CHAPTER X.

REIGN OF JAMES II.

James's Speech to the Council--Rochester supersedes Halifax--Other

Changes in the Ministry--James Collects the Customs without

Parliament--French Pension continued--Scottish Parliament--Oates

and Dangerfield--Meeting of Parliament--It grants Revenue for

Life--Monmouth and Argyll--Argyll's Expedition--His Capture and

Execution--Monmouth's Expedition--He enters Taunton--Failure of

his Hopes--Battle of Sedgemoor--Execution of Monmouth--Cruelties

of Kirke and Jeffreys--The Bloody Assize--The Case of Lady Alice

Lisle--Decline of James's Power--He Breaks the Test Act--Revocation

of the Edict of Nantes--Prorogation of Parliament--Acquittal

of Delamere--Alienation of the Church--Parties at Court--The

Dispensing Power Asserted--Livings granted to Catholics--Court of

High Commission Revived--Army on Hounslow Heath--Trial of "Julian"

Johnson--James's Lawlessness in Scotland and Ireland--Declaration

of Indulgence--The Party of the Prince of Orange and the Princess

Mary--Expulsion of the Fellows of Magdalen College--New Declaration

of Indulgence--Protest of the Seven Bishops--Birth of the Prince of

Wales--Trial and Acquittal of the Bishops--Invitation to William

of Orange--Folly of James--William's Preparations--Blindness of

James and Treachery of his Ministers--William's Declaration--James

convinced, makes Concessions--William lands at Torbay--His Advance

to Exeter--Churchill's Treason--Flight of the Princess Anne and her

Husband--James sends Commissioners to Treat with William--Flight

of James--Riots in London--Return of James--His Final Flight to

France--The Convention--The Succession Question--Declaration of

Rights--William and Mary joint Sovereigns.

To the reign of merry cruelty now succeeded the reign of gloomy,

ascetic, undisguised ferocity. Charles could laugh and sport with his

ladies, whilst his subjects were imprisoned and tortured. James, who

never laughed, pursued his cruel bent with a settled butcher-like mood,

and would have extirpated nations, were it in his power, to restore

Catholicism, and establish the political absolutism adored by the

Stuarts. Yet he began the reign of the Inquisition with the hypocrisy

of the Jesuit. When the breath had left the body of Charles, James

retired for a quarter of an hour to his chamber, and then met the

Privy Council with a speech which promised everything that he was most

resolved not to perform. He began by eulogising the deceased "as a good

and gracious king." If he really thought his late merry, debauched,

and despotic brother good and gracious, it was an evil omen for the

nation, whose ruler had such conceptions of what was good and gracious.

He then added, "I have been reported to be a man fond of arbitrary

power; but that is not the only falsehood which has been reported of

me; and I shall make it my endeavour to preserve this Government,

both in Church and State, as it is by law now established. I know the

principles of the Church of England are favourable to monarchy, and the

members of it have shown themselves good and loyal subjects; therefore

I shall take care to defend and support it. I know, too, that the laws

of England are sufficient to make the king as great a monarch as I can

wish; and as I shall never depart from the just rights and prerogatives

of the Crown, so I shall never invade any man's property. I have often

before ventured my life in defence of this nation, and shall go as far

as any man in preserving it in all its just rights and liberties."

The first thing which scandalised the people was the miserable economy

of the late king's funeral. It was said to be scarcely befitting a

private gentleman, and the Scottish Covenanters asserted that the dead

tyrant had been treated, as the Scriptures declared tyrants should be,

to the "burial of an ass." The first thing which James set about was

the rearrangement of the Cabinet. There was but one man in the Cabinet

of the late king who had his entire confidence--this was Rochester,

the second son of the late Lord Clarendon. To him he gave the office

of Lord High Treasurer, thus constituting him Prime Minister; to

Godolphin, who had held this office, he gave that of Chamberlain to the

Queen. Halifax was deprived of the Privy Seal, and was made President

of the Council, a post both less lucrative and less influential, a

circumstance which highly delighted Rochester, who now saw the wit who

said he had been kicked upstairs, served in precisely the same way.

Sunderland, the late Secretary of State, was suffered to retain his

office. He had intrigued and acted against James; both he and Godolphin

had supported the Exclusion Bill, but Sunderland now with his usual

supple artifice, represented that he could have no hope of the king's

favour but from the merit of his future services; and as he possessed

some dangerous secrets, he was permitted to keep his place. He did

not, however, content himself with this, but cherished the ambition

of superseding Rochester as Lord Treasurer, and therefore represented

himself to the Catholics as their staunch friend, whilst they knew that

Rochester was the champion of the Church of England. For the present,

nevertheless, from having been at high feud with both Rochester and

Clarendon, he cultivated a strong friendship with them to make his

position firm with the king. Halifax had opposed the Exclusion Bill,

but he had become too well known as a decided enemy of Popery and of

the French ascendency. James, therefore, tolerated him for the present,

and whilst he assured him that all the past was forgotten, except the

service he had rendered by his opposition to the Exclusion Bill, he

told Barillon, the French ambassador, that he knew him too well to

trust him, and only gave him the post of President of the Council to

show how little influence he had.

The Great Seal was retained also by Lord Guildford, who, though

he was by no means a friend of liberty, was too much a stickler

for the law to be a useful tool of arbitrary power. James secretly

hated him, and determined to associate a more unscrupulous man with

him in the functions of his office. This was his most obedient and

most unflinching creature, the Lord Chief Justice Jeffreys, of whose

unexampled villainies we shall soon hear too much. Guildford was by the

overbearing Jeffreys at once thrust back into the mere routine of a

judge in equity, and all his State functions and patronage were usurped

by this daring man. At the Council board Jeffreys treated him with the

most marked contempt, and even insult, and poor Guildford soon saw

all influence and profit of the Chancellorship, as well as the Chief

Justiceship, in the hands of Jeffreys, and himself reduced to a cipher.

But the most ungenerous proceeding was that of depriving the old and

faithful Lord Ormond of the Lord-Lieutenancy of Ireland. Ormond had not

only stood firmly by Charles I., but had suffered unrepiningly the evil

fortunes of Charles II. He had shared his exile, and had done all in

his power for his restoration. He had opposed all the endeavours by the

Popish Plot and the Exclusion Bill to get rid of James, and was highly

respected in his office in Ireland. He had lately lost his eldest

son, Lord Ossory, and, though aged, was still vigorous and zealous in

discharge of his duties. But he had the unpardonable faults of being

a firm Protestant and as firm an advocate for the constitutional

restrictions of the Crown. James recalled him from his Lord-Lieutenancy

on the plea that he was wanted at Court in his other office of Lord

Steward of the Household. But the ancient chief felt the ungrateful

act, and, at a farewell dinner at Dublin to the officers of the

garrison, in toasting the health of the king, he filled a cup of wine

to the brim, and, holding it aloft without spilling a drop, declared

that whatever the courtiers might say, neither hand, heart, nor reason

yet failed him--that he knew no approach of dotage.

Having made these changes in the ministry, James lost no time in

letting his subjects see that he meant to enjoy his religion without

the restraints to which he had been accustomed. He had been used to

attend Mass with the queen in her oratory, with the doors carefully

closed; but the second Sunday after his accession he ordered the chapel

doors to be thrown wide open, and went thither in procession. The Duke

of Somerset, who bore the sword of State, stopped at the threshold.

James bade him advance, saying, "Your father would have gone farther."

But Somerset replied, "Your Majesty's father would not have gone so

far." At the moment of the elevation of the Host, the courtiers were

thrown into a strange agitation. The Catholics fell on their knees,

and the Protestants hurried away. On Easter Sunday Mass was attended

with still greater ceremony. Somerset stopped at the door, according to

custom, but the Dukes of Norfolk, Northumberland, Grafton, Richmond,

and many other noblemen, accompanied the king as far as the gallery.

Godolphin and Sunderland also complied, but Rochester absolutely

refused to attend. Not satisfied with proclaiming his Catholicism,

James produced two papers, which he said he had found in the strong

box of the late king, wherein Charles was made to avow his persuasion

that there could be no true Church but the Roman, and that all who

dissented from that Church, whether communities or individuals, became

heretic. James declared the arguments to be perfectly unanswerable,

and challenged Sancroft, Archbishop of Canterbury, to attempt it. This

was not very consistent with his speech as regarded the Church of

England, and his next step was as great a violation of his assurance

that he would not invade any man's property. Funds for carrying on the

Government were necessary, and James declared that as the customs and

part of the excise had only been granted to Charles for his life, they

had now lapsed, and that it would produce great inconvenience to wait

for the meeting of Parliament for their re-enactment. Nothing prevented

him from calling Parliament at once, but James undoubtedly had a fancy

for trying his father's favourite measure of levying taxes without

Parliament. It was contended that as no law for customs or excise now

existed, all goods newly imported would come in duty free, and ruin the

merchants who had to sell goods which had paid the duty. North, Lord

Guildford, recommended that the duties should be levied as usual, but

the proceeds kept in the Exchequer till Parliament met and authorised

their appropriation; but Jeffreys was a councillor much more after the

king's heart. He recommended that an edict should at once be issued,

ordering the duties to be paid as usual to his Majesty, and this advice

was carried, every one being afraid of being declared disloyal, or a

trimmer, who voted against it. The proclamation was issued, but, to

render it more palatable, it announced that a Parliament would be very

soon called, and as many addresses as possible from public bodies,

sanctioning the measure, were procured. The barristers and students of

the Middle Temple, in their address, thanked the king for preserving

the customs, and both they and the two universities expressed the most

boundless obedience to the king's sovereign and unlimited power. But

the public at large looked on with silent foreboding. "The compliments

of these bodies," says Dalrymple, "only served to remind the nation

that the laws had been broken."

Before venturing to assemble Parliament James endeavoured to render

Louis of France acquiescent in this step. He knew from the history

of the late reign how averse Louis was from English Parliaments,

which were hostile to his designs against the Continental nations.

He therefore had a private interview with Barillon, in which he

apologised most humbly for the necessity of calling a Parliament. He

begged him to assure his master of his grateful attachment, and that

he was determined to do nothing without his consent. If the Parliament

attempted to meddle in any foreign affairs, he would send them about

their business. Again he begged him to explain this, and that he

desired to consult his brother of France in everything, but then he

must have money by some means. This hint of money was followed up

the next day by Rochester, and Barillon hastened to convey the royal

wishes. But Louis had lost no time in applying the effectual remedy

for a Parliament, the moment the assembling of one became menaced.

He sent over five hundred thousand crowns, which Barillon carried in

triumph to Whitehall, and James wept tears of joy and gratitude over

the accursed bribe. But he and his ministers soon hinted that the

money, though most acceptable, would not render him independent of

Parliament, and Barillon pressed his sovereign to send more with an

urgency which rather offended Louis, and rendered it possible that

the ambassador had a pretty good commission out of what he obtained.

James sent over to Versailles Captain Churchill, already become Lord

Churchill, and in time to become known to us and all the world as

the Duke of Marlborough. He was to express James's gratitude and his

assurances of keeping in view the interests of France, and so well

did the proceedings of Churchill in Paris and of Barillon in England,

prosper, that successive remittances, amounting to two millions of

livres, were sent over. But of this, except four hundred and seventy

thousand livres, the arrears of the late king's pension, and about

thirty thousand pounds for the corruption of the House of Commons,

Louis strictly forbade Barillon paying over more at present to James

without his orders. In fact, he was no more assured of the good faith

of James than he had been of that of Charles; and he had ample reason

for his distrust, for at the very same time James was negotiating a

fresh treaty with his son-in-law, the Prince of Orange.

It is impossible to comprehend the full turpitude of this conduct of

James without keeping steadily in view the aims of both James and

Louis. James's, like that of all the Stuarts, was simply to destroy

the British constitution and reign absolutely. To do this the money

of France was needed to render them independent of Parliaments, and a

prospect of French troops should the English at length rebel against

these attempts at their enslavement. The object of Louis was to keep

England from affording any aid to any power on the Continent, whilst he

was endeavouring to overrun it with his armies.

On the day of the coronation in England (April 23rd), St. George's

Day, the Parliament in Scotland met. James called on the Scots to set

a good example to the approaching Parliament of England in a liberal

provision for the Crown; and the Scottish Estates, as if complimented

by this appeal, not only responded to it by annexing the excise to

the Crown for ever, and offering him besides two hundred and sixty

thousand pounds a year for his own life, but declared their abhorrence

of "all principles derogatory to the king's sacred, supreme, sovereign,

and absolute power and authority." They did more, they passed an Act

making it death for any one to preach in a conventicle, whether under

a roof or in the open air. In England the elections were going on most

favourably, and therefore James seized on the opportunity, whilst all

appeared smiling and secure, to indulge his appetite for a little

vengeance.

On the 7th of May, Titus Oates, the enemy of James and of Popery, the

arch-instrument of the Whig agitators, was brought up to the bar of the

King's Bench, before the terrible Jeffreys. When he was now brought

up, the Court was crowded with people, a large proportion of them

being Catholics, glad to see the punishment of their ruthless enemy.

But if they expected to see him depressed or humbled, they were much

disappointed. He came up bold and impudent as ever. Jeffreys flung his

fiercest Billingsgate at him, but Oates returned him word for word

unabashed. On his last trial he had sworn he had attended a council of

Jesuits on the 24th of April, 1671, in London, but it was now proved

beyond doubt that on that very day Oates was at St. Omer. He had sworn

also to being present at the commission of treasonable acts by Ireland,

the Jesuit, in London, on the 8th and 12th of August, and on the 2nd of

September of the same year. It was now also clearly proved that Ireland

left London that year on the 2nd of August, and did not return till the

14th of September. Oates was convicted of perjury on both indictments,

and was sentenced to pay a thousand marks on each indictment; to be

stripped of his clerical habit; to be pilloried in Palace Yard, and led

round Westminster Hall, with an inscription over his head describing

his crime. He was again to be pilloried in front of the Royal Exchange,

and after that to be whipped from Aldgate to Newgate, and after two

days' interval whipped again from Newgate to Tyburn. If he survived

this, which was not expected, he was to be confined for life, but five

times every year he was to stand again in the pillory.

If the crimes of this wretch were monstrous, his punishment was

equally so. He had the assurance on his trial to call many persons

of distinction, including members of Parliament, to give evidence

in his favour, but he was answered only by bitter reproaches, for

having led them into the spilling of much innocent blood. The lash was

applied the first day so unmercifully, that though he endured it for

some time, it compelled him to utter the most horrible yells. Several

times he fainted, but the flagellations never stopped, and when the

flogging ceased, it was doubted whether he was alive. The most earnest

entreaties were made to the king and queen to have the second flogging

omitted, but they were both inexorable. Yet the guilty wretch survived

through all, though he was said to have received seventeen hundred

stripes the second day on his already lacerated body. So long as James

reigned, he was subjected to the pillory five times a year, but he

lived to be pardoned at the Revolution, and receive a pension of five

pounds a week in lieu of that granted him by Charles II. He died in

1705.

Dangerfield, who had not only succeeded in destroying so many innocent

victims, but had displayed villainy and ingratitude of the blackest

dye, was also convicted, and sentenced to pay five hundred pounds, and

to be pilloried twice and whipped twice over the same ground as Oates.

He was extremely insolent on his trial, but on hearing his sentence he

was struck with horror, flew into the wildest exclamations, declared

himself a dead man, and chose a text for his funeral sermon. Singularly

enough, his end was really at hand. On returning from his whipping

a gentleman named Robert Francis, of Gray's Inn, stepped up to the

coach and asked him how his back was. Dangerfield replied by a curse,

and Francis thrusting at him with his cane, wounded him in the eye;

the wound was declared to occasion his death, though the unmerciful

flogging was probably the real cause, and Francis was tried for the

murder, and hanged.

[Illustration: JAMES II.]

The meeting of Parliament on the 19th of May drew the public attention

from these barbarities. Every means had been exerted to influence the

elections. In the counties the reaction of Toryism, and the effects

of the Rye House Plot in defeating and intimidating the Whigs, gave

the Court every advantage. In the corporations the deprivation of

their ancient charters made them the slaves of Government. But even

with these advantages James was not satisfied. Wherever there appeared

likely to be any independent spirit shown, agents were sent down to

overawe the people, and to force a choice of the Government candidate.

On the 22nd of May James went to the House of Lords in great state

to open Parliament. He took his seat on the throne with the crown on

his head, and his queen, and Anne, his daughter, Princess of Denmark,

standing on the right hand of the throne. The Spanish and other

Catholic ambassadors were present, and heard the Pope, the Mass, the

worship of the Virgin Mary, and the saints all renounced, as the Lords

took their oaths. James then produced a written speech and read it. He

repeated in it what he had before declared to the Council, that he

would maintain the Constitution and the Church as by law established,

and added that, "Having given this assurance concerning their religion

and property, they might rely on his word." Although it had been the

custom to listen to the royal speech in respectful silence, at this

declaration the members of both Houses broke into loud acclamations. He

then informed them that he expected a revenue for life, such as they

had voted his late brother. Again the expression of accord was loud and

satisfactory, but what followed was not so palatable. "The inclination

men have for frequent Parliaments, some may think, would be the best

secured by feeding me from time to time by such proportions as they

shall think convenient, and this argument, it being the first time I

speak to you from the throne, I will answer once for all, that this

would be a very improper method to take with _me;_ and that the best

way to engage me to meet you often is always to use me well. I expect,

therefore, that you will comply with me in what I have desired, and

that you will do it speedily." This agreeable assurance he followed up

by announcing a rebellion to have broken out in Scotland under Argyll

and other refugees from Holland.

When the Commons returned to their own House, Lord Preston entered

into a high eulogium of the king, telling the House that his name

spread terror over all Europe, and that the reputation of England

was already beginning to rise under his rule; they had only to have

full confidence in him as a prince who had never broken his word, and

thus enable him to assert the dignity of England. The House went into

a Committee of Supply, and voted his Majesty the same revenue that

Charles had enjoyed, namely, one million two hundred thousand pounds

a year for life. But when several petitions against some of the late

elections were presented, a serious opposition asserted itself in a

most unexpected quarter. This was from Sir Edward Seymour, of Berry

Pomeroy Castle, the member for Exeter. Seymour was both a Tory and a

High Churchman, proud of his descent from the Lord Protector Seymour,

and who had great influence in the western counties. He was a man of

indifferent moral character, but able and accomplished, and a forcible

debater. He was now irritated by the Government proceedings in the

elections which had interfered with his interests, and made a fierce

attack on the Government pressure on the electors; denounced the

removal of the charters and the conduct of the returning officers;

declared that there was a design to repeal the Test and Habeas Corpus

Acts, and moved that no one whose right to sit was disputed should vote

till that right had been ascertained by a searching inquiry. There was

no seconder to the motion, and it fell to the ground; for the whole

House, including the Whigs, sat, as it were, thunderstruck. But the

effect was deep and lasting, and in time did not fail of its end.

For the present, however, things went smoothly enough. The king

informed the House--through Sir Dudley North, the brother of the Lord

Keeper Guildford, and the person who had been elected Sheriff of

London by the influence of Charles for his ready and ingenious modes

of serving the royal will--that his late brother had left considerable

debts, and that the naval and ordnance stores were getting low. The

House promptly agreed to lay on new taxes and North induced them to tax

sugar and tobacco, so that the king now had a revenue of one million

nine hundred thousand pounds from England, besides his pension from

France, and was strong in revenue.

The Lords were employed in doing an act of justice in calling before

them Lord Danby, and rescinding the impeachment still hanging over

his head, and also summoning to their bar Lords Powis, Arundel, and

Bellasis, the victims of the Popish plot, and fully discharging them

as well as the Earl of Tyrone. They also introduced a Bill reversing

the attainder of Lord Stafford, who had been executed for treason and

concern in the Popish plot, now admitting that he had been unjustly

sacrificed through the perjury of Oates. The Commons were proceeding

to the third reading of this Bill, when the rebellion of Monmouth

was announced, and the question remained unsettled till the trial of

Warren Hastings more than a century afterwards, when men of all parties

declared that Oates's Popish plot was a fiction, and the attainder of

Stafford was then formally reversed.

The political refugees who had fled to Holland and sought protection

from Prince William were numerous, and some of them of considerable

distinction. Monmouth and the Earl of Argyll were severally looked

up to as the heads of the English and Scottish exiles. The furious

persecution against the Covenanters in Scotland and the Whigs in

England had not only swelled these bands of refugees, but rendered

them at once ardent for revenge and restoration. Amongst them Ford;

Lord Grey of Wark; Ferguson, who had been conspicuous among the Whig

plotters; Wildman and Danvers, of the same party; Ayloffe and Wade,

Whig lawyers and plotters; Goodenough, formerly Sheriff of London, who

gave evidence against the Papists; Rumbold, the Rye House maltster,

and others, were incessantly endeavouring to excite Monmouth to avail

himself of his popularity, and the hatred of Popery which existed, to

rebel against his uncle and strike for the crown. Monmouth, however,

for some time betrayed no desire for so hazardous an undertaking.

On the death of Charles he had returned from the Hague, to avoid

giving cause of jealousy to James, and led the life of an English

gentleman at Brussels. William of Orange strongly advised him to take

a command in the war of Austria against the Turks, where he might

win honour and a rank worthy of his birth; but Monmouth would not

listen to it. He had left his wife, the great heiress of Buccleuch,

to whom he had been married almost as a boy from royal policy, and

had attached himself to Lady Henrietta Wentworth, Baroness Wentworth

of Nettlestede. The attachment, though illicit, appeared to be mutual

and ardent. Monmouth confessed that Lady Henrietta, who was beautiful,

amiable, and accomplished, had weaned him from a vicious life, and had

their connection been lawful, nothing could have been more fortunate

for Monmouth. In her society he seemed to have grown indifferent to

ambition and the life of courts. But he was beset by both Grey and

Ferguson, and, unfortunately for him, they won over Lady Wentworth to

their views. She encouraged Monmouth, and offered him her income and

her jewels to furnish him with immediate funds. With such an advocate,

Grey and Ferguson at length succeeded. Grey was a man of blemished

character. He had run off with his wife's sister, a daughter of the

Earl of Berkeley, and was a poor and desperate adventurer, notoriously

cowardly on the field of battle. Ferguson was a fiery demagogue and

zealot of insurrection. He had been a preacher and schoolmaster amongst

the Dissenters, then a clergyman of the Church, and finally had become

a most untiring intriguer, and was deep in the Rye House Plot. Under

all this fire of rebellion, however, there was more than a suspected

foul smoke of espionage. He was shrewdly believed, though not by his

dupes, to be in the pay of Government, and employed to betray its

enemies to ruin.

Monmouth having consented to take the lead in an invasion, though with

much reluctance and many misgivings, a communication was opened with

Argyll and the Scottish malcontents. We have seen that Argyll, after

his father had been inveigled from his mountains and beheaded, had

himself nearly suffered the same fate from James when in Scotland.

He had been imprisoned and condemned to death on the most arbitrary

grounds, and had only managed to escape in disguise. He had purchased

an estate at Leeuwarden, in Friesland, where the great Mac Cailean

More, as he was called by the Highlanders, lived in much seclusion.

He was now drawn from it once more to revisit his native country at

the head of an invading force. But the views of the refugees were so

different, and their means so small, that it was some time before

they could agree upon a common plan of action. It was at length

arranged that a descent should be made simultaneously on Scotland and

England--the Scottish expedition headed by Argyll, that on England by

Monmouth. But to maintain a correspondence and a sort of unison, two

Englishmen, Ayloffe and Rumbold the maltster, were to accompany the

Scots, and two Scotsmen, Fletcher of Saltoun and Ferguson, the English

force. Monmouth was sworn not to claim any rank or reward on the

success of the enterprise, except such as should be awarded him by a

free Parliament; and Argyll was compelled, although he had the nominal

command of the army, to submit to hold it only as one of a committee of

twelve, of whom Sir Patrick Hume of Polwarth was to be president.

In fact, Argyll at the outset displayed a fatal want of knowledge

of human nature or firmness of resolution, in consenting to accept

a command on so impossible a basis. To expect success as a military

leader when hampered with the conflicting opinions of a dozen men of

ultra views in religion and politics, and of domineering wills, was the

height of folly. Hume, who took the lead in the committee, was a man of

enormous conceit, a great talker, and a very dilatory actor. Next to

him was Sir John Cochrane, the second son of Lord Dundonald, who was

almost equally self-willed and jealous of the power of Argyll. With

their Republican notions, they endeavoured to impose such restrictions

on the power of the earl as were certain to insure the ruin of the

attempt, in which everything must depend on the independent action of a

single mind.

We have already noticed the character of Ferguson, one of the twain

selected to accompany Monmouth. Fletcher of Saltoun, the other, was

a far different man--a man of high talent, fine taste, and finished

education. At the head of a popular senate he would have shone as an

orator and statesman; but he had those qualities of lofty pride and

headstrong will which made him by no means a desirable officer in

an army of adventurers, although his military skill was undoubted.

What was worse, from the very first he foreboded no good result from

the expedition, and accompanied it only because he would not seem to

desert his more sanguine countrymen. When Wildman and Danvers sent from

London flaming accounts of the ripeness of England for revolt, and

said that just two hundred years before the Earl of Richmond landed in

England with a mere handful of men, and wrested the Crown from Richard,

Fletcher coolly replied that there was all the difference between the

fifteenth century and the seventeenth.

These men, Wildman and Danvers, represented the country as so prepared

to receive Monmouth, that he had only to show his standard for whole

counties to flock to it. They promised also six thousand pounds in

aid of the preparations. But the fact was that little or no money

came, and James and his ministers were duly informed of the measures

of the insurgents, and were at once using every means with the Dutch

Government to prevent the sailing of the armaments, and taking steps

for the defence of the Scottish and English coasts. We may first

follow the fortunes of Argyll and his associates, who sailed first.

He put out from the coast of Holland on the 2nd of May, and after a

prosperous voyage, sighted Kirkwall, in Orkney, on the 6th. There he

very unwisely anchored, and suffered two followers to go on shore to

collect intelligence. The object of his armament then became known, and

was sure to reach the English Government in a little time. The Bishop

of Orkney boldly ordered the two insurgents to be secured, and refused

to give them up. After three days lost in endeavouring to obtain their

release, they seized some gentlemen living on the coast, and offered

them in exchange. The bishop paid no regard to their proposal or their

menaces, and they were compelled to pursue their voyage.

The consequence of this ill-advised measure was that news of the

armament was sent to Edinburgh with all speed, and whilst the invading

force was beating round the northern capes and headlands, active

preparations were made for defence. The whole of the militia, amounting

to twenty thousand men, were called out; a third of these, accompanied

by three thousand regulars, were marched into the western counties.

At Dunstaffnage, Argyll sent his son Charles ashore to summon the

Campbells to arms, but he returned with the report that many of the

chiefs had fled or were in prison, and the rest afraid to move. At

Campbelltown, in Kintyre, Argyll published a proclamation, setting

forth that he came to suppress Popery, prelacy, and Erastianism, and

to take the crown from James, whom he accused of persecution of the

Covenanters, and the poisoning of his brother. He sent across the hills

the fiery cross to summon all true men to his standard, and appointed

Tarbert as the place of rendezvous. About eighteen hundred men mustered

at the call, but any advantage to be derived from this handful of men

was far more than counterbalanced by the pertinacious interference of

Cochrane and Hume. They insisted on arranging everything, even the

appointment of the officers over Argyll's own clan. They insisted also

that the attack should be directed against the Lowlands, though Argyll

wisely saw that they had no chance whatever in the open country with

their present force. He contended that having first cleared the Western

Highlands of the national soldiery, they should soon have five or six

thousand Highlanders at their command, and might then descend on the

Lowlands with effect. Rumbold advocated this prudential course, but all

reasoning was lost on Hume and Cochrane, who insolently accused Argyll

of wanting only to secure his own territories, and sailed away with

part of the troops to the Lowlands. They found the coast, however, well

guarded by the English ships, and escaped up the Clyde to Greenock.

There they again quarrelled between themselves, and finding the people

not at all disposed to join them, they returned to Argyll. But they

had learned no wisdom: the earl again proposed to endeavour to secure

Inverary--they as firmly opposed it. They, therefore, fixed on the

castle of Ealan Ghierig as their present headquarters, landed their

arms and stores, and made an officer named Elphinstone commander of

the fort. Argyll and Rumbold now drove back the troops of Athol, and

prepared to march on Inverary; but from this they were diverted by a

call from Hume and Cochrane at the ships, who were about to be attacked

by the English fleet. Argyll hastened to them, and proposed to give

fight to the English, but was again prevented by these infatuated men.

The earl, therefore, in utter despair, passed into Dumbartonshire,

and was the very next day followed by the news of the capture of all

his ships, and the flight of Elphinstone from Ealan Ghierig, without

striking a blow. As a last desperate attempt, Argyll proposed to

make a rush on Glasgow and secure a strong footing there; but the

very men who had so strongly urged the attempt on the Lowlands now

deserted him in numbers, and on the march nothing but disasters from

the insubordination of the little army ensued. They were attacked on

all sides by the militia, and when the earl and Ayloffe advised a bold

attack on the enemy, Hume and his partisans protested against it. The

end of all was that, becoming involved amongst morasses, the army was

seized with panic, and rapidly melted away. The wrong-headed Hume

escaped, and reached the Continent; Cochrane was taken, and soon after

Rumbold, Major Fullerton, and Argyll himself were seized.

[Illustration: THE LAST SLEEP OF ARGYLL. (_See p._ 297.)

(_From the Fresco by E. M. Ward, R.A., in the House of Commons._)]

The conduct of Argyll after his capture was distinguished by a calm

dignity which showed how superior he was to the factious, pugnacious

men who had baffled all his plans. With his arms pinioned behind him,

he was led bareheaded through the streets of Edinburgh, from Holyrood

to the castle. The Royalists thus revelled in revenging on the son the

act of his father thirty-five years before, when he caused Montrose to

be conducted over the very same ground. The headsman marched before him

with his axe, and on reaching his cell in the castle Argyll was put

into irons, and informed that his execution would quickly follow. This

was the 20th of June; his execution did not take place till the 30th.

During the ten days the orders of James were that he should be tried

all ways to compel him to confess the full particulars of the invasion,

its originators, supporters, and participators. It was understood that

James meant that his favourite application of the boots and thumbscrews

should be used, but this was not attempted. Argyll was menaced, but

his firm refusal to reveal anything that would incriminate others,

convinced his enemies that it was useless, and could only cover them

with odium. The last day of his life he lay down to rest, ere the hour

of his execution should arrive. During his sleep, a renegade Privy

Councillor insisted on entering his cell. The door was gently opened,

and there lay the great Argyll in heavy chains and sleeping the happy

sleep of infancy. The beholder turned and fled, sick at heart. His

former sentence of death was deemed sufficient to supersede any fresh

trial, and being brought out to the scaffold, and saying that he died

in peace with all men, one of the Episcopalian clergymen stepped to

the edge of the scaffold and exclaimed to the people, "My lord dies a

Protestant." "Yes," said the earl, also going forward, "a Protestant,

and cordial hater of Popery, prelacy, and all superstition." His head

was fixed on the top of the Tolbooth, where that of Montrose had

formerly stood.

On the 30th of May, nearly a month after the sailing of Argyll,

Monmouth left the Texel. His squadron consisted of a frigate of

thirty-two guns, called the _Helderenbergh_, and three small tenders,

a fourth tender having been refused by the Dutch. He was attended

by about eighty officers, and a hundred and fifty men of different

degrees, fugitives from England and Scotland. With such a force he

proposed to conquer the crown of England! All the fine promises of

money by Wildman and Danvers had ended in smoke, and he had only been

able, chiefly through the revenues of Lady Henrietta Wentworth, to

supply himself with arms and stores for a small body of cavalry and

infantry. The voyage was long and tedious, the weather was stormy,

and the Channel abounded with the royal cruisers. On the morning of

the 11th of June his little fleet appeared off the port of Lyme, in

Dorsetshire.

Monmouth was extremely popular with the people, and on discovering

that it was their favourite hero come to put down the Popish tyrant,

he was received with loud acclamations. "Monmouth and the Protestant

religion!" was the cry. There was a rush to enlist beneath his banners,

and within four-and-twenty hours he was at the head of fifteen hundred

men. Dare, one of the adventurers, had been put ashore as they came

along the coast to ride across the country and rouse the people of

Taunton, and he now came in at the head of about forty horsemen,

with the news that the people of Somersetshire were in favour of his

cause. But with this arrival came the tidings that the Dorsetshire

and Somersetshire folk were mustering at Bridport to attack them, and

Monmouth ordered Lord Grey, who was the commander of the cavalry,

to march there at once, and disperse them before they had collected

in strength. But here an incident occurred which showed the unruly

materials that he had to work with. Dare had mounted himself on a fine

horse in his expedition to Taunton, and Fletcher of Saltoun, who was

second in command of the cavalry under Grey, without asking leave

of Dare, as superior officer, and being himself badly mounted, took

possession of his horse. Dare refused to let him have it, they came to

high words, Dare shook his whip at Fletcher, and the proud Scot drew

his pistol and shot Dare dead on the spot. This summary proceeding,

which might have passed in the ruder country of Scotland, created a

violent outburst amongst the soldiers of Monmouth. They demanded of

the duke instant execution of the murderer, and it was only by getting

on board the _Helderenbergh_ that Fletcher escaped with his life. He

returned to Holland, and thus was lost to the expedition almost its

only man of any talent and experience.

The next morning Grey, accompanied by Wade, led forth his untrained

cavalry to attack the militia at Bridport. There was a smart brush

with the militia, in which Monmouth's raw soldiers fought bravely, and

would have driven the enemy from the place, but Grey, who was an arrant

coward in the field, turned his horse and fled, never drawing bit till

he reached Lyme. The men were indignant, and Monmouth was confounded

with this conduct of his chief officer; but nevertheless he had not

moral firmness to put some more trusty officer in his place. Four

days after his landing, the 15th of June, Monmouth marched forward to

Axminster, where he encountered Christopher Monk, Duke of Albemarle,

the son of the first General Monk, at the head of four thousand men

of the trained bands. Though daunted at first, Monmouth accepted the

situation, and disposed his men admirably for a fight. He drew up

the main body in battle array on advantageous ground, sent out his

skirmishers to the front, and, as a last precaution, lined the hedges

of a narrow lane, through which Albemarle must pass to come at him,

with musketeers. Monk, however, was too cautious to risk a pitched

battle on these terms--the more especially as his own forces were

untrustworthy. There appeared so much enthusiasm for Monmouth amongst

his troops that, fearing their desertion, he drew back. The result

was that the whole body was speedily thrown into disorder, that panic

seized them, and that they fled pell-mell towards Exeter, flinging away

their arms and uniforms to expedite their escape. Monmouth, however,

probably not aware of the extent of the rout, steadily pursued his

march to Chard, and thence to Taunton, where he arrived on the 18th

of June, just a week after his landing, and was received by the whole

place with the warmest demonstrations of joy.

All this seemed auspicious and encouraging, but it did not satisfy

Monmouth. He knew that, without the adhesion of the army and the

leading gentry, he should never make his way to the crown. Their

adhesion had been promised him, but where were they? Not a regiment had

given a sign of being ready to join him. Lords Macclesfield, Brandon,

Delamere, and other Whig noblemen--who, he had been assured, would

instantly fly to his standard--lay all still. Trenchard of Taunton, who

had promised to join him, unlike his townsmen, fled at his approach,

and made his way into Holland, to the Prince of Orange. Wildman, who

had promised such wonders of county support and of money, did not

appear. On the contrary, the nobility and gentry from all parts of the

country, with the clergy, were pouring in addresses of attachment and

support to James. Parliament, both Lords and Commons, displayed the

same spirit.

The common people might believe that the son of Lucy Walters was

legitimate, but the educated classes knew better, and that Monmouth

could never be king. Parliament, therefore, at once voted James four

hundred thousand pounds for present necessities, and laid new taxes

for five years on foreign silks, linen, and spirits. They ordered

Monmouth's declaration to be burnt by the hangman, and rapidly passed

against him a Bill of Attainder, setting a reward of five thousand

pounds on his head. They were ready to go farther, and the Commons

actually passed a Bill for the preservation of the king's person and

government, making it high treason to say that Monmouth was legitimate,

or to make any motion in Parliament to alter the succession. But James,

knowing the uselessness of any such Act, adjourned Parliament without

waiting for the Act passing the Lords, and dismissed the nobles and

gentry to defend his interests in their different localities. He took

care, however, to revive the censorship of the press, which had expired

in 1679.

When Monmouth, with consternation, noted these adverse circumstances,

Ferguson was ready with a reason. It was that Monmouth had committed

a capital error in not taking the title of king. The style and title

of king, he asserted, carried a wonderful weight with the English.

But of this right he had deprived himself by abjuring this title and

leaving it entirely to James. The majority would fight for the man

who was in possession of the royal name, but for whom were they to

fight who fought for Monmouth? Nobody could tell, and the result must

be discouragement. Grey seconded Ferguson: Wade and the Republicans

opposed the scheme. But probably Monmouth was only too willing to be

persuaded, and, accordingly, on the 20th of June, he was proclaimed in

the market-place of Taunton. As the names of both rivals were James,

and James II. would continue to mean James who now had that title,

Monmouth was styled King Monmouth. Immediately on taking this step,

Monmouth issued four proclamations. Following the example of James,

he set a price on the head of James, late Duke of York; declared the

Parliament sitting at Westminster an unlawful assembly, and ordered

it to disperse; forbade the people to pay taxes to the usurper; and

proclaimed Albemarle a traitor, unless he forthwith repaired to the

standard of King Monmouth, where he would be cordially received.

Almost every part of this proceeding was a gross political blunder.

By assuming the royal title he lost nearly everything, and gained

nothing. He offended the Republican party, and divided the allegiance

of his little army, some of the most energetic of whose officers, as

Wade and others, were of that political faith. He offended that great

Protestant party which was looking forward to the Protestant succession

of William of Orange and the Princess Mary, and in case of their want

of issue to the Princess Anne. He cut off all retreat to Holland in

case of failure, and all hope of mercy from James if he fell into his

hands. By pledging himself on landing not to aspire to the crown, and

thus immediately breaking his pledge, he inspired the thinking portion

of the people with deep distrust, as inducing the same disregard of

his word as had been so long conspicuous in the Stuarts. With all the

influential Protestants who might have joined him, so soon as events

gave hope of success, considering him the champion of a Protestant

succession, he had placed himself in a hopeless position, because that

succession could only come through a legitimate issue. By denouncing

the Parliament that body became his mortal foes. The only party from

which he could now expect any support was the people, and without

means, without leaders, without military training, the result could

only be failure, utter and fearful.

And despite the persuasions of Ferguson, the melancholy truth seemed

already to stare the unhappy Monmouth in the face. He received a secret

answer from Albemarle, addressed to James Scott, late Duke of Monmouth,

telling him that he knew who was his lawful king, and that he had

better have let rebellion alone. As he rode out of Taunton on the 22nd

of June towards Bridgewater, it was remarked that he looked gloomy and

dejected; the very people who crowded in the road to greet him with

huzzas, could not help remarking how different was the expression of

his countenance to what it had been in his gay procession there five

years before. The only man who seemed elated with anticipation of

triumph was Ferguson, and if, as is suspected to have been the case, he

were playing the traitor to the unfortunate Monmouth, he might now well

grow confident of his diabolical success.

[Illustration: THE CROSS, BRIDGEWATER, WHERE MONMOUTH WAS PROCLAIMED

KING.]

On reaching Bridgewater, where there existed a strong Whig body,

Monmouth was again well received. The mayor and aldermen in their robes

welcomed him, and preceded him in procession to the Cross, where they

proclaimed him king. He took up his abode in the castle, encamped his

army on the castle field, and crowds rushed to enlist in his service.

His army already amounted to six thousand men, and might soon have

been doubled or trebled; but his scanty supply of arms and equipments

was already exhausted. He had no money, and men without weapons were

useless. Numbers of them endeavoured to arm themselves, mob-fashion,

with scythes, pitchforks, and other implements of husbandry and of

mining.

Meanwhile, troops were drawing from all quarters, and preparing to

overwhelm the invaders. Lord Feversham and Churchill, afterwards

Marlborough, were ordered to march with strong bodies of troops to the

West. Churchill was already arrived, and Feversham rapidly approaching.

The militias of Sussex and Oxfordshire were drawing that way, followed

by bodies of volunteer gownsmen from Oxford. To prevent any of the Whig

party from affording Monmouth aid, they and the Nonconformists were

closely watched, and many seized and imprisoned.

From Bridgewater Monmouth advanced to Glastonbury, and thence to Wells

and Shepton Mallet. He appeared to have no precise object, but to seek

reinforcements; from Shepton Mallet he directed his march on Bristol,

which was only defended by the Duke of Beaufort and the muster of his

tenantry. Bristol, once gained, would give them a strong position,

and afford large supplies of money, stores, and arms. But Churchill

harassed his rear on the march, and to reach the Gloucestershire

side of the town, which was easiest of assault it was necessary to

march round by Keynsham Bridge, which was partly destroyed. Men were

despatched to repair it, and Monmouth following, on the 24th of June

was at Ponsford, within five miles of the city. On reaching Keynsham

Bridge, it was found to be repaired, but they were there encountered

by a body of Life Guards under Colonel Oglethorpe, and Bristol having

received reinforcements, the attack on it was abandoned. It was

then proposed to get across the Severn and march for Shropshire and

Cheshire, where he had been enthusiastically received in his progress;

but the plan was not deemed practicable, and he advanced to Bath, which

was too strongly garrisoned to make any impression upon. On the 26th

they halted at Philip's Norton.

Feversham was now at their heels, and attacked them, the charge being

led by the Duke of Grafton--the son of Charles and the Duchess of

Cleveland--who fought bravely, but was repulsed. Monmouth, however,

took advantage of the night to steal away to Frome, which was well

affected to his cause, but had been just visited and disarmed by the

Earl of Pembroke with the Wiltshire militia. The night march thither

had been through torrents of rain and muddy roads; Frome could afford

neither assistance nor protection; and, to add to his disappointment,

here news reached him of the total failure of Argyll's expedition into

Scotland, and that Feversham was now joined by his artillery and was in

pursuit of him. Under these disastrous circumstances, and not a man of

note, not a regiment of regulars or militia (as had been so liberally

promised him by Wildman and Danvers) having come over to him, Monmouth

bitterly cursed his folly in having listened to them, and resolved

to ride off with his chief adherents, and get back to the Continent

and his beloved Lady Wentworth. But from this ignominious idea he was

dissuaded by Lord Grey, and they retreated again towards Bridgewater,

where a report represented fresh assembling of armed peasantry. They

reached that town on the 2nd of July, and, whilst throwing up trenches

for defence, on the 5th Feversham arrived with about five thousand

men, and pitched his tents on Sedgemoor, about three miles from the

town. Feversham himself, with the cavalry at Weston Zoyland, and the

Earl of Pembroke with the Wiltshire militia, about fifteen hundred in

number, camped at the village of Middlezoy. Monmouth and his officers

ascended the tower of the church and beheld the disposition of the

enemy. Sedgemoor had formerly been a vast marsh, where Alfred, in his

time, had sought a retreat from the triumphant Danes, and it was now

intersected by several deep ditches, as most fen lands are, behind

which the royal army lay. Near Chedzoy were some regiments of infantry

which Monmouth had formerly commanded at Bothwell Bridge.

It was reported that the soldiers were left, by the reckless

incapacity of the general, to drink cider and preserve little watch;

and Monmouth, who saw that they lay in a very unconnected condition,

conceived that by a skilful night attack he could easily surprise

them. The gormandising incapacity of Louis Duras, now Lord Feversham,

a foreigner who had been advanced by Charles II., was notorious, and

the transcendent military talents of Churchill, who was in subordinate

command, were yet little known. Preparations were therefore instantly

made for the surprise. Scouts were sent out to reconnoitre the ground,

who reported that two deep ditches full of mud and water lay between

them and the hostile camp, which would have to be passed. At eleven

o'clock at night the troops, with "Soho" for their watchword, marched

out of Bridgewater in profound silence, taking a circuitous route,

which would make the march about six miles. It was a moonlight night,

but the moor lay enveloped in a thick fog, and about one in the

morning the troops of Monmouth approached the royal camp. Their guides

conducted the soldiers by a causeway over each of the two ditches, and

Monmouth drew up his men for the attack, but by accident a pistol went

off; the sentinels of the division of the army--the Foot Guards--which

lay in front of them, were alarmed, and, listening, became aware of the

trampling of the rebels as they were forming in rank. They fired their

carbines and flew to rouse the camp. There was an instant galloping

and running in all directions. Feversham and the chief officers were

aroused, and drums beat to arms, and the men ran to get into rank. No

time was to be lost, and Monmouth ordered Grey to dash forward with

the cavalry, but he was suddenly brought to a halt by a third dyke, of

which they had no information. The Foot Guards on the other side of the

dyke demanded who was there, and on the cry of "King Monmouth!" they

discharged a volley of musketry with such effect, that the untrained

horses of Grey's cavalry became at once unmanageable; the men, thrown

into confusion, were seized with panic and fled wherever they could

find a way or their horses chose to carry them. Grey, as usual, was

in the van of the fugitives. But, on the other hand, Monmouth came now

rushing forward with his infantry, and, in his turn, finding himself

stopped by the muddy dyke, he fired across it at the enemy, and a

fierce fight took place, which was maintained for three-quarters of an

hour. Nothing could be more brave and determined than Monmouth and his

peasant soldiers. But day was now breaking, the cavalry of Feversham,

and the infantry of Churchill, were bearing down on their flanks from

different quarters, and Monmouth, then seeing that his defeat was

inevitable, forgot the hero and rode off to save his life, leaving

his brave, misguided followers to their fate. If anything could have

added to the base ignominy of Monmouth's desertion of his adherents,

it was the undaunted courage which they showed even when abandoned.

They stood boldly to their charge; they cut down the horsemen with

their scythes, or knocked them from their saddles with the butt end

of their guns; they repulsed the vigorous attack of Oglethorpe, and

left Sarsfield for dead on the field. But, unfortunately, their powder

failed, and they cried out for fresh supplies in vain. The men with

the ammunition waggons had followed the flight of the cavalry, and

driven far away from the field. Still the brave peasantry and soldiers

fought desperately with their scythes and gunstocks, till the cannon

was brought to bear on them, and mowed them down in heaps. As they

began to give way the royal cavalry charged upon them from the flank,

the infantry poured across the ditch, the stout men, worthy of a better

fate and leader, were overwhelmed and broke, but not before a thousand

of them lay dead on the moor, or before they had killed or wounded more

than three hundred of the king's troops.

The unfortunate rebels were pursued with fury, and hunted through

the day out of the neighbouring villages, whither they had flown for

concealment. The road towards Bridgewater was crowded with flying

men and infuriated troopers following and cutting them down. Many of

those who rushed frantically into the streets of Bridgewater fell and

died there of their wounds, for the soldiers, who were treated by the

farmers to hogsheads of cider, were drunk with drinking, with blood

and fury. A vast number of prisoners were secured, for they were a

profitable article of merchandise in the Plantations; five hundred

were crowded into the single church of Weston Zoyland, and the battle

and pursuit being over, the conqueror commenced that exhibition of

vengeance which was always so dear to James. Gibbets were erected by

the wayside, leading from the battle-field to Bridgewater, and no less

than twenty of the prisoners were hanging on them. The peasantry were

compelled to bury the slain, and those most suspected of favouring the

rebels were set to quarter the victims who were to be suspended in

chains. Meanwhile Monmouth, Grey, and Buyse, the Brandenburger, were

flying for their lives. They took the north road, hoping to escape

into Wales. At Chedzoy Monmouth drew up a moment to hide his George

and procure a fresh horse. From the summit of a hill they turned and

saw the final defeat and slaughter of their deluded followers. They

pushed forward for the Mendip Hills, and then directed their course

towards the New Forest, hoping to obtain some vessel on that coast to

convey them to the Continent. On Cranborne Chase their horses were

completely exhausted; they therefore turned them loose, hid their

saddles and bridles, and proceeded on foot. But the news of the defeat

of the rebels had travelled as fast as they, and in the neighbourhood

of Ringwood and Poole parties of cavalry were out scouring the country,

in hopes of the reward of five thousand pounds for Monmouth. Lord

Lumley and Sir William Portman, the commanders, agreed to divide the

sum among their parties if successful, and early on the morning of the

7th, Grey and the guide were taken at the junction of the two cross

roads. This gave proof that the more important prize was not far off.

The officers enclosed a wide circle of land, within which they imagined

Monmouth and Buyse must yet be concealed; and at five the next morning

the Brandenburger was discovered. He confessed that he had parted

from Monmouth only four hours before, and the search was renewed with

redoubled eagerness. The place was a network of small enclosures,

partly cultivated and covered with growing crops of pease, beans, and

corn, partly overrun with fern and brambles. The crops and thickets

were trodden and beaten down systematically in the search, and at seven

o'clock Monmouth himself was discovered in a ditch covered with fern.

[Illustration: "AFTER SEDGEMOOR."

FROM THE PAINTING BY W. RAINEY, R.I.]

Monmouth, though mild and agreeable in his manners, had never displayed

any high moral qualities. Indeed, if we bear in mind the frivolous and

debauched character of the Court in which he had grown up, whether it

were the Court of the exile or of the restored king, it would have

been wonderful if he had. He was handsome, gay, good-natured, but

dissolute and unprincipled. He was ready to conspire against his

father or his uncle, to profess the utmost contrition when defeated,

and to forget it as soon as forgiven. He has been properly described

as the Absalom of modern times. If he merely deserted his miserable

followers on the battle-field, he now more meanly deserted his own

dignity. He continued, from the moment of his capture to that when he

ascended the scaffold, prostrating himself in the dust of abasement,

and begging for his life in the most unmanly terms. He wrote to James

instantly from Ringwood, so that his humble and agonised entreaties

for forgiveness would arrive with the news of his arrest. James

admitted the crawling supplicant to the desired interview, but it was

in the hope of the promised word of wondrous revelation, not with any

intention of pardoning him. He got him to sign a declaration that

his father had assured him that he was never married to his mother,

and then coolly told him that his crime was of too grave a dye to be

forgiven. The queen, who was the only person present besides James

and the two Secretaries of State, Sunderland and Middleton, is said

to have insulted him in a most merciless and unwomanly manner. When,

therefore, Monmouth saw that nothing but his death would satisfy the

king and queen, he appeared to resume his courage and fortitude, and

rising with an air of dignity, he was taken away. But his apparent

firmness lasted only till he was out of their presence. On his way to

the Tower he entreated Lord Dartmouth to intercede for him--"I know,

my lord," he said, "that you loved my father; for his sake, for God's

sake, endeavour to obtain mercy for me." But Dartmouth replied that

there could be no pardon for one who had assumed the royal title.

Grey displayed a much more manly behaviour. In the presence of the

king he admitted his guilt, but did not even ask forgiveness. As

Monmouth was under attainder, no trial was deemed necessary, and it

was determined that he should be executed on Wednesday morning, the

next day but one. On the fatal morning of the 15th he was visited by

Dr. Tenison, afterwards archbishop, who discoursed with him, but not

very profitably, on the errors of his ways. Before setting out for

the scaffold, his wife and children came to take leave of him. Lady

Monmouth was deeply moved; Monmouth himself spoke kindly to her, but

was cold and passionless. When the hour arrived, he went to execution

with the same courage that he had always gone into battle. He was no

more the cringing, weeping supplicant, but a man who had made up his

mind to die. A disgusting scene of butchery followed, owing to the

nervousness of the executioner. The populace were so enraged at the

man's clumsiness, that they would have torn him to pieces if they could

have got at him. Many rushed forward to dip their handkerchiefs in

Monmouth's blood, and the barbarous circumstances of his execution and

the unfeeling persecution of the prelates, did not a little to restore

his fame as a martyr to liberty and Protestantism.

Whilst these things were going on in London, the unfortunate people

in the West were suffering a dreadful penalty for their adherence to

Monmouth. Feversham was called to town, and covered with honours and

rewards, though it was notorious that he had done nothing towards

the victory. Buckingham even declared that he had won the battle of

Sedgemoor in bed. In his place was left one of the most ferocious and

unprincipled monsters that ever disgraced the name of soldier. This was

Colonel Kirke, who had been governor of Tangier until it was abandoned,

and now practised the cruelties that he had learned in his unrestrained

command there. In that Settlement, left to do his licentious will on

those in his power, he acquired a name for arbitrary, oppressive, and

dissolute conduct, which in ordinary times would have insured his

death. He now commanded the demoralised soldiers that he had brought

back with him, and who, whilst they were capable of every atrocity,

were called "Kirke's lambs," because, as a Christian regiment sent

against the heathen, they bore on their banner the desecrated sign of

the Lamb. His debauched myrmidons were let loose on the inhabitants

of Somersetshire, and such as they could not extort money from, they

accused on the evidence of the most abandoned miscreants, and hanged

and quartered, boiling the quarters in pitch, to make them longer

endure the weather on their gibbets. The most horrible traditions

still remain of Kirke and his lambs. He and his officers are said to

have caused the unhappy wretches brought in, who were not able to

pay a heavy ransom, to be hanged on the sign-post of the inn where

they messed, and to have caused the drums to beat as they were in the

agonies of death, saying they would give them music to their dancing.

To prolong their sufferings, Kirke would occasionally have them cut

down alive, and then hung up again; and such numbers were quartered,

that the miserable peasants compelled to do that revolting work, were

said to stand ankle deep in blood. All this was duly reported to the

king in London, who directed Lord Sunderland to assure Kirke that

"he was very well satisfied with his proceedings." It was asserted in

London that in the single week following the battle, Kirke butchered a

hundred of his victims, besides pocketing large sums for the ransom of

others, yet he declared that he had not gone to the lengths to which

he was ordered. On the 10th of August he was sent for to Court, to

state personally the condition of the West, James being apprehensive

that he had let the rich delinquents escape for money, and the system

of butchery was left to Colonel Trelawny, who continued it without

intermission, soldiers pillaging the wretched inhabitants, or dragging

them away to execution under the forms of martial law. But a still

more sweeping and systematic slaughter was speedily initiated under a

different class of exterminators--butchers in ermine.

[Illustration: MONMOUTH'S INTERVIEW WITH THE KING. (_See p._ 303.)]

Lord Chief Justice Jeffreys, the most diabolical judge that ever sat on

the bench--now rendered furious by nightly debauch and daily commission

of cruelties; in his revels hugging in mawkish and disgusting fondness

his brutal companions; in his discharge of his judicial duties passing

the most barbarous sentences in the most blackguard and vituperative

language; in whose blazing eye, distorted visage, and bellowing voice

raged the unmitigated fiend,--was sent forth by his delighted master

to consummate his vengeance on the unhappy people whom the soldiers

had left alive and cooped up in prison. He was already created Baron

of Wem, dubbed by the people Earl of Flint, and, the Lord Keeper just

now dying, he was promised the Great Seal if he shed blood enough to

satisfy his ruthless king. Four other judges were associated with him,

rather for form than for anything else, for Jeffreys was the hardened,

daring, and unscrupulous instrument on whom James confidently relied.

Jeffreys' Bloody Assize, as it was then and always has been termed,

both from its wholesale slaughter and from the troops which accompanied

him throughout the circuit--a name constantly used by the unfeeling

king himself--was opened at Winchester on the 27th of August, and

commenced with a case of hitherto unexampled ruthlessness. Mrs. Alice

Lisle--or, as she was generally called, Lady Alice, her husband,

one of the judges of Charles I., having been created a lord by

Cromwell--was now an infirm and aged woman, deaf and lethargic. Her

husband had been murdered, as we have related, by the Royalists, as

he was entering the church at Lausanne. Lady Alice was known far and

wide for her benevolence. Though her husband was on the other side, she

had always shown active kindness to the followers of the king during

the Civil War, and on this account, after her husband's death, his

estate had been granted to her. During the rebellion of Monmouth her

son had served in the king's army against the invader; yet this poor

old lady was now accused of having given a night's shelter to Hicks,

a Nonconformist minister, and Nelthorpe, a lawyer, outlawed for his

concern in the Rye House Plot. They were fugitives from Sedgemoor,

and the law of treason was that he who harbours a traitor is liable

to death, the punishment of a traitor. Mrs. Lisle had no counsel, and

pleaded that though she knew that Hicks was a Presbyterian minister,

she did not know that he and Nelthorpe were concerned in the rebellion,

and there was no direct proof of the fact.

Jeffreys terrified the witnesses, and then came the turn of the jury.

They retired to consult, but not coming to a speedy conclusion, for

they were afraid of the judge, and yet loth to condemn the prisoner,

Jeffreys sent them word that if they did not agree he would lock them

up all night. They then came into court and expressed their doubts of

Mrs. Lisle knowing that Hicks had been with Monmouth. Jeffreys told

them that their doubt was altogether groundless, and sent them back

to agree. Again they returned, unable to get rid of their doubt. Then

Jeffreys thundered against them in his fiercest style, and declared

that were he on the jury, he would have found her guilty had she been

his own mother. At length the jury gave way and brought in a verdict

of guilty. The next morning Jeffreys pronounced sentence upon her amid

a storm of vituperation against the Presbyterians, to whom he supposed

Mrs. Lisle belonged. He ordered her, according to the rigour of the old

law of treason, to be burned alive that very afternoon.

This monstrous sentence thoroughly roused the inhabitants of the

place; and the clergy of the cathedral, the staunchest supporters of

the king's beloved arbitrary power, remonstrated with Jeffreys in such

a manner, that he consented to a respite of five days, in order that

application might be made to the king. The clergy sent a deputation to

James, earnestly interceding for the life of the aged woman, on the

ground of her generous conduct on all occasions to the king's friends.

Ladies of high rank, amongst them the Ladies St. John and Abergavenny,

pleaded tenderly for her life. Feversham, moved by a bribe of a

thousand pounds, joined in the entreaty, but nothing could move that

obdurate heart, and all the favour that James would grant her was that

she should be beheaded instead of burnt. Her execution, accordingly,

took place at Winchester on the 2nd of September, and James II. won

the unenviable notoriety of being the only tyrant in England, however

implacable, who had ever dyed his hands in woman's blood for the

merciful deed of attempting to save the lives of the unfortunate. What

made this case worse was, that neither Hicks nor Nelthorpe had yet been

tried, so that the trial of Mrs. Lisle was altogether illegal, and the

forcing of the jury completed one of the most diabolical instances of

judicial murder on record.

From Winchester Jeffreys proceeded to Dorchester. He came surrounded

by still more troops, and, in fact, rather like a general to take

bloody vengeance, than as a judge to make a just example of the guilty,

mingled with mercy, on account of the ignorance of the offenders. The

ferocious tyrant was rendered more ferocious, from his temper being

exasperated by the agonies of the stone which his drunken habits had

inflicted on him. He had the court hung with scarlet, as if to announce

his sanguinary determination. When the clergyman who preached before

him recommended mercy in his sermon, he was seen to make a horrible

grimace, expressive of his savage disdain of such a sentiment. It was

whilst preparing to judge the three hundred prisoners collected there,

that he received the news of his elevation to the woolsack. He had

received orders from James to make effectual work with the rebels, and

he now adopted a mode of despatching the unhappy wretches in wholesale

style. As it would be a very tedious work to try all that number one by

one, he devised a more expeditious plan. He sent two officers to them

into the prison, offering them mercy or certain death. All who chose

to make confession of their guilt should be treated with clemency,

all who refused should be led to immediate execution. His clemency

amounted to a respite of a day or two--he hanged them all the same.

Writing to Sunderland, Jeffreys said on the 16th of September:--"This

day I began with the rebels, and have despatched ninety-eight." Of the

three hundred, two hundred and ninety-two received sentence of death.

Eighty only were hanged, the rest were, for the most part, sent to the

Plantations as slaves.

From Dorchester he went to Exeter, where two hundred and forty-three

prisoners awaited their doom. He proceeded in the same way, and

condemned the whole body in a batch, and as they saved him much

trouble, he did not hang so many of them. Taunton, the capital of

Somersetshire, the county where the rebellion was the strongest,

presented him with no fewer than a thousand prisoners. Here he

perfectly revelled in his bloody task. The work seemed to have the

effect of brandy or champagne upon him. He grew every day more

exuberant and riotous. He was in such a state of excitement from

morning to night, that many thought him drunk the whole time. He

laughed like a maniac, bellowed, scolded, cut his filthy jokes on

the astounded prisoners, and was more like an exulting demon than a

man. There were two hundred and thirty-three prisoners hanged, drawn,

and quartered in a few days. The whole number hanged in this bloody

campaign has been variously stated at from three to seven hundred.

Probably the medium is the most correct. But so many were hung in

chains, or their jointed quarters and limbs displayed on the highways,

village greens, and in the market-places, that the whole country

was infected with the intolerable stench. Some of their heads were

nailed on the porches of parish churches; the whole district was a

perfect Golgotha. It was in vain that the most distinguished people

endeavoured to check the infuriated judge's rage; he only turned his

evil diatribes on them, and gave them what he called "a lick with the

rough side of his tongue." Because Lord Stowell, a Royalist, complained

of the remorseless butchery of the poor people of his neighbourhood, he

gibbeted a corpse at his park gate.

The fate of the transported prisoners was worse than death itself. They

were eight hundred and forty in number, and were granted as favours

to the courtiers. Jeffreys estimated that they were, on an average,

worth from ten pounds to fifteen pounds apiece to the grantee. They

were not to be shipped to New England or New Jersey, because the

Puritan inhabitants might have a sympathy with them on account of their

religion, and mitigate the hardship of their lot. They were to go to

the West Indies, where they were to be slaves, and not acquire their

freedom for ten years. They were transported in small vessels with all

the horrors of the slave trade. They were crowded so that they had not

room for lying down all at once; were never allowed to go on deck;

and in darkness, starvation, and pestiferous stench, they died daily

in such quantities that the loss of one-fifth of them was calculated

on. The rest reached the Plantations, ghastly, emaciated, and all but

lifeless. Even the innocent school girls, many under ten years of age,

at Taunton, who had gone in procession to present a banner to Monmouth,

at the command of their mistress, were not excused. The queen, who had

never preferred a single prayer to her husband for mercy to the victims

of this unprecedented proscription, was eager to participate in the

profit, and had a hundred sentenced men awarded to her, the profit

on which was calculated at one thousand pounds. Her maids of honour

solicited a share of this blood-money, and had a fine of seven thousand

pounds on these poor girls assigned to them.

The only persons who escaped from this sea of blood were Grey, Sir

John Cochrane, who had been in Argyll's expedition, Storey, who had

been commissary to Monmouth's army, Wade, Goodenough, and Ferguson.

All these owed their escape to money or their secret services in

giving information against their old friends, except Ferguson, who by

some means escaped to the Continent. On the other hand, Bateman, the

surgeon who had bled Oates in Newgate after his scourging, and by his

attentions saved his life, was, for a mere duty of his profession,

arrested, tried, hanged, and quartered.

James now seemed at the summit of his ambition. He had established an

actual reign of terror. The dreadful massacre of the West struck dumb

the most courageous, and this gloomy tyrant gave full play to his love

of cruelty. The Nonconformists were everywhere beset by informers, who

imprisoned, robbed, and abused them at pleasure. They could only meet

for worship in the most obscure places and in the most secret manner.

Their houses were broken into and searched on pretence of discovering

conventicles. Their ministers were seized and thrust into prison.

Baxter was there; Howe was obliged to escape abroad. Never, even in

the time of Laud, had the oppression been so universal and crushing.

All spirit of resistance appeared to be quenched in terror. The close

of the year 1685 was long remembered as one of indescribable and

unexampled depression and speechless misery.

James, on the contrary, never was so triumphant. He believed that he

had now struck effectual terror into the country, and might rule at

will. He had increased the army, and openly declared the necessity of

increasing it further. He had in many instances dispensed with the

Test Act in giving many commissions in the army to Catholics, and he

resolved to abolish both that Act and the Habeas Corpus Act. His great

design was to restore the Roman religion to full liberty in England;

he believed that he was able now to accomplish that daring deed.

Parliament was to meet in the beginning of November, and he announced

to his Cabinet his intention to have the Test Act repealed by it,

or, if it refused, to dispense with it by his own authority. This

declaration produced the utmost consternation. Halifax, however, was

the only member who dared to warn him of the consequences, and avowed

that he would be compelled to oppose the measure. James endeavoured to

win him over to his views, but finding it vain, determined to dismiss

him from office. His more prudent Councillors cautioned him against

such an act on the eve of the meeting of Parliament, on the ground

that Halifax possessed great influence, and might head a dangerous

opposition. But James was the last man to see danger ahead, and Halifax

ceased to be President of the Council. The news was received with

astonishment in England, with exultation in Paris, and with discontent

at the Hague.

The dismissal of Halifax produced a great sensation out of doors. The

Opposition gathered new courage. Danby and his party showed themselves

early to coalesce with the adherents of Halifax. The whispered

assurance that Halifax was dismissed for refusing to betray the Test

and Habeas Corpus Acts created general alarm, and even the leading

officers of the army did not hesitate to express their disapprobation.

Just at this crisis, only a week before Parliament would assemble, came

the news of the revocation of the Edict of Nantes by Louis XIV. This

Edict had been issued under the ministry of Richelieu, and had closed

the long and bloody war between Catholic France and its Protestant

subjects. Under certain restrictions the Huguenots were tolerated,

and were contented. But Louis, urged by the Jesuits, had long been

infringing on the conditions of the treaty. He had dismissed all

Huguenots from his service, had forbade them to be admitted to the

profession of the law, and compelled Protestant children to be educated

by Catholics. Now at length he abolished the Edict altogether, by which

the Huguenots were once more at the mercy of dragoons and ruffian

informers and constables. Their ministers were banished, their children

torn from them, and sent to be educated in convents. The unhappy people

seeing nothing but destruction before them, fled out of the kingdom

on all sides. No less than fifty thousand families were said to have

quitted France, some of them of high rank and name, the bulk of them

weavers in silk and stuffs, hatters, and artificers of various kinds.

Many settled in London, where they introduced silk weaving, and where

their descendants yet remain, still bearing their French names, in

Bethnal Green and Spitalfields. Others carried their manufacturing

industry to Saxony, and others emigrated to the Cape as vine growers.

France, by this blind act of bigotry, lost a host of her best citizens,

and had her arts carried to her rivals.

This was a terrible blow to the scheme of James for restoring

Romanism to power in England. The people justly said, if a politic

monarch like Louis could not refrain at such a serious cost from

persecuting Protestants, what was England to expect should Romanism

gain the ascendency here, under a bigoted and narrow-minded king like

James? James himself saw the full extent of the, to him, inopportune

occurrence, and professed to join heartily in the universal outcry of

Europe, not excepting the very Pope himself, and Spain, the land of

Jesuits and inquisitions; for those parties who were suffering from

the aggressions of Louis found it, like James, convenient to make an

outcry. What more irritated James was an address which the French

clergy in a body had presented to Louis, applauding the deed and

declaring that the pious king of England was looking to Louis for his

aid in reducing his heretical subjects. This address was read with

astonishment and terror by the English people, and James hastened to

condemn the revocation of the Edict, and to promote and contribute to

the relief of the refugees who had sought shelter here. This affected

sympathy did not last long.

On the 9th of November James met his Parliament. He congratulated them

on the suppression of the rebellion in the West, but observed that it

had shown how little dependence could be placed on the militia. It

would be necessary to maintain a strong regular force, and that would,

of course, require proportionate funds. He had, he observed, admitted

some officers to commissions who had not taken the test, but they were

such as he could rely on, and he was resolved to continue them there.

On their return to their House the Lords tamely voted him an address

of thanks, but with the Commons a demur on this head arose, and a

delay of three days was voted before considering an address. This was

ominous, and during the interval the ambassadors of Austria and the

Pope advised James not to quarrel with the Parliament. Barillon, on the

contrary, urged him towards the fatality, for which he required little

stimulus. If he quarrelled with his Parliament, he must become Louis's

slave, and leave Austria, Spain, and Italy at his mercy. When the

Parliament resumed the question, the members, both Whigs and Tories,

who were alike opposed to James's projected aggressions, carefully

avoided any irritating topic except that of the army. They took no

notice of the atrocities committed in the west; they did not revert to

the illegal practices by which members in the interest of Government

had been returned, but they skilfully proposed improvements in the

militia, so as to supersede the necessity of a standing army. When the

vote for Supply was proposed, the House carried a motion for bringing

in a Bill for rendering the militia more effective, and on this motion

Seymour of Exeter, a Tory, as well as Sir William Temple, and Sir John

Maynard, who had taken a leading part in the Parliamentary struggle

against Charles I., and was now upwards of eighty years of age, took

part: several officers of the army, including Charles Fox, Paymaster

of the Forces, voted on the popular side of the question. Of course

they were dismissed. But the House now having broken the ice, voted an

address to the king on the subject of maintaining inviolate the Test

Act. When they went into Committee for the Supply, the king demanded

one million two hundred thousand pounds, the House proposed four

hundred thousand pounds. They were afterwards willing to advance the

sum to seven hundred thousand pounds, but the Ministers put the motion

for the original sum to the vote, and were defeated. The next day the

Commons went in procession to Whitehall, with their address regarding

the test. James received them sullenly, and told them that whatever

they pleased to do, he would abide by all his promises. This was saying

that he would violate the Test Act as he had done. On returning to

their House, John Coke of Derby said he hoped they were all Englishmen,

and were not to be frightened from their duty by a few high words. As

the House had been careful to avoid any expressions disrespectful to

the king, they resented this manly but incautious speech, and committed

Coke to the Tower. The Court took courage at this proceeding, but

though the Commons had not all at once recovered their independent

tone, the discontent was strongly fermenting, and though Seymour had

at first in vain called on them to examine the abuses of the franchise

during the last election, they now took up the question, and Sir John

Lowther of Cumberland, another Tory member, headed this movement. The

same spirit in the same day broke out in the Lords. Though they had

voted thanks for the address, Halifax now contended that that was

merely formal, and the Earl of Devonshire, William Cavendish, the bosom

friend of Lord William Russell, and Viscount Mordaunt, afterwards

the celebrated Earl of Peterborough, proposed to consider the king's

speech, and vehemently denounced a standing army. What was still more

significant was, that Compton, the Bishop of London, a Royalist, and

the son of a Royalist--that Earl of Northampton who had fought for

Charles I.,--and who had, moreover, been the educator of the two

princesses, not only spoke for himself, but for the whole bench and

Church, and declared that the constitution, civil and ecclesiastic,

was in danger. Here was a quick end of the doctrine of Non-resistance.

Jeffreys endeavoured to reply to these ominous harangues, but the

bully of the bench, where he had it all his own way, here cut a very

different figure. He was scarified in a style of refined sarcasm,

against which his coarse Billingsgate was worse than harmless; it

recoiled upon his own head, and this brutal monster, cowardly as he was

insolent, sank prostrate before the whole House, and even gave way to a

dastardly flood of tears of shame. James, astonished and enraged, but

not warned by this first breath of the rising tempest, the next morning

hurried to the House of Lords and prorogued Parliament till the 10th of

February; but it never met again, being repeatedly prorogued, till the

national spirit arose which drove him from the throne.

[Illustration: JUDGE JEFFREYS. (_After a Painting by Sir Godfrey

Kneller._)]