 However, one of the story's major characters is a sympathetically portrayed Roundhead named Heatherstone, the Intendant given the task of managing the Forest lands.Marryat had been wounded several times in his naval career; he understood the nature of war and makes clear his hostility to extremists on both sides.He suggests that good governance lies somewhere between King Charles's insistence on the divine right of kings and Parliament's unjustifiable execution of him.