JAMES II. A.D. 1685--1688.
James II. had, at least, been honest in openly joining the Church in
which he believed; but the people disliked and distrusted him, and he
had not the graces of his brother to gain their hearts with, but was
grave, sad, and stern.
The Duke of Monmouth came across from Holland, and was proclaimed king
in his uncle's stead at Exeter. Many people in the West of England
joined him, and at Taunton, in Somersetshire, he was received by rows
of little girls standing by the gate in white frocks, strewing flowers
before him. But at Sedgemoor he was met by the army, and his friends
were routed; he himself fled away, and at last was caught hiding in a
ditch, dressed in a laborer's smock frock, and with his pockets full
of peas from the fields. He was taken to London, tried, and executed.
He did not deserve much pity, but James ought not to have let the
people who favored him be cruelly treated. Sir George Jeffreys, the
chief justice, was sent to try all who had been concerned, from
Winchester to Exeter; and he hung so many, and treated all so savagely,
that his progress was called the Bloody Assize. Even the poor little
maids at Taunton were thrown into a horrible, dirty jail, and only
released on their parents paying a heavy sum of money for them.
This was a bad beginning for James's reign; and the English grew more
angry and suspicious when they saw that he favored Roman Catholics
more than anyone else, and even put them into places that only
clergymen of the Church of England could fill. Then he put forth a
decree, declaring that a person might be chosen to any office in the
State, whether he were a member of the English Church or no; and he
commanded that every clergyman should read it from his pulpit on
Sunday mornings. Archbishop Sancroft did not think it a right thing
for clergymen to read, and he and six more bishops presented a
petition to the king against being obliged to read it. One of these
was Thomas Ken, Bishop of Bath and Wells, who wrote the morning hymn,
"Awake, my soul, and with the sun," and the evening hymn, "All praise
to Thee, my God, this night." Instead of listening to their petition,
the king had all the seven bishops sent to the Tower, and tried for
libel--that is, for malicious writing. All England was full of
anxiety, and when at last the jury gave the verdict of "not guilty,"
the whole of London rang with shouts of joy, and the soldiers in their
camp shouted still louder.
This might have been a warning to the king; for he thought that, as he
paid the army, they were all on his side, and would make the people
bear whatever he pleased. The chief comfort people had was in thinking
their troubles would only last during his reign: for his first wife,
an Englishwoman, had only left him two daughters, Mary and Anne, and
Mary was married to her cousin William, Prince of Orange, who was a
great enemy of the King of France and of the pope; and Anne's husband,
Prince George, brother to the King of Denmark, was a Protestant. He
was a dull man, and people laughed at him--because, whenever he heard
any news, he never said anything but "_Est il possible?_" is it
possible? But he had a little son, of whom there was much hope.
But James had married again, Mary Beatrice d'Este, an Italian princess;
and, though none of her babies had lived before, at last she had a
little son who was healthy and likely to live, and who was christened
James. Poor little boy! Everyone was so angry and disappointed that
he should have come into the world at all, that a story was put about
that he was not the son of the king and queen, but a strange baby who
had been carried into the queen's room in a warming-pan, because James
was resolved to prevent Mary and William from reigning.
Only silly people could believe such a story as this; but all the
Whigs, and most of the Tories, thought in earnest that it was a sad
thing for the country to have an heir to the throne brought up by a
Roman Catholic, and to think it right to treat his subjects as James
was treating them. Some would have been patient, and have believed
that God would bring it right, but others were resolved to put a stop
to the evils they expected; and, knowing what was the state of people's
minds, William of Orange set forth from Holland, and landed at Torbay.
Crowds of people came to meet him, and to call on him. It was only
three years since the Bloody Assize, and they had not forgotten it in
those parts. King James heard that one person after another had gone
to the Prince of Orange, and he thought it not safe for his wife and
child to be any longer in England. So, quietly, one night he put them
in charge of a French nobleman who had been visiting him, and who took
them to the Thames, where, after waiting in the dark under a church
wall, he brought them a boat, and they reached a ship which took them
safely to France.
King James staid a little longer. He did not mind when he heard that
Prince George of Denmark had gone to the Prince of Orange, but only
laughed, and said "_Est il possible?_" but when he heard his daughter
Anne, to whom he had always been kind, was gone too, the tears came
into his eyes, and he said, "God help me, my own children are deserting
me." He would have put himself at the head of the army, but he found
that if he did so he was likely to be made prisoner and carried to
William. So he disguised himself and set off for France; but at
Faversham, some people who took him for a Roman Catholic priest seized
him, and he was sent back to London. However, as there was nothing
the Prince of Orange wished so little as to keep him in captivity, he
was allowed to escape again, and this time he safely reached France,
where he was very kindly welcomed, and had the palace of St. Germain
given him for a dwelling-place.
It was on the 4th of November, 1688, that William landed, and the
change that now took place is commonly called the English Revolution.
We must think of the gentlemen, during these reigns, as going about
in very fine laced and ruffled coats, and the most enormous wigs.
You know the Roundheads had short hair and the Cavaliers long: so
people were ashamed to have short hair, and wore wigs to hide it if
it would not grow, till everybody came to have shaven heads, and
monstrous wigs in great curls on their shoulders: and even little
boys' hair was made to look as like a wig as possible. The barber
had the wig every morning to fresh curl, and make it white with hair
powder, so that everyone might look like an old man, with a huge
quantity of white hair.