Fairfax, to whom
he was not, however, united. His intrigue with Barbara continued
for upwards of three years, when it was temporarily suspended by
her marriage to one Roger Palmer, a student of the Inner Temple,
the son of a Middlesex knight, and, moreover, a man of the most
obliging temper, as will hereafter be seen. Barbara's loyalty to
her husband was but of short duration. Before she had been nine
months a wife, we find her writing to her old lover she is "ready
and willing to goe all over the world" with him--a sacrifice he
declined to accept! though eager to take advantage of the
affection which prompted it. A little while later he was obliged
to quit England; for it happened in the first month of the year
1660 he quarrelled with and killed one Francis Woolley, a student
at law, to avoid the consequences of which act he speedily fled
the country.
Arriving at Calais, he wrote to King Charles, who was then
preparing to return, throwing himself on his mercy, and
beseeching his pardon; which the king granting, Lord Chesterfield
sought his majesty at Brussels. Soon afterwards Barbara Palmer
and her complaisant husband, a right loyal man, joined the king's
court abroad, when the intrigue begun which was continued on the
night of the monarch's arrival in London. True the loyal
PARLIAMENTARY INTELLIGENCER stated "his majesty was diverted from
his pious intention of going to Westminster to offer up his
devotions of prayer and praise in publick according to the
appointment of his Majesty, and made his oblations unto God in
the presence-chamber;" but it is, alas, equally certain,
according to Oldmixon, Lord Dartmouth, and other reliable
authorities, he spent the first night of his return in the
company of Barbara Palmer.
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