[Transcriber's notes:
This work is derviced from
http://www.archive.org/details/popularhistoryeng04guiz
This quote sums up this last volume:
"The bitter time of revolutions had ended for England."--pg. 16]
[Image]
Napoleon Received On The Bellerophon.
{1}
A Popular
History Of England
From the Earliest Times
_To The Reign Of Queen Victoria _
by
M. GUIZOT
Author OF "The Popular History of France," etc.
_Authorized Edition _
Illustrated
Vol. IV
[Image]
Publisher's Logo: ALDI DISCIP ANGLVS
New York
John W. Lovell Company
150 Worth Street, corner Mission Place
{2}
{3}
List Of Illustrations.
Volume Four.
Napoleon Received on the Bellerophon. -- Frontispiece.
King James at the Battle of Boyne. -- 34
The Duke and Duchess of Marlborough. -- 42
Visit of Louis XIV to the Death-Bed of James II. -- 86
Queen Anne. -- 94
Shrewsbury Invested with the White Rod. -- 134
George I. -- 136
The Mysterious Letter. -- 176
George II. -- 178
Charles Edward. -- 198
Arrest of Charles Edward.-- 222
Portrait of Pitt. -- 224
Death of Wolfe. -- 242
George III. -- 254
Franklin -- 286
The Last Speech of the Earl of Chatham. -- 290
Surrender to Nelson at Cape St. Vincent. -- 374
The Battle of Aboukir. -- 382
See what a Little Place you Occupy in the World. -- 398
Death of Nelson. -- 410
Waterloo. -- 438
George IV. -- 444
Windsor Castle. -- 460
Wellington in the Mob. -- 475
{4}
{5}
Table Of Contents.
Chapter XXXII. William and Mary
Establishment of Parliamentary Government
(1688-1702).
9
Chapter XXXIII. Queen Anne
War of the Spanish Succession
(1702-1714)
93
Chapter XXXIV. George I.
and the Protestant Succession
(1714-1727)
135
Chapter XXXV. George II.
(1727-1760)
178
Chapter XXXVI. George III.
The American War
(1760-1783).
255
Chapter XXXVII. George III.
Pitt and the French Revolution
(1783-1801)
337
Chapter XXXVIII. George III.
Addington and Pitt
(1801-1806)
388
Chapter XXXIX. George III.
and the Emperor Napoleon
(1806-1810)
414
Chapter XL. George IV.
Regent and King
(1815-1830).
442
Chapter XLI. William IV.
Parliamentary Reform
(1830-1837).
462
{6}
{7}
Guizot's
History Of England,
Vol. IV.
From the Accession of William and Mary
to the Reign of Queen Victoria,
1688-1837.
{8}
{9}
History Of England.
Chapter XXXII.
William And Mary.
Establishment Of Parliamentary Government.
(1688-1702).
King James had abandoned England, fleeing from the storm which he
had raised, obstinate in his ideas and holding persistently to
the hope of a return, which his people was resolved to prevent at
any price. William of Orange had entered London; but he had not
established his quarters at Whitehall, and he refused to take the
crown by right of conquest. Shrewd and far-seeing, he did not
wish to belie the promises of his declaration, or, by parading
its defeat, to irritate the English army, which he hoped soon to
command. He had not conquered England, which had called him to
her aid and had voluntarily submitted to him; and he desired to
keep the supreme power with her free consent. A provisory
assembly was formed of those lords who were in London, as well as
of members of the House of Commons who had sat in Parliament
under the reign of King Charles II.; and the aldermen of London
and a deputation of the City Council were invited to participate
in the proceedings. At his departure, King James had left a
letter: some peers asked to be informed of its contents. "I have
seen the missive," said Godolphin, "and can assure your Lordships
that you would find nothing in it which could give you any
satisfaction."
{10}
Aware of the blind obstinacy of the fugitive King, the peers of
the realm presented their address to the prince on the 25th of
December; some days later the Commons followed their example.
"Your Highness, led by the hand of God and called by the voice of
the people, has saved our dearest interests," said the
addresses--"the Protestant religion, which is Christianity in its
primitive purity, our laws, which are the ancient titles on which
rest our lives, liberties and possessions, and without which this
world would be only a desert in our eyes. This divine mission has
been respected by the nobility, the people, and the brave
soldiers of England. They have laid down their arms at your
approach." The same thanks and same requests were presented by
the Scotch lords who happened to be in London; the Earl of Arran
alone, son of the Duke of Hamilton, had proposed to treat with
King James. "All cry, Hosanna! to-day," said the Prince of Orange
to Dykvelt and his Dutch friends, who brought him the
congratulations of his native country, and were delighted at the
enthusiasm shown everywhere in England; "but in a day or two
perhaps they will repeat quite as loudly: 'Crucify him! crucify
him!'" Resolved as he was to govern England, William caught a
glimpse, though he did not foresee their extent, of the
difficulties and obstacles which the great enterprise he was
asked to attempt would meet with in England itself. Nevertheless
he accepted his mission without wavering.
{11}
On the 22nd of January, 1689, a Convention, which soon declared
itself Parliament, assembled at Westminster, elected arbitrarily
on circular letters sent forth in the name of the Prince of
Orange. The parties were already beginning to divide; the great
national unanimity which had willed and accomplished the
revolution was yielding to different passions and opinions. In
this supreme crisis of the government of England, the Tories,
numerous in the House of Lords, weak in the House of Commons,
hesitated, according to their political and religious
complexions, between negotiations with King James, the
establishment of a regency, leaving to the fugitive monarch the
vain title of king, or the declaration that the throne was
vacant, and the calling of the Princess Mary to the crown as its
natural heiress. No one dared to assert the legitimacy of the
Prince of Wales. Some of the Whigs, a party which included in its
ranks a number of dissenters, proposed that Parliament should
proclaim the nation's right to depose a prince guilty of bad
government; the others, less involved in revolutionary schemes,
though just as firmly resolved to deliver England from the
misgovernment of King James, sought to cover the national will
with a legal form. "It is said that kings have a divine right of
their own," cried Sir Robert Howard; "nations also have
_their_ divine right."
On the 26th of January the House of Commons ended by passing a
resolution couched as follows: "King James II., having undertaken
to overthrow the Constitution of the realm by not fulfilling the
original contract of King and people, has broken the fundamental
laws of the Kingdom by the advice of Jesuits and other corrupt
counsellors; by his voluntary retirement he has abdicated the
government, in consequence of which the throne has become
vacant." The form of the resolution was open to criticism; only
its gist was important. The Commons soon added to their
declaration of the vacancy of the throne a second equally grave
resolution: "The reign of a Catholic monarch is incompatible with
the security and welfare of this Protestant nation." The two
resolutions were sent up to the Lords.
{12}
The Protestant declaration was unanimously voted. The King of
England, head of the Anglican Church, should naturally belong to
that Church. In regard to the vacancy of the throne, the Tories
insisted on previously debating the question of a regency,
proposed some time before by Bancroft, Archbishop of Canterbury,
and now advocated by Lord Rochester and Lord Nottingham. Divided
between their conviction of the dangers that King James caused
the country to incur, and their sentiments of loyalty, the
members of this fraction of the Tory party hoped to remain
faithful to their oath of allegiance by treating the truant
monarch like an invalid incapable of governing, and hence obliged
to delegate his powers to the Prince of Orange. This course
having been rejected, Lord Danby admitted the throne to be
vacant, and demanded that the Princess Mary be declared queen,
according to the principle that the throne could not remain
unoccupied. The Whigs, with Halifax at their head, loudly
maintained the right of the nation to choose its monarch. King
James was alive, and the princess could not then be his heiress;
the throne became elective, and the Prince of Orange alone was
worthy of being called to it.
The discussion between the two houses, as well as that inside the
House of Lords, was waxing hot; the crowd was pressing to the
gates of the palace. Lord Lovelace informed the peers that he was
charged with a petition demanding the immediate proclamation of
the Prince and Princess of Orange as King and Queen of England.
"By whom has the petition been signed?" was asked. "No man has
yet put his hand to it," answered the bold nobleman, the first to
meet the Prince of Orange when he landed; "but when I shall bring
it here, there will be signers enough."
{13}
The same threats were made to the House of Commons. The princess
was detained in Holland by the state of the sea, encumbered by
ice. Danby was zealously pleading her cause before the Lords,
without William, who remained faithful to his promise of
committing to the Convention all grave political questions,
interfering in any way in the debate. One of his friends, a
Dutchman, probably Dykvelt, accidentally was present at the
debate; he was pressed to say what he might know of the prince's
sentiments. The Dutchman held out for a long time. "I can only
guess his Highness's state of mind," he said at last; "but since
you want to know what I fancy, I think he would scarcely care to
be his wife's gentleman of the bedchamber; but I actually know
nothing at all." "I know enough, and even a little too much,"
retorted Danby.
Finally Burnet made up his mind to reveal what the princess had
lately confided to him. "I know, for a long time," he said, "that
she had determined, even in case she should have mounted the
throne in the regular order of succession, to hand over her power
to her husband, with the sanction of Parliament." At the same
time Mary wrote to Danby: "I am the prince's wife, and I have no
other desire than to remain subjected to him; the greatest wrong
that could be done me would be to put me forward as his rival;
and I shall never hold as friends those who would follow such a
course."
In a moment the impetuous Tories maintained the rights of
Princess Anne, threatened by the elevation of William of Orange;
the Churchills were enlisted in her cause, though the princess
was making no objections to the exaltation of her brother-in-law,
when the prince summoned the leaders of both parties to the House
of Lords. He summed up in a few words the various alternatives
agitated in Parliament.
{14}
"I have kept silent hitherto," he added; "I have used neither
solicitation nor threats; I have not even let my views or desires
transpire. I have neither the right nor the inclination to impose
anything on the Convention. I only reserve the privilege of
refusing functions which I could not perform with honor to myself
or advantage to the country. I am resolved never to be regent,
and I shall not accept that fraction of administrative power
which the princess, raised to the throne, could entrust to me. I
esteem her as much as a man can esteem a woman; but I am not so
made that I can be tied to the apron-string of the best of wives.
There is but one rôle which I can honorably fill: if the Houses
offer me the crown for my life, I will accept it; if not, I will
return without regret to my native land." The prince ended by
saying that he thought it just to secure the succession to the
Princess Anne and her children, in preference to the posterity
which he might have by another wife than Princess Mary.
The question was decided: William and Mary were to reign together
as sovereigns of England, and the government was entrusted to
William. A conference between the two houses soon resulted in a
vote. Lord Nottingham demanded a modification in the oaths of
allegiance "I don't approve the acts of the Convention," he said,
"but I want to be able to promise to obey the new sovereigns
faithfully." The House of Commons had charged Somers with drawing
up the Declaration of Rights. The jurist's name had for the first
time resounded with éclat during the trial of the bishops, and
already his rare abilities, the power and subtilty of his mind,
as well as his masculine eloquence, had placed him in a high
rank, destined soon to be the highest. After a firm and plain
statement of the people's rights, Parliament declared William and
Mary, Prince and Princess of Orange, King and Queen of England,
during their lives. After them the crown devolved upon Princess
Anne and her children; in their default, it reverted to the issue
of William.
{15}
Princess Mary had just landed in England; she had hardly arrived
at Whitehall, and already people criticised her attitude and the
first indications of her character. Those who had seen her had
found her in high spirits, determined to enjoy her new grandeur,
forgetful of the catastrophe which hurled her father from the
throne she was about to occupy. Burnet himself was shocked. "I
had always noticed so much good feeling in her whole conduct,"
said he, "that my surprise was extreme to see her deficient in it
on this occasion. Some days later I took the liberty of asking
her, how it could be that the misfortunes of a father had made so
little impression on her. She took my frankness in good part, as
usual, and assured me that it was not for want of having felt
them keenly, if she had had the air of not thinking of them; but
because she had been directed in a letter to affect much gayety.
It was possible that she had overdone the rôle they had made for
her, so strange was it to her true disposition." On the 13th of
February, the two houses betook themselves formally to Whitehall,
to offer the crown to the Prince and Princess of Orange. Halifax
was spokesman. "We accept with gratitude what you offer us," said
William. "For my own part, I can assure you that these laws of
England which I have already defended, will be the rule of my
conduct. I shall apply myself constantly to develop the
prosperity of the realm; and, to aid me in the task, I count upon
the counsel of the two Houses, which I am inclined to put before
my own." The public proclamation before the great gate of the
palace was hailed by the acclamations of the crowd. The
revolution was consummated; a new reign was commencing.
{16}
With the new reign began a new era. The revolution of 1688 had
been singularly moderate and reasonable; it had not claimed a new
right, it had not added a liberty to the rights and liberties
which England then enjoyed; it had not changed a custom; it did
not renounce one of the forms or ceremonies observed in the old
times, and dear to the veneration of the people; it had simply
proclaimed in principle and established in fact that the nation
regarded its rights and liberties as its most precious treasure,
that it placed them above hereditary titles and the rights of the
throne. Liberal as well as legal, it demanded from the prince a
certain measure of good government and of respect for the
national wishes, at the same time that it unrolled from the mists
of the past those grand principles of the compact of sovereign
and people, which England had known how to keep and guard through
perils and through oppression. The work of liberty was not yet
complete; all its seeds rested in the Declaration of Rights drawn
up by Somers, and solemnly accepted by the new sovereigns. The
bitter time of revolutions had ended for England.
Yet the day of rest had not come. The reign of William III. was
to remain constantly troublesome, disputed, stormy. The reasons
of this were various and complicated. In the first place stood
his birth; he was a Dutchman in heart as in race, a stranger in
his tastes as in his manners to England, which never forgot the
fact. Both free and Protestant, the two countries were
nevertheless separated by wide divergencies. In England the Whigs
and Tories divided among them the upper classes; the tendencies
toward republicanism existed in the dark among a certain number
of dissenters; the Anglican Church, the Presbyterians, the
Catholics, were royalists by taste as by principle.
{17}
In Holland, on the other hand, the mercantile patriciate remained
nearly everywhere zealously attached to the republican form; the
partisans of the stadtholdership of the house of Orange were
counted in the army and among the great property-holders: and
part of the provinces of Guelders and Friesland was equally
devoted to it.
Brought up in Holland in the midst of parties which he understood
and whose springs he had moved for a long time, sympathizing with
the very persons there who hereditarily opposed his family and
his policy, William III. found himself in England as much a
stranger as he was generally considered. Cold and reserved, like
a man surrounded by enemies or critics, he only had confidence in
the Dutch; he lavished his personal favors on Dutchmen alone; he
only opened his heart and unbent his countenance for Dutchmen.
This marked preference for his native land and this eagerness to
flee from the soil of his new country so soon as the summer could
bring him back to Holland, were a constant reproach and source of
weakness to the King of England. In Holland alone he breathed at
ease; there, alone he freely spread the wings of his grand
policy, more European than English, difficult to be imported by a
foreign prince into a new kingdom still entirely peopled for him
with secret or open enemies.
For a long time England had remained isolated from the
combinations of continental politics; lowered in her own eyes and
those of Europe, she had submitted, under Charles III. and James
II., to the yoke of France, against which William III. proudly
stood erect, demanding from England, as from Holland, the last
sacrifices to sustain the cause of European independence. It was
not without disquiet and a certain insular jealousy that the
English saw themselves drawn into all the political complications
on the continent; they had given themselves to William of Orange,
but they preserved towards him a secret distrust, silently nursed
by the persistent distrust of the Church of England.
{18}
William was a Protestant; but, a Calvinist by conviction,
accustomed to the widest toleration in his own country, which had
become the refuge of all persons suffering persecution, he found
himself in England confronted by the Anglican Church, which was
divided in regard to him, and had partially remained faithful to
the fugitive monarch he had dethroned; obliged to struggle at
once against the anti-Catholic spirit which had carried him to
the throne and against the intolerance towards dissenters, which
was contrary to all his principles. Dutchman, European statesman,
tolerant Calvinist, he met throughout England distrust and
impediments which all the success of the revolution of 1688 could
not dispel, and which the personal superiority of the new king
never wholly succeeded in repressing.
The Church silent and sombre, the army sad and humiliated,
parties keenly exasperated--such was the domestic situation of
William on the morrow of his triumph, when the uprising of
Ireland menaced the peace of the kingdom, and the whole
government still remained to be organized. Responsible and
concordant ministers did not exist then: William called around
him counsellors from different sides--Whigs, Tories, trimmers;
Danby, Nottingham, Halifax, Shrewsbury, Herbert, Mordaunt.
Disagreements were not slow to display themselves. The Tories had
alone exercised power for some years. They were more experienced
and skilful in public affairs than the Whigs; the latter were for
the most part sincerely devoted to the new government, jealous
and suspicious toward their adversaries, who had now become their
colleagues.
{19}
Traps and intrigues, sometimes violent scenes, succeeded one
another without intermission, fettering and retarding the march
of the government, sapping the popularity of the King, to whom
all parties appealed, and who tried in vain to calm them all. An
attack of John Hampden on Halifax appeared so violent that
somebody cried in the House of Commons: "This is called a speech:
it is a libel!"
William was weary of parliamentary struggles and eager to return
to the camp life, which he always preferred to politics, when he
pronounced, on the 27th of January, 1690, the dissolution of
Parliament. The state of his affairs in Ireland imperatively
demanded his presence.
Fleeing from England and the dangers which there threatened, as
he thought, his liberty and life, King James had found in France,
at the court of Louis XIV., the most generous and splendid
hospitality. Lodged by the king at the castle of Saint-Germain,
and in every respect treated as a sovereign and equal, James II.
had asked and obtained from his royal host the aid which he
needed not only to exist in France, but to undertake the conquest
of rebellious and Protestant England by means of Ireland, which
remained Catholic and true. Civil war had already broken out in
this little kingdom; the cession by James of all the civil power
to the Catholics and indigenous inhabitants disquieted knots of
Protestants, scattered as colonists over certain districts. The
small town of Kenmore, the cities of Enniskillen and Londonderry,
were filled with refugees of their religion and race, driven by
the tyranny exercised upon them to that refuge which the Scotch
Presbyterians had lately founded in Ulster. Tyrconnel had tried
in vain to maintain an appearance of order; the Irish population,
whose passions had been long aroused, would not yield to his
influence. Ireland was in flames, when James II. landed at
Kinsale on the 12th of March, 1689.
{20}
He had embarked at Brest, accompanied by a small body of French
officers under the orders of the Count de Rosen. With him Louis
XIV. had sent Count d'Avaux, charged with the diplomatic part of
the expedition, and with plans to be tried among the English
malcontents. From the start, this clever politician, familiar
with complicated continental intrigues, foresaw the trouble that
the fallen monarch, whose cause he was to plead, would occasion
him. "It will not be an easy thing to keep any secret with the
King of England," wrote Count d'Avaux to Louis XIV.; "he has told
before the sailors of the St. Michel, what he ought to have
reserved for his most confidential friends. Another thing which
will give us trouble is his irresolution, for he often changes
his mind and does not always settle on the best course. He
frequently dwells upon little things, on which he employs his
whole time, and passes lightly over most essential matters.
Moreover he listens to everybody, and one has to spend as much
time in removing the impressions which bad advice has produced on
him, as in inspiring him with correct ones." "All the troops
Tyrconnel had been able to raise, were occupied with the
Protestant rising in Ulster," says King James in his Memoirs;
"the Catholics of the country had no arms, while the Protestants
had an abundance, and the best horses in the kingdom; there were
only eight small field-pieces in condition to accompany the army;
no provisions or ammunition in the magazine, little powder or
balls, no money in the chest, and all the officers gone to
England."
To this gloomy picture of the condition of his forces in Ireland,
James might have added the embarrassments about to be caused by
an intractable Parliament, and the pretensions, as immoderate as
they were absurd, of partisans, who thought they had a right to
lay down the law for the sovereign they persisted in serving.
{21}
The indigenous Irish claimed the entire independence of their
country, threatening, if James refused it, to appeal to France,
and place themselves thenceforth under her protection. The
English exiles who accompanied the king, despising Ireland and
the Irish, only aspired to reseat their sovereign on the throne
of England.
"My Lord Melford is neither a good Frenchman nor a good
Irishman," said Count d'Avaux; "he only thinks of England."
Despite a proclamation of toleration by James, there was a
general understanding to re-establish the absolute supremacy of
Catholicism in Ireland; the act of establishment of Charles II.
was repealed; the lands of Catholics, lately confiscated to the
benefit of Protestants, returned to their original owners; one
law of proscription embraced all the fugitive or refugee
Protestants in the northern counties; the endowments of the
Anglican Church were taken from it. The fanatics triumphed; the
King was anxious and disgusted. He estimated better than his
advisers, the strength of Protestantism, even in Ireland; he
glanced at the effect of his measures in England. After long
hesitation, which still followed him after starting and made him
turn back for a moment, James set out to besiege the town of
Londonderry in person.
The place was small, badly fortified, and encumbered with
refugees, who had brought no provisions there. Its governor,
Lundy, proved a traitor to the garrison and citizens. Before
flying pusillanimously, he attempted several times to betray them
to the enemy. The religious and patriotic zeal of the inhabitants
triumphed over all obstacles. An Anglican clergyman, George
Walker, and Major Henry Baker, had taken command of the troops in
the town by the natural and legitimate ascendancy of their
characters.
{22}
Determined to accept no capitulation, they were braving the
repeated attacks of the Irish army, as well as the cruel assaults
of famine, when Lord Strabane was instructed to offer the
inhabitants the royal pardon. "The people of Londonderry have
done nothing that requires a pardon," replied Major Murray; "they
recognize no other sovereigns but King William and Queen Mary.
Your lordship might not find yourself safe, if you stayed here
much longer, or if you repeated the same offers; allow me to
accompany you outside our lines."
King James II. returned to Dublin. The town held out a hundred
and five days, in spite of the cruelties of the Count de Rosen,
who had roused the indignation of James himself, when, on the
30th of July, upon receipt of a formal order from London, Colonel
Kirke, lately dispatched from England to the aid of Londonderry,
made a last effort to force the barricade constructed by the
enemy across the river. "If we don't deliver the brave citizens
of Londonderry, the whole world will rise against us," cried
Birch, in the House of Commons. "A barricade! well, let it be
forced! Shall we let our brothers perish almost before our eyes?"
The barricade was forced, and the population of Derry, decimated,
dying, but still indomitable, at last saw the vessels, which
brought the aid so long expected, advance majestically by the
narrow channel which alone the drought had left navigable.
Thanksgivings and cries of joy were still echoing in the town,
when a line of flames already indicated the retreat of the
Jacobite army. The siege of Londonderry was raised.
{23}
The same day the inhabitants of Enniskillen, who had spiritedly
held their town in face of the enemy's troops, pursued the Irish
in retreat to the village of Newtown Butler. There, at the foot
of a hill, in front of a bog, the battle took place. "Advance or
retreat?" their leader Wolseley, detailed by Kirke, had asked his
improvised soldiers. "Advance! advance!" shouted the Protestants.
The rout of King James's partisans was complete, and the massacre
frightful. Nothing could check the violence of religious and
political hatreds among a half civilized population. "The
dragoons, who had fled in the morning, retreated with the rest of
the cavalry without firing a pistol," wrote the Count d'Avaux,
"and they all ran away in such a panic that they threw away
muskets, pistols, and sabres, and most of them having run their
horses to death, took off their clothes, to go quicker on foot."
While the arms of King James met with these severe checks in
Ireland, he received news from England which for a moment
disquieted his counsellors; but soon reanimated, by the very
imminence of the danger, the natural courage of the Irish race.
The illustrious Marshal Schomberg, who was driven by the
revocation of the Edict of Nantes from the adopted country he had
gloriously served, the lieutenant of William III. when he first
set foot in England, had just embarked for Ireland at the head of
a numerous body of troops. Other alarming intelligence was added
to this: the last efforts of the Scotch insurrection had
miscarried; and all hope of a Jacobite restoration was dying out
in the hereditary kingdom of the Stuarts.
A tyranny which England had never endured had long been pressing
on Scotland: an oppressive and corrupt government had met little
opposition in a timid or venal Parliament; a religion hateful to
the nation had been imposed on it by law. The Revolution of 1688
lent to the condition of things and of feelings in Scotland a
wholly different character from that which it had assumed in
England.
{24}
There King James had been dethroned in the name of violated law.
All legal forms had been observed in the election of the
Parliament which proclaimed William and Mary. At Edinburg the
reaction was violent, and passions were destructive; the Anglican
pastors were maltreated and insulted. The first act of the
Convention convoked by the Prince of Orange was the abolition of
episcopacy. Everywhere the Presbyterians recovered power as well
as liberty; everywhere the Covenanters, long kept down with an
iron hand, proudly held up their heads. At the same time, at the
moment when the Parliament of Scotland, after a lively debate,
decided to recognize the legitimacy of the revolution by
proclaiming in its towns the new sovereigns of England, an
insurrection broke out in the Scottish Highlands under the
conduct of Viscount Dundee, lately celebrated under the name of
Graham of Claverhouse. He was sustained in his campaign in favor
of King James by the Earl of Balcarras. Both had visited the
Prince of Orange at London, both had claimed the protection of
the government. "Take care, my lord," William had said to
Balcarras, who was excusing himself for not voting for the
deposition of James. "Remain inside the limits of the law; if you
violate it, expect to be given up to it." Balcarras and Dundee
had received the last orders of James II. "I commit to you my
affairs in Scotland," the monarch had said, as he made ready to
fly; "Balcarras will take care of my civil affairs and Dundee
will command my troops." It was with great difficulty that the
latter had been able to escape from the Convention where he had
had the audacity to present himself. "Where do you purpose
going?" Balcarras had asked him. "Where the shade of Montrose
shall lead me," replied the intrepid partisan; and he disappeared
at the head of fifty dragoons, the remnant of the famous
regiments which had lately cut the Covenanters in pieces. The
latter had not forgotten the fact.
{25}
The English Jacobites belonged almost entirely to the Anglican
Church, being passionately and ancestrally devoted to its cause,
as well as to the House of Stuart. The Irish Jacobites were
Catholics and separatists, convinced that the greatness of their
native country, like that of the Roman Church, depended on the
restoration of King James. The Scotch Jacobites actively engaged
in the struggle were Episcopalians, lately triumphant, but now
oppressed in their religion, or Highlanders uniting against the
power of the Clan Campbell and its chief, the Earl of Argyle,
_Mac Callum More_, as he was called in the mountains. It was
Argyle who, standing before the throne at Whitehall, had
pronounced the words of the royal oath, repeated after him by the
new sovereigns. At its last clause William had paused for a
moment: its purport was that he should destroy all heretics and
enemies of God. "I could not engage to become a persecutor," said
the king aloud. "Neither the tenor of the oath nor the laws of
Scotland impose this obligation on your majesty," replied one of
the delegates. "It is on this condition that I swear," returned
William; "and I beg you, my lords and gentlemen, to be witnesses
of this."
So much moderation and prudence remained without effect upon the
Highlanders. Argyle was employed in the new government. However
unimportant his part in it was to be, from the capacity and
character of the earl, the traditional foes of his clan, the
Camerons, the Macleans, the Macgregors, naturally, went over to
the other camp. When Dundee, threatened with arrest, left the
little castle where he had quartered himself since fleeing from
Edinburg, he found the Highlanders already risen under the
command of Lochiel, chief of the Camerons, and Colin Keppoch, one
of the Macdonalds.
{26}
Bringing in his suite some Lowland gentlemen, capturing some
Whigs, whom he carried with him as prisoners, sending the fiery
cross before him, and accompanied everywhere by the terror of his
name, Dundee soon found himself at the head of an army of five or
six thousand men, all brave, hardy, inured to fatigue,
undisciplined and tumultuous, incapable of fighting according to
the ordinary rules of war, and, consequently, of making a long
resistance to regular troops. "We would not have time to learn
your mode of fighting," said Lochiel, "and we would have time to
forget our own."
Dundee was uneasy; he asked King James to send him considerable
reinforcements. He waited through the month of June, encamped at
Lochaber, until the forces of General Mackay, tired of pursuing
him without coming up to him, retreated into the Lowlands. The
castle of Edinburg, long held by the Duke of Gordon for King
James, had just capitulated. The numerous dependents of the
Marquis of Athole were waiting for him to declare himself; his
eldest son, Lord Murray, had embraced King William's party; the
confidential agent of the marquis, Stewart of Badenoch, served
King James. Lord Murray had presented himself before Blair
Castle. The garrison which occupied it, in behalf of his father,
refused him admittance to the fortress. He had laid siege to it,
when Dundee and all the Highland chiefs descended impetuously
from the mountains to the relief of the garrison.
The siege was raised when they arrived. Murray's soldiers had
abandoned it; filling their caps with the water of a spring, they
had drunk to the health of King James, and dispersed. But Mackay
and his troops already occupied the defile of Killiecrankie,
which led to the fortress. Dundee resolved to attack them.
{27}
The aged Lochiel moved to and fro among the ranks of the
Highlanders, whose fierce cries the echoes repeated; while the
tone of the enemy was feeble and faint. "We shall carry the day,"
said Lochiel; "that is not the cry of men about to conquer." He
charged the enemy at the head of his clan with sword in hand, and
bare feet, like his soldiers.
A first discharge had not checked the forward motion of the
Highlanders, and Mackay's soldiers were reloading their pieces,
when the torrent of mountaineers came down upon them. Reeling,
overthrown, deafened by the shouts, dazzled by the sheen of
swords, the men threw away their muskets and began to fly.
Mackay, intrepid in defeat, called to his aid his cavalry,
dreaded by the mountaineers. Only Dundee could have rallied his
troops, carried away by their eagerness to plunder. Dundee was
dead in his glory, struck, it was told afterwards, by a silver
button used as a ball and discharged at him by the superstition
of the soldiers. "He is invulnerable to lead and iron," said the
covenanters, who had not long ago seen him urging on his soldiers
in the middle of a rain of balls. The intrepid soldier, the bold
and skilful leader, the pitiless persecutor, had been mortally
wounded while leading a small body of horse to the front. Falling
from his charger, a soldier had received him in his arms. "How
goes it?" asked Dundee. "Well for King James," answered the
trooper, "but I grieve for your lordship." "Small matter about
me, if things go well for him," murmured Dundee. These were his
last words. His body, wrapped in the plaids of the Highlanders,
was borne to Blair Castle.
{28}
The death of Dundee was in truth the end of the Scotch rising.
Irregular and indecisive actions were continued for some time
between the Highlanders and the Cameronian regiments, inflamed
against each other by religious and political passions. Meantime
the mountaineers returned gradually to their flocks. On
separating, their chiefs declared that they remained the faithful
subjects of King James, always ready to serve him.
They had ceased fighting for him when Marshal Schomberg landed at
Antrim, on the 13th of August. Soon master of Carrick-Fergus, he
had much difficulty in protecting the Irish regiments against the
rage of the Protestant colonists. The courage of the Jacobites
revived a little: twenty thousand men were assembled under the
walls of Drogheda. After one day's march, Schomberg had
entrenched himself in a strong position near Dundalk.
The inexperienced zeal of the Irish, as well as of the English
recruits brought by Schomberg, led them to desire immediate
battle; but Rosen and Schomberg were old commanders, accustomed
to weigh the chances of war and the valor of armies; and neither
was eager to give battle. In spite of the maladies which ravaged
his army, of the bad quality of the provisions, and of the
injurious rumors circulated against him in England as well as
Ireland, Schomberg remained shut up in his camp at Dundalk
without the enemy's daring to attack him. When he returned to the
north, at the beginning of November, the Irish had taken up their
winter quarters and did not disturb themselves about his retreat.
"I declare," wrote the marshal, from Lisburn to William III.,
"that if it were not for the profound obedience I have for your
majesty's orders, I should prefer the honor of being inactive at
your court to the command of an army in Ireland composed as was
that of the past campaign; and if I had hazarded a battle, which
would have been hard to do if the enemy wished to remain in his
camp, I should perhaps have lost all that you possess in this
kingdom, without speaking of the consequences which might have
resulted from it in Scotland, and even in England."
{29}
Europe was again in flames when Schomberg wrote thus to King
William; but the true chief of the coalition against Louis XIV.
was not able to leave his kingdom or to place himself at the head
of the forces which he had sent to the assistance of his allies;
the difficulties of parliamentary government and the war in
Ireland kept him in his own dominions. The new Parliament had met
on the 20th of March, 1690. The Tories were numerous, energetic
and confident in it. The king committed the direction of his
affairs to Danby, whom he had just made Marquis of Caermarthen.
He then announced formally to the Houses his intention of
crossing into Ireland. The parties had for a short time thought
of interfering with this resolution. "I find they are beginning
to be much distressed at my journey to Ireland," wrote William to
his friend Bentinck whom he had made Duke of Portland, and who
was then in Holland; "especially the Whigs, who fear to lose me
too soon, before they have made what they want of me; for, as for
their friendship, you know one must not count upon that in this
country. I have said nothing as yet of my design to Parliament,
but I propose to do so next week. Meantime I have begun to make
my preparations, and everybody speaks publicly of them."
The new Commons voted that they would sustain and maintain the
government of their majesties, King William and Queen Mary, with
all their power, as well by their counsels as by their
assistance. "I thank you for your address, gentlemen," replied
William. "I have already had occasion to expose my life for the
nation; rest assured I shall continue to do so in future." Yet
the two Houses had resolved to subject the royal revenues to the
necessity of a repeated vote.
{30}
William was hurt at this; the civil lists granted to Charles II.
and James II. had been granted for their lives. "The gentry of
England have had confidence in King James, who was the enemy of
their religion and laws," he observed to Burnet; "they distrust
me, who have preserved their religion and laws." The discontent
which he was quick to feel and bitter in expressing, never
disturbed the justice and loftiness natural to the spirit of
William III. When the Whigs proposed a bill of abjuration,
intended to disquiet the consciences of a large number of
moderate and honorable Tories, the king let his friends know that
he had no desire to impose a painful test upon his subjects. The
motion, much modified, was brought before the House of Lords. "I
have taken many oaths," said old Lord Wharton, formerly colonel
in the service of the Long Parliament, "and I have not kept them
all: I ask God not to impute to me this sin; but I should not
like to spread anew a snare into which my own soul or that of my
neighbor might fall."
The Earl of Macclesfield, who had accompanied William of Orange
at the time of his arrival in England, supported the words of
Lord Wharton. "I am surprised," said Churchill, who had lately
become Earl of Marlborough, "that your Lordship has any objection
to the bill, after the part you have played in the revolution."
"The noble earl exaggerates the part I have had in the
deliverance of my country," retorted Macclesfield: "I have always
been ready to risk my life in defence of her laws and liberties,
but there are things that I should not have liked to do, even in
this cause. I have been a rebel against a bad king; others have
gone further than I."
{31}
Marlborough was silent; the King, who was present, became grave.
Some days later, before bidding farewell to the Parliament, he
transmitted to it by Lord Caermarthen an act of pardon, a free
and spontaneous amnesty, to which the practice of preceding
reigns had not accustomed England. The regicides who were still
alive and a certain number of the most guilty satellites of King
James, were alone excepted from the general pardon. These had,
for the most part, sought safety upon the continent; those who
were in England were informed that new crimes alone could expose
them to the vengeance of the laws. The act of pardon was passed
on the 20th of May; on the same date the king prorogued the
Parliament, committing to the queen the cares of government. A
council composed of nine persons was to assist in this important
task. Four Whigs and five Tories sat in this confidential
ministry. William had provided with far-seeing tenderness for all
the wants of his wife. "I put my trust in God," he said to
Burnet, whom he had made Bishop of Salisbury, and to whom he
unveiled the melancholy state of his soul, in presence of so many
troubles and dangers. "I shall complete my task or fall in its
performance. The poor queen alone distresses me. If you love me,
see her often; give her all the aid you can. As for myself,
separated from her, I shall be very glad to find myself on
horseback and under canvas once more; I am fitter to command an
army than to direct your Houses of Parliament. But though I know
I am doing my duty, it is hard for my wife to feel that her
father confronts me on the field of battle. God grant that no
harm may befall him. Pray for me, doctor."
William embarked at Highlake on the 11th of June; three days
later he landed at Carrick-Fergus. The same evening he reached
Belfast. Schomberg had arrived before him. At the same time James
left Dublin for his camp on the northern frontier of Leicester.
{32}
He was accompanied by Lauzun, who had recently come from France
with four Irish regiments, equipped and drilled at the expense of
Louis XIV. "For the love of God," Louvois had said to Lauzun, of
whom he had a rather poor opinion, "Don't let yourself be carried
away by your desire to come to blows; endeavor to tire the
English, and above all maintain discipline." Careless and
venturous as he was, Lauzun was astonished at the disorder which
he found everywhere in Ireland. "It is a chaos like that
described in Genesis," he wrote to Louvois; "I would not spend
another month here for the whole world."
William III. urged on his preparations and hurried his advance,
eagerly desiring to attack the enemy. Schomberg wanted to hold
him back. "I have not come here to let the grass grow under my
feet," said the King of England. "This country is worth making
one's own," he added, as he gazed upon the beautiful, though
semi-civilized places he was passing through. The valley of the
Boyne, on the confines of the counties of Lowth and Meath,
reminded him of the rich meadows of England. The tents of the
enemy were pitched beneath Drogheda; the standards of the houses
of Stuart and Bourbon floated over the walls of the town. "I am
very glad to see you at last, gentlemen," said William of Orange,
viewing the motions of the Jacobite army from afar; "if you
escape me now, it will be my fault." One part of the army of King
James was concealed by the undulations of the ground. "Strong or
weak," said William, "I shall soon know which they are."
{33}
The two armies were almost equal in numbers: twenty-five or
thirty thousand were mustered on either side. "Although it is
true that the soldiers seem determined to do their best and are
exasperated against the rebels," wrote d'Avaux, who had just
returned to France with Rosen, who was superceded by Lauzun, "yet
that is not the only requisite for fighting a battle. The
subaltern officers are bad; and, excepting a very few, there are
none to take care of the soldiers, the arms and the discipline.
More confidence is placed in the cavalry, the greater part of
which is good enough." William had brought with him his veteran
Dutch and German regiments; representatives of all the Protestant
churches of Europe were there in arms against the enemies of
their liberties. None were more impetuous than the Irish
Protestants, burning to avenge their recent injuries, and the
French Huguenots, who flocked from all quarters against the
monarch whom Louis XIV. sustained. "I am sure," the Baron
d'Avejon, lieutenant colonel in King William's service, had
written to Geneva, "that you will not fail to have published in
all the French churches of Switzerland the obligation which rests
on all refugees to come and help us in this campaign, in which
the glory of God, and, consequently, the reestablishment of his
Church in our country are at stake." Vain hopes! which explain
the zeal of the French Protestants against the Irish and King
James. Two refugees--Marshal Schomberg, and M. de Caillemotte,
younger brother of Ruvigny--led them at the battle of the Boyne,
exclaiming: "Forward, my children, to glory! Forward! behold our
persecutors!"
On the morning of the first of July, King William, who was
wounded on the shoulder the evening before while making a
reconnaissance, was on horseback from daybreak. The armies joined
battle in the river. At first Schomberg had remained on the bank,
directing the movement of his troops. He rallied around him the
Huguenot regiments, shaken by the death of their leader
Caillemotte. The moment the marshal stepped aground, after
crossing the Boyne, a detachment of Irish cavalry surrounded him;
he was dead when his friends succeeded in rejoining him.
{34}
The native infantry had promptly taken to flight; nevertheless
the regiments from France and the Irish gentlemen fought
furiously. King William had entered the river at the head of the
left wing, with difficulty guiding his horse with his wounded
arm. He drew his sword with his left hand, and, charging at the
head of the Enniskillen Protestants, he dashed upon the enemy.
"You will be my guards today," he had said to the brave settlers;
"I have often heard of you, let us see what you can do." The heat
of battle expanded the heart of the grave and silent prince,
whose unconquerable reserve his best friends frequently deplored:
he moved about in every direction, receiving bullets on his
pistol-butt and the top of his boot, following up the victory
which at every point declared itself for him. King James had
taken no part in the action; he had remained afar, viewing the
combat from the heights of Dunmore. When he was certain that
fortune was against him, he turned bridle, accompanied by some
horsemen. In the evening he reached Dublin, bearing the news of
his own defeat. Irritated and humiliated, he bitterly reproached
his partisans with the cowardice of their countrymen. "I shall
never in my life command an Irish army," said he. "I must now
think of my safety alone; let each man do the same." Next day at
sunrise he left Dublin, and on the 3d of July he took ship at
Waterford. He soon landed at Brest, and related the history of
the battle in detail. "From the account of the battle that I have
heard the king and several of his suite give," wrote one of his
first hearers, "it does not seem to me that he was very well
informed of what took place in the action, and that he only knows
the rout of his troops." "Those who love the King of England
ought to be glad to know of his safety," said the Marshal de
Luxembourg, in Germany; "but those who love his glory have to
deplore the part he has played."
[Image]
King James at the Battle of Boyne.
{35}
Queen Mary was more pre-occupied about her father's safety than
her own glory. She wrote to her husband on the 5th of July: "I
was uneasy to know what had become of the king, my father; I only
dared to ask Lord Nottingham, and I have had the satisfaction of
learning that he was safe and sound. I know I have no need of
asking you to spare him; but add this to your clemency--let the
world know that for love of me you wish no harm to befall his
person."
The joy in England was complete when it was known that King
William had entered Dublin on the 6th. The rumor of his death had
been spread for a short time in Paris, where it had given rise to
popular rejoicings. The governor of the Bastile had even had
cannon fired. King James set about undeceiving the court and
city. His royal illusions were not yet dispelled. "My subjects
love me still," he used to say; "they await me impatiently in
England." When he arrived at Versailles, his first care was to
press Louis XIV. to send an army of invasion at once. "All the
forces of England are in Ireland," said he; "my people will rise
in my behalf." Tourville had just attempted a descent on the
coasts of Devonshire, but the peasants had taken arms and the
Cornish miners had emerged from the bowels of the earth to repel
the invasion. The French sailors contented themselves with
burning Teignmouth, and took to sea again more proud of the
triumph they had lately gained (July 10) over the united English
and Dutch fleets at Beachy Head, than humiliated at their check
on the English coast. One cry re-echoed in all the southern
countries: "God bless King William and Queen Mary!"
{36}
King William had felt deeply the disaster of his fleet. The news
had reached him a few days after that of the battle of Fleurus,
which had been won by the Marshal de Luxembourg from the Prince
de Waldeck, commanding the allied forces. "I cannot express to
you," wrote William to Heinsius, "how I am distressed at these
two great great disasters which almost simultaneously have fallen
upon the arms of the Republic. That of the fleet affects me the
more deeply, because I have been informed that my vessels have
not properly assisted those of the States, and left them in a
critical position. I have ordered an inquiry to take place; the
queen has given similar orders; no personal consideration shall
prevent my rigorously punishing the guilty." William had a right
to feel in the bottom of his soul a secret pride for his native
country. The Dutch vessels had born the whole weight of the
contest at Beachy Head, while the Marshal de Luxembourg wrote
after the battle of Fleurus: "Prince de Waldeck will never forget
the French cavalry, and I shall remember the Dutch infantry. It
has done still better than the Spaniards at Rocroi."
The indignation of England was great against Admiral Herbert,
created Lord Torrington, who was wrongfully accused of treason.
An inquiry was held upon his conduct, and many people were found
to be compromised in a Jacobite plot. Lord Clarendon, the queen's
uncle, was of the number. Before his departure to Ireland the
king had already had proof of his intrigues. The queen interceded
for him. William had summoned Lord Rochester. "Your brother has
plotted against me," he had said, "I am assured. I have been
advised to except him from the amnesty, but I have been unwilling
to cause this grief to the queen. It is for her sake that I
forgive the past; but let Lord Clarendon take care in future; he
will perceive that I am not jesting." This kind advice had not
sufficed; Lord Clarendon's name was connected anew with Jacobite
plots. The advisers of the queen hesitated to accuse him in her
presence.
{37}
"I know," said Mary, "and everybody knows as well as I, that Lord
Clarendon is accused of things too grave to suffer him to be
excepted from the precautionary measures." A warrant was signed
for Clarendon's arrest. "I am more grieved for Lord Clarendon
than people will believe," the queen wrote to her husband.
William returned to England, after meeting with a repulse before
the walls of Limerick, defended by the Irish with the patriotic
and sectarian zeal which had before animated the Protestant
citizens of Londonderry. Lauzun and the auxiliary regiments,
after withdrawing to Galway, had just embarked for France. King
William bid Marlborough to make a descent upon Cork and Kinsale.
The two places fell into the hands of that able general, and five
weeks from his departure from Portsmouth he paid his respects to
the king at Kensington. "There is not in Europe a general, having
so little experience in war, who is worthier of great commands
than the Earl of Marlborough," William said generously, for he
did not like him. The return of the king, and his journey from
Bristol to London, had been greeted with national transports of
joy. He had left in Ireland the Dutch general Ginckel, a resolute
and prudent man, at the head of an army, well disciplined, well
equipped, and well victualled. Before the close of the following
year, Ginckel had completed his task of pacifying Ireland. On the
20th of June, 1691, in spite of the presence and exertions of
Saint-Ruth, who had come with reinforcements from France, he
carried by storm the town of Athlone, the true key of Connaught,
and the strongest place in Ireland. "His master should have him
hanged for attempting to take Athlone," said the French general,
"and my master can do the same to me, if I lose it." On the 12th
of July Saint-Ruth was killed at the battle of Aghrim, and the
Irish signally defeated. On the 26th of August, Ginckel laid
siege to Limerick.
{38}
Tyrconnel had just breathed his last, old and prematurely worn
out by fatigue and debauches. King James's troops were commanded
by Lord Sarsfield, the most able and brilliant of the Irish
officers. On the 1st of August a capitulation was signed, and was
soon followed by a treaty. The Irish regiments were permitted to
choose between the service of William and that of Louis XIV. A
large number of soldiers went over spontaneously to France,
forming in the armies of Louis XIV. and Louis XV. that Irish
brigade, whose name has become famous. "Has this last campaign
altered your opinion of our military qualities?" asked Sarsfield
of the English officers. "To tell the truth," answered they, "we
think almost the same of them as we have always thought." "Well,"
replied Sarsfield, "whatever bad opinion you may have of us, only
let us change our king and begin again, and you will see."
Ginckel was raised to the dignity of Earl of Athlone and Aghrim.
King William and Parliament had ratified the terms offered by the
general to the Irish; the struggle was over, the conquest
consummated; the Protestant colonists, lately oppressed, became
the masters, and often the oppressors of the indigenous race,
which was dejected and decimated. Scotland was absorbed with the
triumph of the Presbyterians, who had just legally recovered the
religious supremacy in their country, to the great detriment of
Episcopalians and Cameronians. The English Parliament had voted
supplies generously, the Jacobite plots were exploded; the trial
of Lord Torrington had ended in an acquittal, which never
succeeded in erasing from the king's mind a distrust, which was
merited by the dissolute life and known intemperance of the
admiral.
{39}
William had not waited for this first interval of domestic peace
to respond to the needs of his soul, and the imperious call of
political necessity. On the 18th of January, 1691, in spite of
the severity of the season, he had embarked at Gravesend for
Holland. "I yearn for this moment more than I can express to
you," he wrote six months before to Heinsius.
The English fleet had arrived in sight of the coasts of Holland.
The voyage had been unpleasant; disembarkation seemed impossible:
enormous blocks of ice encumbered the channel, while a thick fog
hid the land. For eighteen hours the four little ships were
obliged to keep to sea. The king was, as usual, weak and
suffering, yet he had wished to put off in an open boat, to gain
his natal soil the quicker. The whole night was spent before he
could step on dry land; the cold was intense, and the danger
serious. Some of the sailors were in despair. "Fie!" said William
to them, "are you afraid to die with me?" Some great British
noblemen, the Dukes of Ormond and Norfolk, the Earls of
Devonshire, Dorset and Monmouth, were with him; Portland and
Zulestein were glad to accompany their beloved sovereign to
Holland. It was only at daybreak, by the feeble light of a
winter's morning, that they were able at last to land on the
island of Goree. The king rested there some hours before taking
the road to the Hague.
Joy beamed on the face which the English were accustomed to find
stern and haughty. Heart was responding to heart; England had
accepted its deliverance from the hand of William III., without
affinity for him and through necessity. The Dutch loved the heir
of the greatest name in their nation and of their race, the
liberator of their country, the man who had carried to the throne
of England the glory, the name and the manners of his Dutch
fatherland.
{40}
The people pressed upon his steps. "Let them alone," said the
king; "let them come near me and all be my friends." A splendid
reception had been prepared at the Hague: he was opposed to the
pageant and the ceremonies, and murmured against this useless
expenditure. "It is quite enough to have to bear the cost of the
war," he observed. His countrymen spared him neither a speech nor
a salvo of artillery; the joy of the population was at its
height. "It would be quite another thing if Mary had accompanied
me," said the king to those who congratulated him upon his
triumph; "she is more popular than I."
The States-General were solemnly convened. William was more moved
than he had been formerly on leaving his native country. "When I
took leave of you," he said, "I informed you of my intention to
cross over to England, to save, thanks to your aid, that kingdom
from a deluge of evils present and to come. Providence has
blessed my enterprise, and the nation has offered me the crown of
the three kingdoms. I have accepted it, not from ambition, God is
my witness, but to put the religion, the welfare, the peace of
Great Britain beyond the power of any assault, and to be able to
protect the allies, the republic in particular, against the
supremacy of France. I have loved this country from my earliest
youth, and, if anything could increase this love, it is the
certainty that I have found a reciprocal attachment in the hearts
of my countrymen. If it pleases God that I should become the
instrument which Providence may deign to use in order to restore
repose to Europe and re-establish security in your state, I shall
have lived long enough and shall go down tranquilly to the
grave."
{41}
It was at the Hague that the Congress of the Grand Alliance had
met. Having become King of England, and controlling the forces of
a great kingdom, William of Orange remained its chief,
notwithstanding princely jealousies and rivalries, by that
ascendancy of genius which had carried him to the first rank when
he was as yet but the stadtholder of a petty republic. The
assembled princes or their envoys were not used to hear such bold
language employed against the all-powerful king of France as that
of William at the opening of the Diet. "The states of Europe,"
said the king, "have been too long given up to a spirit of
division, indolence, or attention to their private interests. We
may rest assured that the interest of each is inseparable from
the general interest of all. The King of France's forces are
great; he will sweep away everything like a torrent. It will be
vain to oppose him with murmurs and protests against injustice.
It is not the resolutions of diets, or hopes founded on fanciful
rumors, but powerful armies, and a firm union among the allies
which can stay the common enemy in his triumphant career and in
the effervescence of his power. It is with the sword that we must
wrest from his hands the liberties of Europe which he aims at
smothering, or we must endure the yoke of slavery forever. For my
part I shall spare neither my credit, my forces nor my person, to
attain this glorious result, and I shall come in the spring at
the head of my troops to conquer or die with my allies."
The spring had not come yet, and Mons had been already invested
on the 15th of March by a French army. Louis XIV. arrived there
with the Dauphin on the 12th, and, despite the impetuous efforts
of William to relieve the place in time, it capitulated almost in
sight of the allied army. The vigilance of Marshal de Luxembourg
baffled William's maneuvres throughout the campaign.
{42}
When he returned to England in October, the advantage was with
France everywhere on the Continent. The Duke of Savoy had adhered
to the Grand Alliance, but Nice had fallen into the power of
Catinat. Opening the session of Parliament, the King spoke
complacently of the successful issue of the war in Ireland; at
the same time he warned the representatives of the nation that a
great effort would be necessary against the King of France, and
in order to support the Grand Alliance. The subsidies had been
voted without opposition, and the House was engaged with the
affairs of the East India Company, when a strange report was
spread abroad: the Earl of Malborough, lately at the head of the
English contingent to the allied army, while the king of England
was absent, had been suddenly stripped of his employment and his
dignities. The Princess Anne, who persisted in keeping her
favorite with her, had to retire with her to the country. The
causes of Malborough's disgrace remained a mystery, which
occasioned the most diverse conjectures, and allowed the enemies
of William and Mary to attribute unworthy or frivolous motives to
them. The cause was grave, and the necessity absolute: the Earl
of Marlborough was hatching a new treason. In the Parliament and
the army all was ready to attempt a Jacobite restoration.
James II. himself wrote in November, 1692: "Last year my friends
formed the design of recalling me by act of Parliament. The
method was arranged, and Lord Churchill was to propose in
Parliament to expel all foreigners, as well from the army and the
council as from the kingdom. If the Prince of Orange had agreed
to this measure, they would have had him in their hands; if he
had resisted it, they would have made Parliament declare against
him, and at the same time Lord Churchill with the army was to
declare himself for the Parliament; the fleet was to do the same,
and they were to recall me. They had commenced to move in the
matter and had gained a large party, when some indiscreet
subjects, thinking they were serving me, and that what Lord
Churchill was doing was not for me, but for the Princess of
Denmark, had the imprudence to discover the whole thing to
Bentinck, and thus averted the blow."
[Image]
Duke And Duchess Of Marlborough.
{43}
The original manuscript of Burnet's Memoirs also contains the
following: "Marlborough busied himself with decrying the conduct
of the king and with depreciating him in all his conversations,
seeking to rouse the dislike of the English for the Dutch, who,
he said, enjoyed a larger share of the king's confidence and
favor than they did. It was a point on which it was easy to
excite the English, too much inclined, as they are, to despise
all other nations and to esteem themselves immoderately. This was
the subject of all the conversations at Marlborough's residence,
where English officers met incessantly. The king had told me that
he had good reasons for believing also that the earl had made his
peace with King James, and had opened a correspondence with
France."
William III. had learned clemency in his dealings with English
statesmen: the treason of Lord Clarendon and of Lord Dartmouth
had been treated with mildness; when Lord Preston's plot had been
discovered, and Elliot, one of the accomplices, was multiplying
denunciations, the king, who was present, had touched
Caermarthen's shoulder. "There is enough of this, my lord," he
had said; thus imposing silence upon useless revelations about an
impotent discontent against which he did not wish to be severe.
Yet he feared the Earl of Marlborough's perfidy: he knew at once
his rare abilities and his profound baseness, and wished to
secure himself against a treason which threatened his throne and
life.
{44}
Through excessive magnanimity or prudence he persistently
concealed the motives of his determination; but Marlborough's
disgrace was to be long-lived. The silence of William left a
formidable foe to France and a superlatively able head to the
coalition against her, who, had the details of his treason been
generally known, would have been irrecoverably ruined in the
public opinion of England.
William was about to leave England to take command of the allied
forces on the continent. At his departure he wished to finish the
pacification of Scotland. His late deputy, Lord Melville, had
allowed the Presbyterians to assume a dominating position which
seriously threatened the liberty of the Episcopalians. He was
replaced by Sir John Dalrymple, known in history as the Master of
Stair. Eloquent and able, he had conceived the idea of detaching
a certain number of Highland chiefs from the Jacobite cause by
bribery. A considerable sum had been effectively spent among men
proud and uncultured, but poor and exhausted by their warlike
efforts and their domestic feuds. Numerous chiefs made their
submission, notwithstanding the repugnance inspired by Lord
Breadalbane, who was employed by the Master of Stair in these
negotiations, and whom his connection with the Campbells rendered
suspected by the mountaineers. On the 31st of December, 1691,
Macdonald of Glencoe, or MacLean, as he was called in the
Highlands, found himself almost the only one to refuse the oath
of allegiance.
He made up his mind, at last, but too late. When he presented
himself at Fort William, the fixed time had expired, and no
magistrate was present. The old chief, alarmed at last, betook
himself to Inverary; they refused for a long time to accept his
submission. McLean returned to his mountains, whither an unjust
and cruel vengeance was about to pursue him.
{45}
The Master of Stair had consented to become the instrument of the
hereditary hate of the Campbells; it had been represented to him
that this was the price of the pacification of Scotland. His
orders had been issued in advance for the destruction of all the
clans which should not have made their submission before the 1st
of January, 1692. "Your troops will ravage all the district of
Lochaber, the domains of Lochiel, Keppoch, Glengarry, and
Glencoe. Your powers will be sufficient for the purpose. I hope
your soldiers will not embarrass the government with prisoners."
Lochiel, Keppoch and Glengarry had acted in time. All the hate of
the Campbells and all the administrative zeal of the Master of
Stair were turned upon Glencoe. King William signed his sentence
without reading it, Burnet asserts, and amid the mass of papers
which were presented to him every day. He did not, doubtless,
understand its purport. "It is a charitable duty," wrote the
Master of Stair, "to destroy this nest of robbers."
On the 1st of February, 1692, a detachment of Argyle's regiment
entered the territory of Glencoe, peacefully, and as if animated
by the most friendly intentions. "It would be better to do
nothing in the matter than to do it unsuccessfully," the Master
of Stair had said. "Since the thing is resolved on, it must be
executed secretly and suddenly." The commander of the small body,
Captain Campbell, commonly called Glenlyon from the name of his
estate, had a niece married to the second son of Glencoe. The
soldiers were well received and housed among the cottages.
{46}
They passed twelve days there waiting for the time when
Lieutenant-colonel Hamilton should have occupied the defiles of
the mountains. The 13th of February had been fixed on as the
fatal day; the Highlanders had felt some uneasiness, but their
guests had reassured them, "If there was any danger," Glenlyon
had said to the chiefs eldest son, "should I not have warned your
brother and his wife?" At the appointed hour Hamilton had not yet
arrived; nevertheless the massacre began. Under every roof,
beside every hearth, Glenlyon's soldiers shot down their hosts,
men, women and children; the Master of Stair's orders had allowed
them to spare old men above seventy. In their bloody intoxication
the troops gave no quarter; the aged Glencoe perished among the
first. His wife, assassinated beside him, was stripped of her
jewelry, and did not expire till the next day. At every door was
seen a corpse. When Hamilton appeared at the head of his troops,
they plundered all the houses, and long lines of cattle were
driven down the mountain passes by the light of the flames which
were consuming the villages.
God does not suffer crime, though cleverly conceived, to gain a
complete triumph. The passes had not been guarded; the murderers
had not all arrived in time, and a large number of the Macdonalds
of Glencoe succeeded in escaping, at the cost of new
sufferings--exposed to hunger, cold, and unceasing dangers. They
repaired to the midst of their mountains, above their ruined
houses and their blood stained hearths. The cry of their calamity
mounted slowly to Heaven. The Jacobites assisted in spreading it
abroad: they had eagerly seized this weapon against King William.
When the latter, far away and imperfectly informed, wished to
open an inquiry into the authors of the crime, so many and so
important persons were compromised in it, that the Master of
Stair alone was removed for a time from public life. The massacre
of Glencoe has remained a dark stain on the reign of William
III., a sad contrast to the leniency and humanity which usually
characterized his government.
{47}
Hardly had the king left England before the nation, as well as
Queen Mary, was a prey to serious uneasiness. Louvois had died
suddenly on the 17th of July, 1691, without Louis XIV., with whom
his influence had been decreasing, appearing particularly
distressed at his loss. "Tell the King of England that I have
lost a good minister," was the answer he had made to King James's
condolences, "but that his affairs and mine will fare none the
worse for it."
Louvois would not have consented to the schemes which James was
urging Louis XIV. to execute. Still convinced of the attachment
of his English subjects, especially of the navy, he was for some
time in correspondence with Admiral Russell, a sincere Whig, and
Protestant, but morose, discontented, unreasonable and easily led
away by his temperament into guilty intrigues. A camp had lately
been formed on the coasts of Normandy; all the Irish regiments
were there, under command of Lord Sarsfield; French forces were
to join them. James called on the English people to pronounce in
his favor by a manifesto so arrogant, so obstinate in the errors
and faults which had caused his downfall, that the ministers of
William III. had it printed and widely circulated in the kingdom.
Some English Jacobites attempted to combat the disastrous effect
of the manifesto by another paper, drawn up with care and with a
full knowledge of the state of feeling in England; but nobody let
himself be taken in by this maneuvre. A popular movement was
displayed in favor of the government; the militia responded
spiritedly to the call; the coasts were covered with troops; the
fleet of the allies entered the Channel. Those of the British
sailors who had given hopes to King James, recovered their
fidelity in presence of the enemy.
{48}
"I should like to serve King James," said Admiral Russell to the
Bishop of St. Asaph. "It might be done, if he was willing to let
us alone; but he does not know how to act with us. Let him forget
the whole past, and grant a general amnesty, and I will see what
I can do for him."
The bishop tried some hints about the personal favor reserved for
the admiral. The latter interrupted him: "I am not uneasy about
that, I only think of the public; and don't imagine I should ever
let the French conquer us on our own seas. Be it well known that
I shall fight them if I meet them, were His Majesty himself on
board!"
This outburst of patriotism, in a malcontent, who had lately been
on the point of becoming a traitor, did not suffice to open King
James's eyes: at his request the formal orders of Louis XIV.
forced the hand of Admiral de Tourville, who was hesitating, to
fight. He had been instructed to protect the disembarkation of
the invading forces upon the English coasts; but the wind
retarded his sailing from Brest. The Dutch fleet had joined the
English, and Tourville wished to await the squadrons of Estrées
and Rochefort.
Pontchartrain was minister of Marine as well as of Finance since
Seignelay, son of Colbert, had died, in 1690. He sent this answer
from Versailles to the experienced sailor, who was used to
fighting from the age of fourteen: "It is not for you to discuss
the king's orders; it is your business to execute them and enter
the Channel. If you don't wish to do so, the king will appoint in
your place some one more obedient and less cautious than you."
Tourville set out and met the hostile squadrons between the capes
of La Hague and Barfleur. He had forty-four vessels against
ninety-nine which the English and Dutch numbered. Tourville
convened his council of war; all the officers advised him to
retire; but the king's command was peremptory, and the admiral
gave battle.
{49}
After three days' desperate resistance, aided by the most skilful
maneuvering, Tourville was forced to retreat under the forts of
La Hogue in the hope of stranding his vessels. King James and
Marshal de Bellefonds were opposed to this. The vessels were
attacked and burned by the English in sight of the French and
Irish camp. The dethroned king was divided between his desire for
victory and his patriotic instincts. Seeing the sailors who
fought against him gallantly scaling the French vessels, he could
not help exclaiming: "Oh, my brave Englishmen!" Previously, on
the occasion of a trifling advantage that Tourville had gained in
the Bay of Bantry, while James II. was in Ireland, when they came
to announce to the latter that the French had beaten the English,
the king had said, not without bitterness: "Then it is the first
time." Tourville had lost a dozen vessels. The conduct of the
English officers and sailors had been heroic; the admiral had
himself inspected all the vessels and addressed the crews. "If
your commanders betray you," he had said, "throw them overboard,
and me the first!" King James counted wrongly on Rear-Admiral
Carter, who had made him promises, while at the same time he
warned Queen Mary of the fact. Severely wounded, Carter, who was
the first to break the French lines, would not let go his sword.
"Fight, fight," he said, dying, "until the ship sinks!"
The news of the victory of La Hogue caused great joy in England:
it calmed the minds of the population, distracted by repeated
rumors of conspiracies. The plot denounced by Fuller in February,
and Young's plot in April, both invented, and the creations of
false witnesses, worthy rivals of Titus Oates and Dangerfield,
had disturbed men's spirits. Lord Huntingdon had been arrested;
the Earl of Marlborough had been sent to the Tower for a short
time: the Bishop of Rochester had been tried. Marlborough was
guilty of intrigues more serious, and unknown to the public.
{50}
The Bishop, rich and indolent, had nothing to do with any plot.
He easily proved his innocence; the false witnesses were severely
punished; and Marlborough was set at liberty, with a caution,
after forty-eight hours. His accusers had done him the service of
dispelling the vague suspicions that had brought his disgrace
upon him.
At the close of the same year, the plot of Grandval, aimed at the
King's life, was to wake again the public disquiet that was
destined to be revived more than once in his reign. In Europe, as
well as England, King William's courage and thoughtfulness stood
in the way of many great designs, and disappointed many hopes.
The sentence which condemned the criminal publicly compromised
the Marquis de Barbezieux, son of Louvois, and secretary of state
for war. Louis' ministers kept silence and did not refute the
charge.
The fortune of war continued to favor France: Namur had
capitulated on the 20th of June, and its citadel surrendered on
the 30th. "The allies learned it by three salvas from the army of
the Marshal de Luxembourg and that of the Marquis de Boufflers,"
wrote Louis XIV. in his Memoirs. "They fell into a consternation
which rendered them immovable for three days; so much so that the
Marshal de Luxembourg having resolved to repass the Sombre, they
thought neither of annoying him on his march nor of attacking him
in his retreat."
{51}
When William III. came up with Luxembourg on the 31st of August,
between Enghien and Steinkerque, a new victory, due to the
brilliant gallantry of the French infantry, completed the
uneasiness of the allies. At the end of the year, William, always
clear-sighted and often a pessimist, in spite of his unbending
determination, wrote to Heinsius "I have to tell you frankly
that, if we could obtain peace just now--which certainly would
not be on favorable terms--we should yet have to accept it; for,
to my grief, I don't see that we have anything better to
expect--far from it, for things go from bad to worse. It will
not, for that reason, be less needful for one to do his best; and
for my part, I will do everything in my power."