow, and England settled down to enjoy her repose. At home there was no chance of employment for the professional soldier for many years to come, and adventurous youth must look abroad.
There over the sea was a tempting prospect. Frederick Henry, the young Prince of Orange, had begun his brilliant career. In the previous year he had suddenly taken the offensive and snatched Grol from the very arms of the great Spinola. His treasury was overflowing with the plunder of the plate-fleet which Peter Hein had captured, and now he was besieging Bois-le-duc. Lord Vere had returned at his summons to command the English brigade and to give the young Stadtholder the benefit of his unrivalled experience. It was a name to conjure with, and volunteers flocked over from England eager for the reputation of having served under the most accomplished soldier England had yet produced. But amateur soldiering would not now satisfy George Monk, nor would his purse bear the expenses which a gentleman-private must incur. Fortunately he was not without interest, and was able to procure a commission in the regiment of which Lord Vere's kinsman, the young Earl of Oxford, had just obtained the command.
Before he could join Bois-le-duc had fallen, and it was not till 1631 that the Stadtholder took the field again. This year, however, saw the annihilation of the Spanish flotilla which attempted to surprise the island of Tholen. Lord Oxford had command of the English contingent, which was detailed to man the prince's boats, and at last George tasted the sweets of victory. The following year he was to witness one of the most brilliant campaigns which had ever been fought in the Low Countries. No sooner was the prince in motion than Venlo, Stralen, Ruremonde fell in rapid succession, and by the