The execution, therefore, of the king, against which they had always protested, having occasioned a vacancy of the throne, they immediately proclaimed his son and successor, Charles II.; but upon condition "of his good behavior, and strict observance of the covenant, and his entertaining no other persons about him but such as were godly men, and faithful to that obligation." These unusual clauses, inserted in the very first acknowledgment of their prince, sufficiently showed their intention of limiting extremely his authority.

And the English commonwealth, having no pretence to interpose in the affairs of that kingdom, allowed the Scots, for the present, to take their own measures in settling their government.
The dominion which England claimed over Ireland, demanded more immediately their efforts for subduing that country.

In order to convey a just notion of Irish affairs, it will be necessary to look backwards some years, and to relate briefly those transactions which had passed during the memorable revolutions in England.

When the late king agreed to that cessation of arms with the Popish rebels,[*] which was become so requisite, as well for the security of the Irish Protestants as for promoting his interests in England, the parliament, in order to blacken his conduct, reproached him with favoring that odious rebellion, and exclaimed loudly against the terms of the cessation.

They even went so far as to declare it entirely null and invalid, because finished without their consent; and in this declaration the Scots in Ulster, and the earl of Inchiquin, a nobleman of great authority in Munster, professed to adhere.