I am
unalterably
your good friend, William.
Macaulay
The House of Austria, indeed,
had appealed to arms. But with the House of Austria alone the House of
Bourbon could easily deal. Other powers were still looking in doubt to
England for the signal; and England, though her aspect was sullen and
menacing, still preserved neutrality. That neutrality would not have
lasted so long, if William could have relied on the support of his
Parliament and of his people. In his Parliament there were agents of
France, who, though few, had obtained so much influence by clamouring
against standing armies, profuse grants, and Dutch favourites, that they
were often blindly followed by the majority; and his people, distracted
by domestic factions, unaccustomed to busy themselves about continental
politics, and remembering with bitterness the disasters and burdens of
the last war, the carnage of Landen, the loss of the Smyrna fleet, the
land tax at four shillings in the pound, hesitated about engaging
in another contest, and would probably continue to hesitate while he
continued to live. He could not live long. It had, indeed, often been
prophesied that his death was at hand; and the prophets had hitherto
been mistaken. But there was now no possibility of mistake. His cough
was more violent than ever; his legs were swollen; his eyes, once bright
and clear as those of a falcon, had grown dim; he who, on the day of the
Boyne, had been sixteen hours on the backs of different horses, could
now with great difficulty creep into his state coach. [22] The vigorous
intellect, and the intrepid spirit, remained; but on the body fifty
years had done the work of ninety. In a few months the vaults of
Westminster would receive the emaciated and shattered frame which was
animated by the most far-sighted, the most daring, the most commanding
of souls. In a few months the British throne would be filled by a woman
whose understanding was well known to be feeble, and who was believed to
lean towards the party which was averse from war. To get over those few
months without an open and violent rupture should have been the first
object of the French government. Every engagement should have been
punctually fulfilled; every occasion of quarrel should have been
studiously avoided. Nothing should have been spared which could quiet
the alarms and soothe the wounded pride of neighbouring nations.
The House of Bourbon was so situated that one year of moderation might
not improbably be rewarded by thirty years of undisputed ascendency.
Was it possible the politic and experienced Lewis would at such a
conjuncture offer a new and most galling provocation, not only to
William, whose animosity was already as great as it could be, but to
the people whom William had hitherto been vainly endeavouring to inspire
with animosity resembling his own? How often, since the Revolution of
1688, had it seemed that the English were thoroughly weary of the new
government. And how often had the detection of a Jacobite plot, or the
approach of a French armament, changed the whole face of things. All at
once the grumbling had ceased, the grumblers had crowded to sign loyal
addresses to the usurper, had formed associations in support of his
authority, had appeared in arms at the head of the militia, crying God
save King William. So it would be now. Most of those who had taken a
pleasure in crossing him on the question of his Dutch guards, on the
question of his Irish grants, would be moved to vehement resentment when
they learned that Lewis had, in direct violation of a treaty, determined
to force on England a king of his own religion, a king bred in his own
dominions, a king who would be at Westminster what Philip was at Madrid,
a great feudatory of France.
These arguments were concisely but clearly and strongly urged by Torcy
in a paper which is still extant, and which it is difficult to believe
that his master can have read without great misgivings. [23] On one side
were the faith of treaties, the peace of Europe, the welfare of France,
nay the selfish interest of the House of Bourbon. On the other side were
the influence of an artful woman, and the promptings of vanity which, we
must in candour acknowledge, was ennobled by a mixture of compassion and
chivalrous generosity. The King determined to act in direct opposition
to the advice of all his ablest servants; and the princes of the blood
applauded his decision, as they would have applauded any decision which
he had announced. Nowhere was he regarded with a more timorous, a more
slavish, respect than in his own family.
On the following day he went again to Saint Germains, and, attended by
a splendid retinue, entered James's bedchamber. The dying man scarcely
opened his heavy eyes, and then closed them again. "I have something,"
said Lewis, "of great moment to communicate to Your Majesty. " The
courtiers who filled the room took this as a signal to retire, and were
crowding towards the door, when they were stopped by that commanding
voice: "Let nobody withdraw. I come to tell Your Majesty that, whenever
it shall please God to take you from us, I will be to your son what I
have been to you, and will acknowledge him as King of England, Scotland
and Ireland. " The English exiles who were standing round the couch fell
on their knees. Some burst into tears. Some poured forth praises and
blessings with clamour such as, was scarcely becoming in such a place
and at such a time. Some indistinct murmurs which James uttered, and
which were drowned by the noisy gratitude of his attendants, were
interpreted to mean thanks. But from the most trustworthy accounts it
appears that he was insensible to all that was passing around him. [24]
As soon as Lewis was again at Marli, he repeated to the Court assembled
there the announcement which he had made at Saint Germains. The whole
circle broke forth into exclamations of delight and admiration.
What piety! What humanity! What magnanimity! Nor was this enthusiasm
altogether feigned. For, in the estimation of the greater part of that
brilliant crowd, nations were nothing and princes every thing. What
could be more generous, more amiable, than to protect an innocent boy,
who was kept out of his rightful inheritance by an ambitious kinsman?
The fine gentlemen and fine ladies who talked thus forgot that, besides
the innocent boy and that ambitious kinsman, five millions and a half
of Englishmen were concerned, who were little disposed to consider
themselves as the absolute property of any master, and who were still
less disposed to accept a master chosen for them by the French King.
James lingered three days longer. He was occasionally sensible during a
few minutes, and, during one of these lucid intervals, faintly expressed
his gratitude to Lewis. On the sixteenth he died. His Queen retired
that evening to the nunnery of Chaillot, where she could weep and pray
undisturbed. She left Saint Germains in joyous agitation. A herald
made his appearance before the palace gate, and, with sound of trumpet,
proclaimed, in Latin, French and English, King James the Third of
England and Eighth of Scotland. The streets, in consequence doubtless of
orders from the government, were illuminated; and the townsmen with loud
shouts wished a long reign to their illustrious neighbour. The poor lad
received from his ministers, and delivered back to them, the seals of
their offices, and held out his hand to be kissed. One of the first acts
of his mock reign was to bestow some mock peerages in conformity with
directions which he found in his father's will. Middleton, who had as
yet no English title, was created Earl of Monmouth. Perth, who had stood
high in the favour of his late master, both as an apostate from the
Protestant religion, and as the author of the last improvements on the
thumb screw, took the title of Duke.
Meanwhile the remains of James were escorted, in the dusk of the
evening, by a slender retinue to the Chapel of the English Benedictines
at Paris, and deposited there in the vain hope that, at some future
time, they would be laid with kingly pomp at Westminster among the
graves of the Plantagenets and Tudors.
Three days after these humble obsequies Lewis visited Saint Germains in
form. On the morrow the visit was returned. The French Court was now at
Versailles; and the Pretender was received there, in all points, as his
father would have been, sate in his father's arm chair, took, as his
father had always done, the right hand of the great monarch, and wore
the long violet coloured mantle which was by ancient usage the mourning
garb of the Kings of France. There was on that day a great concourse
of ambassadors and envoys; but one well known figure was wanting.
Manchester had sent off to Loo intelligence of the affront which had
been offered to his country and his master, had solicited instructions,
and had determined that, till these instructions should arrive, he would
live in strict seclusion. He did not think that he should be justified
in quitting his post without express orders; but his earnest hope was
that he should be directed to turn his back in contemptuous defiance on
the Court which had dared to treat England as a subject province.
As soon as the fault into which Lewis had been hurried by pity, by
the desire of applause, and by female influence was complete and
irreparable, he began to feel serious uneasiness. His ministers were
directed to declare everywhere that their master had no intention of
affronting the English government, that he had not violated the Treaty
of Ryswick, that he had no intention of violating it, that he had merely
meant to gratify an unfortunate family nearly related to himself by
using names and observing forms which really meant nothing, and that
he was resolved not to countenance any attempt to subvert the throne
of William. Torcy, who had, a few days before, proved by irrefragable
arguments that his master could not, without a gross breach of contract,
recognise the Pretender, imagined that sophisms which had not imposed on
himself might possibly impose on others. He visited the English embassy,
obtained admittance, and, as was his duty, did his best to excuse the
fatal act which he had done his best to prevent. Manchester's answer to
this attempt at explanation was as strong and plain as it could be in
the absence of precise instructions. The instructions speedily arrived.
The courier who carried the news of the recognition to Loo arrived there
when William was at table with some of his nobles and some princes of
the German Empire who had visited him in his retreat. The King said not
a word; but his pale cheek flushed; and he pulled his hat over his
eyes to conceal the changes of his countenance. He hastened to send off
several messengers. One carried a letter commanding Manchester to quit
France without taking leave. Another started for London with a despatch
which directed the Lords Justices to send Poussin instantly out of
England.
England was already in a flame when it was first known there that
James was dying. Some of his eager partisans formed plans and made
preparations for a great public manifestation of feeling in different
parts of the island. But the insolence of Lewis produced a burst of
public indignation which scarcely any malecontent had the courage to
face.
In the city of London, indeed, some zealots, who had probably swallowed
too many bumpers to their new Sovereign, played one of those senseless
pranks which were characteristic of their party. They dressed themselves
in coats bearing some resemblance to the tabards of heralds, rode
through the streets, halted at some places, and muttered something which
nobody could understand. It was at first supposed that they were merely
a company of prize fighters from Hockley in the Hole who had taken
this way of advertising their performances with back sword, sword and
buckler, and single falchion. But it was soon discovered that these
gaudily dressed horsemen were proclaiming James the Third. In an instant
the pageant was at an end. The mock kings at arms and pursuivants threw
away their finery and fled for their lives in all directions, followed
by yells and showers of stones. [25] Already the Common Council of
London had met, and had voted, without one dissentient voice, an address
expressing the highest resentment at the insult which France had offered
to the King and the kingdom. A few hours after this address had been
presented to the Regents, the Livery assembled to choose a Lord
Mayor. Duncombe, the Tory candidate, lately the popular favourite, was
rejected, and a Whig alderman placed in the chair. All over the kingdom,
corporations, grand juries, meetings of magistrates, meetings of
freeholders, were passing resolutions breathing affection to William,
and defiance to Lewis. It was necessary to enlarge the "London Gazette"
from four columns to twelve; and even twelve were too few to hold the
multitude of loyal and patriotic addresses. In some of those addresses
severe reflections were thrown on the House of Commons. Our deliverer
had been ungratefully requited, thwarted, mortified, denied the means
of making the country respected and feared by neighbouring states. The
factious wrangling, the penny wise economy, of three disgraceful years
had produced the effect which might have been expected. His Majesty
would never have been so grossly affronted abroad, if he had not first
been affronted at home. But the eyes of his people were opened. He had
only to appeal from the representatives to the constituents; and he
would find that the nation was still sound at heart.
Poussin had been directed to offer to the Lords Justices explanations
similar to those with which Torcy had attempted to appease Manchester.
A memorial was accordingly drawn up and presented to Vernon; but Vernon
refused to look at it. Soon a courier arrived from Loo with the letter
in which William directed his vicegerents to send the French agent out
of the kingdom. An officer of the royal household was charged with the
execution of the order. He repaired to Poussin's lodgings; but Poussin
was not at home; he was supping at the Blue Posts, a tavern much
frequented by Jacobites, the very tavern indeed at which Charnock and
his gang had breakfasted on the day fixed for the murderous ambuscade
of Turnham Green. To this house the messenger went; and there he found
Poussin at table with three of the most virulent Tory members of the
House of Commons, Tredenham, who returned himself for Saint Mawes;
Hammond, who had been sent to Parliament by the high churchmen of the
University of Cambridge; and Davenant, who had recently, at Poussin's
suggestion, been rewarded by Lewis for some savage invectives against
the Whigs with a diamond ring worth three thousand pistoles. This supper
party was, during some weeks, the chief topic of conversation. The
exultation of the Whigs was boundless. These then were the true English
patriots, the men who could not endure a foreigner, the men who would
not suffer His Majesty to bestow a moderate reward on the foreigners who
had stormed Athlone, and turned the flank of the Celtic army at Aghrim.
It now appeared they could be on excellent terms with a foreigner,
provided only that he was the emissary of a tyrant hostile to the
liberty, the independence, and the religion of their country. The
Tories, vexed and abashed, heartily wished that, on that unlucky day,
their friends had been supping somewhere else. Even the bronze of
Davenant's forehead was not proof to the general reproach. He defended
himself by pretending that Poussin, with whom he had passed whole days,
who had corrected his scurrilous pamphlets, and who had paid him his
shameful wages, was a stranger to him, and that the meeting at the Blue
Posts was purely accidental. If his word was doubted, he was willing to
repeat his assertion on oath. The public, however, which had formed a
very correct notion of his character, thought that his word was worth as
much as his oath, and that his oath was worth nothing.
Meanwhile the arrival of William was impatiently expected. From Loo
he had gone to Breda, where he had passed some time in reviewing his
troops, and in conferring with Marlborough and Heinsius. He had hoped
to be in England early in October. But adverse winds detained him
three weeks at the Hague. At length, in the afternoon of the fourth of
November, it was known in London that he had landed early that morning
at Margate. Great preparations were made for welcoming him to his
capital on the following day, the thirteenth anniversary of his landing
in Devonshire. But a journey across the bridge, and along Cornhill and
Cheapside, Fleet Street, and the Strand, would have been too great an
effort for his enfeebled frame. He accordingly slept at Greenwich, and
thence proceeded to Hampton Court without entering London. His return
was, however, celebrated by the populace with every sign of joy and
attachment. The bonfires blazed, and the gunpowder roared, all night. In
every parish from Mile End to Saint James's was to be seen enthroned on
the shoulders of stout Protestant porters a pope, gorgeous in robes
of tinsel and triple crown of pasteboard; and close to the ear of His
Holiness stood a devil with horns, cloven hoof, and a snaky tail.
Even in his country house the king could find no refuge from the
importunate loyalty of his people. Reputations from cities, counties,
universities, besieged him all day. He was, he wrote to Heinsius, quite
exhausted by the labour of hearing harangues and returning answers. The
whole kingdom meanwhile was looking anxiously towards Hampton Court.
Most of the ministers were assembled there. The most eminent men of the
party which was out of power had repaired thither, to pay their duty
to their sovereign, and to congratulate him on his safe return. It was
remarked that Somers and Halifax, so malignantly persecuted a few months
ago by the House of Commons, were received with such marks of esteem
and kindness as William was little in the habit of vouchsafing to his
English courtiers. The lower ranks of both the great factions were
violently agitated. The Whigs, lately vanquished and dispirited, were
full of hope and ardour. The Tories, lately triumphant and secure,
were exasperated and alarmed. Both Whigs and Tories waited with intense
anxiety for the decision of one momentous and pressing question. Would
there be a dissolution? On the seventh of November the King propounded
that question to his Privy Council. It was rumoured, and is highly
probable, that Jersey, Wright and Hedges advised him to keep the
existing Parliament. But they were not men whose opinion was likely to
have much weight with him; and Rochester, whose opinion might have had
some weight, had set out to take possession of his Viceroyalty just
before the death of James, and was still at Dublin. William, however,
had, as he owned to Heinsius, some difficulty in making up his mind. He
had no doubt that a general election would give him a better House of
Commons; but a general election would cause delay; and delay might cause
much mischief. After balancing these considerations, during some hours,
he determined to dissolve.
The writs were sent out with all expedition; and in three days the whole
kingdom was up. Never--such was the intelligence sent from the Dutch
Embassy to the Hague--had there been more intriguing, more canvassing,
more virulence of party feeling. It was in the capital that the first
great contests took place. The decisions of the Metropolitan constituent
bodies were impatiently expected as auguries of the general result. All
the pens of Grub Street, all the presses of Little Britain, were hard
at work. Handbills for and against every candidate were sent to every
voter. The popular slogans on both sides were indefatigably repeated.
Presbyterian, Papist, Tool of Holland, Pensioner of France, were the
appellations interchanged between the contending factions. The Whig
cry was that the Tory members of the last two Parliaments had, from a
malignant desire to mortify the King, left the kingdom exposed to danger
and insult, had unconstitutionally encroached both on the legislature
and on the judicial functions of the House of Lords, had turned the
House of Commons into a new Star Chamber, had used as instruments of
capricious tyranny those privileges which ought never to be employed but
in defence of freedom, had persecuted, without regard to law, to natural
justice, or to decorum, the great Commander who had saved the state
at La Hogue, the great Financier who had restored the currency and
reestablished public credit, the great judge whom all persons not
blinded by prejudice acknowledged to be, in virtue, in prudence,
in learning and eloquence, the first of living English jurists and
statesmen. The Tories answered that they had been only too moderate,
only too merciful; that they had used the Speaker's warrant and the
power of tacking only too sparingly; and that, if they ever again had
a majority, the three Whig leaders who now imagined themselves secure
should be impeached, not for high misdemeanours, but for high treason.
It soon appeared that these threats were not likely to be very speedily
executed. Four Whig and four Tory candidates contested the City of
London. The show of hands was for the Whigs. A poll was demanded; and
the Whigs polled nearly two votes to one. Sir John Levison Gower,
who was supposed to have ingratiated himself with the whole body of
shopkeepers by some parts of his parliamentary conduct, was put up for
Westminster on the Tory interest; and the electors were reminded by
puffs in the newspapers of the services which he had rendered to
trade. But the dread of the French King, the Pope, and the Pretender,
prevailed; and Sir John was at the bottom of the poll. Southwark not
only returned Whigs, but gave them instructions of the most Whiggish
character.
In the country, parties were more nearly balanced than in the capital.
Yet the news from every quarter was that the Whigs had recovered part
at least of the ground which they had lost. Wharton had regained his
ascendency in Buckinghamshire. Musgrave was rejected by Westmoreland.
Nothing did more harm to the Tory candidates than the story of Poussin's
farewell supper. We learn from their own acrimonious invectives that the
unlucky discovery of the three members of Parliament at the Blue
Posts cost thirty honest gentlemen their seats. One of the criminals,
Tredenham, escaped with impunity. For the dominion of his family over
the borough of St. Mawes was absolute even to a proverb. The other two
had the fate which they deserved. Davenant ceased to sit for Bedwin.
Hammond, who had lately stood high in the favour of the University of
Cambridge, was defeated by a great majority, and was succeeded by the
glory of the Whig party, Isaac Newton.
There was one district to which the eyes of hundreds of thousands were
turned with anxious interest, Gloucestershire. Would the patriotic and
high spirited gentry and yeomanry of that great county again confide
their dearest interests to the Impudent Scandal of parliaments, the
renegade, the slanderer, the mountebank, who had been, during thirteen
years, railing at his betters of every party with a spite restrained by
nothing but the craven fear of corporal chastisement, and who had in the
last Parliament made himself conspicuous by the abject court which he
had paid to Lewis and by the impertinence with which he had spoken of
William.
The Gloucestershire election became a national affair. Portmanteaus full
of pamphlets and broadsides were sent down from London. Every freeholder
in the county had several tracts left at his door. In every market
place, on the market day, papers about the brazen forehead, the viperous
tongue, and the white liver of Jack Howe, the French King's buffoon,
flew about like flakes in a snow storm. Clowns from the Cotswold Hills
and the forest of Dean, who had votes, but who did not know their
letters, were invited to hear these satires read, and were asked
whether they were prepared to endure the two great evils which were
then considered by the common people of England as the inseparable
concomitants of despotism, to wear wooden shoes, and to live on frogs.
The dissenting preachers and the clothiers were peculiarly zealous. For
Howe was considered as the enemy both of conventicles and of factories.
Outvoters were brought up to Gloucester in extraordinary numbers. In the
city of London the traders who frequented Blackwell Hall, then the great
emporium for woollen goods, canvassed actively on the Whig side.
[Here the revised part ends. --EDITOR. ]
Meanwhile reports about the state of the King's health were constantly
becoming more and more alarming. His medical advisers, both English and
Dutch, were at the end of their resources. He had consulted by letter
all the most eminent physicians of Europe; and, as he was apprehensive
that they might return flattering answers if they knew who he was, he
had written under feigned names. To Fagon he had described himself as a
parish priest. Fagon replied, somewhat bluntly, that such symptoms could
have only one meaning, and that the only advice which he had to give
to the sick man was to prepare himself for death. Having obtained
this plain answer, William consulted Fagon again without disguise, and
obtained some prescriptions which were thought to have a little retarded
the approach of the inevitable hour. But the great King's days were
numbered. Headaches and shivering fits returned on him almost daily. He
still rode and even hunted; [26] but he had no longer that firm seat or
that perfect command of the bridle for which he had once been renowned.
Still all his care was for the future. The filial respect and tenderness
of Albemarle had been almost a necessary of life to him. But it was of
importance that Heinsius should be fully informed both as to the whole
plan of the next campaign and as to the state of the preparations.
Albemarle was in full possession of the King's views on these subjects.
He was therefore sent to the Hague. Heinsius was at that time suffering
from indisposition, which was indeed a trifle when compared with the
maladies under which William was sinking. But in the nature of William
there was none of that selfishness which is the too common vice of
invalids. On the twentieth of February he sent to Heinsius a letter in
which he did not even allude to his own sufferings and infirmities. "I
am," he said, "infinitely concerned to learn that your health is not yet
quite reestablished. May God be pleased to grant you a speedy recovery.
I am unalterably your good friend, William. " Those were the last lines
of that long correspondence.
On the twentieth of February William was ambling on a favourite horse,
named Sorrel, through the park of Hampton Court. He urged his horse to
strike into a gallop just at the spot where a mole had been at work.
Sorrel stumbled on the mole-hill, and went down on his knees. The King
fell off, and broke his collar bone. The bone was set; and he returned
to Kensington in his coach. The jolting of the rough roads of that time
made it necessary to reduce the fracture again. To a young and vigorous
man such an accident would have been a trifle. But the frame of William
was not in a condition to bear even the slightest shock. He felt that
his time was short, and grieved, with a grief such as only noble spirits
feel, to think that he must leave his work but half finished. It was
possible that he might still live until one of his plans should be
carried into execution. He had long known that the relation in which
England and Scotland stood to each other was at best precarious, and
often unfriendly, and that it might be doubted whether, in an estimate
of the British power, the resources of the smaller country ought not
to be deducted from those of the larger. Recent events had proved that,
without doubt, the two kingdoms could not possibly continue for another
year to be on the terms on which they had been during the preceding
century, and that there must be between them either absolute union or
deadly enmity. Their enmity would bring frightful calamities, not on
themselves alone, but on all the civilised world. Their union would
be the best security for the prosperity of both, for the internal
tranquillity of the island, for the just balance of power among European
states, and for the immunities of all Protestant countries. On the
twenty-eighth of February the Commons listened with uncovered heads to
the last message that bore William's sign manual. An unhappy accident,
he told them, had forced him to make to them in writing a communication
which he would gladly have made from the throne. He had, in the first
year of his reign, expressed his desire to see an union accomplished
between England and Scotland. He was convinced that nothing could more
conduce to the safety and happiness of both. He should think it
his peculiar felicity if, before the close of his reign, some happy
expedient could be devised for making the two kingdoms one; and he, in
the most earnest manner, recommended the question to the consideration
of the Houses. It was resolved that the message should betaken into
consideration on Saturday, the seventh of March.
But on the first of March humours of menacing appearance showed
themselves in the King's knee. On the fourth of March he was attacked by
fever; on the fifth his strength failed greatly; and on the sixth he was
scarcely kept alive by cordials. The Abjuration Bill and a money bill
were awaiting his assent. That assent he felt that he should not be able
to give in person. He therefore ordered a commission to be prepared
for his signature. His hand was now too weak to form the letters of
his name, and it was suggested that a stamp should be prepared. On the
seventh of March the stamp was ready. The Lord Keeper and the clerks of
the parliament came, according to usage, to witness the signing of the
commission. But they were detained some hours in the antechamber while
he was in one of the paroxysms of his malady. Meanwhile the Houses were
sitting. It was Saturday, the seventh, the day on which the Commons
had resolved to take into consideration the question of the union with
Scotland. But that subject was not mentioned. It was known that the King
had but a few hours to live; and the members asked each other anxiously
whether it was likely that the Abjuration and money bills would be
passed before he died. After sitting long in the expectation of a
message, the Commons adjourned till six in the afternoon. By that time
William had recovered himself sufficiently to put the stamp on the
parchment which authorised his commissioners to act for him. In the
evening, when the Houses had assembled, Black Rod knocked. The Commons
were summoned to the bar of the Lords; the commission was read, the
Abjuration Bill and the Malt Bill became laws, and both Houses adjourned
till nine o'clock in the morning of the following day. The following day
was Sunday. But there was little chance that William would live through
the night. It was of the highest importance that, within the shortest
possible time after his decease, the successor designated by the Bill
of Rights and the Act of Succession should receive the homage of the
Estates of the Realm, and be publicly proclaimed in the Council: and the
most rigid Pharisee in the Society for the Reformation of Manners could
hardly deny that it was lawful to save the state, even on the Sabbath.
The King meanwhile was sinking fast. Albemarle had arrived at Kensington
from the Hague, exhausted by rapid travelling. His master kindly bade
him go to rest for some hours, and then summoned him to make his report.
That report was in all respects satisfactory. The States General were
in the best temper; the troops, the provisions and the magazines were
in the best order. Every thing was in readiness for an early campaign.
William received the intelligence with the calmness of a man whose
work was done. He was under no illusion as to his danger. "I am fast
drawing," he said, "to my end. " His end was worthy of his life. His
intellect was not for a moment clouded. His fortitude was the more
admirable because he was not willing to die. He had very lately said to
one of those whom he most loved: "You know that I never feared death;
there have been times when I should have wished it; but, now that this
great new prospect is opening before me, I do wish to stay here a little
longer. " Yet no weakness, no querulousness, disgraced the noble close
of that noble career. To the physicians the King returned his thanks
graciously and gently. "I know that you have done all that skill
and learning could do for me; but the case is beyond your art; and I
submit. " From the words which escaped him he seemed to be frequently
engaged in mental prayer. Burnet and Tenison remained many hours in
the sick room. He professed to them his firm belief in the truth of the
Christian religion, and received the sacrament from their hands with
great seriousness. The antechambers were crowded all night with lords
and privy councillors. He ordered several of them to be called in,
and exerted himself to take leave of them with a few kind and cheerful
words. Among the English who were admitted to his bedside were
Devonshire and Ormond. But there were in the crowd those who felt as no
Englishman could feel, friends of his youth who had been true to him,
and to whom he had been true, through all vicissitudes of fortune; who
had served him with unalterable fidelity when his Secretaries of State,
his Treasury and his Admiralty had betrayed him; who had never on any
field of battle, or in an atmosphere tainted with loathsome and deadly
disease, shrunk from placing their own lives in jeopardy to save his,
and whose truth he had at the cost of his own popularity rewarded
with bounteous munificence. He strained his feeble voice to thank
Auverquerque for the affectionate and loyal services of thirty years.
To Albemarle he gave the keys of his closet, and of his private drawers.
"You know," he said, "what to do with them. " By this time he could
scarcely respire. "Can this," he said to the physicians, "last long? " He
was told that the end was approaching. He swallowed a cordial, and asked
for Bentinck. Those were his last articulate words. Bentinck instantly
came to the bedside, bent down, and placed his ear close to the King's
mouth. The lips of the dying man moved; but nothing could be heard. The
King took the hand of his earliest friend, and pressed it tenderly to
his heart. In that moment, no doubt, all that had cast a slight passing
cloud over their long and pure friendship was forgotten. It was now
between seven and eight in the morning. He closed his eyes, and gasped
for breath. The bishops knelt down and read the commendatory prayer.
When it ended William was no more.
When his remains were laid out, it was found that he wore next to his
skin a small piece of black silk riband. The lords in waiting ordered
it to be taken off. It contained a gold ring and a lock of the hair of
Mary.
*****
[Footnote 1: Evelyn saw the Mentz edition of the Offices among Lord
Spencer's books in April 1699. Markland in his preface to the Sylvae of
Statius acknowledges his obligations to the very rare Parmesan edition
in Lord Spencer's collection. As to the Virgil of Zarottus, which
his Lordship bought for 46L, see the extracts from Warley's Diary, in
Nichols's Literary Anecdotes, i. 90. ]
[Footnote 2: The more minutely we examine the history of the decline and
fall of Lacedaemon, the more reason we shall find to admire the sagacity
of Somers. The first great humiliation which befel the Lacedaemonians
was the affair of Sphacteria. It is remarkable that on this occasion
they were vanquished by men who made a trade of war. The force which
Cleon carried out with him from Athens to the Bay of Pyles, and to which
the event of the conflict is to be chiefly ascribed, consisted entirely
of mercenaries, archers from Scythia and light infantry from Thrace. The
victory gained by the Lacedaemonians over a great confederate army
at Tegea retrieved that military reputation which the disaster of
Sphacteria had impaired. Yet even at Tegea it was signally proved that
the Lacedaemonians, though far superior to occasional soldiers, were not
equal to professional soldiers. On every point but one the allies were
put to rout; but on one point the Lacedaemonians gave way; and that was
the point where they were opposed to a brigade of a thousand Argives,
picked men, whom the state to which they belonged had during many years
trained to war at the public charge, and who were, in fact a standing
army. After the battle of Tegea, many years elapsed before the
Lacedaemonians sustained a defeat. At length a calamity befel them which
astonished all their neighbours. A division of the army of Agesilaus was
cut off and destroyed almost to a man; and this exploit, which seemed
almost portentous to the Greeks of that age, was achieved by Iphicrates,
at the head of a body of mercenary light infantry. But it was from the
day of Leuctya that the fall of Spate became rapid and violent. Some
time before that day the Thebans had resolved to follow the example
set many years before by the Argives. Some hundreds of athletic youths,
carefully selected, were set apart, under the names of the City Band and
the Sacred Band, to form a standing army. Their business was war. They
encamped in the citadel; they were supported at the expense of the
community; and they became, under assiduous training, the first soldiers
in Greece. They were constantly victorious till they were opposed
to Philip's admirably disciplined phalanx at Charonea; and even at
Chaeronea they were not defeated but slain in their ranks, fighting to
the last. It was this band, directed by the skill of great captains,
which gave the decisive blow to the Lacedaemonian power. It is to be
observed that there was no degeneracy among the Lacedaemonians. Even
down to the time of Pyrrhus they seem to have been in all military
qualities equal to their ancestors who conquered at Plataea. But their
ancestors at Plataea had not such enemies to encounter. ]
[Footnote 3: L'Hermitage, Dec. 3/13 7/17, 1697. ]
[Footnote 4: Commons' Journals, Dec. 3. 1697. L'Hermitage, Dec 7/17. ]
[Footnote 5: L'Hermitage, Dec. 15/24. , Dec. 14/24. , Journals. ]
[Footnote 6: The first act of Farquhar's Trip to the Jubilee, the
passions which about his time agitated society are exhibited with much
spirit. Alderman Smuggler sees Colonel Standard and exclaims, "There's
another plague of the nation a red coat and feather. " "I'm disbanded,"
says the Colonel. "This very morning, in Hyde Park, my brave regiment, a
thousand men that looked like lions yesterday, were scattered and looked
as poor and simple as the herd of deer that grazed beside them. " "Fal al
deral! " cries the Alderman: "I'll have a bonfire this night, as high as
the monument. " "A bonfire! " answered the soldier; "then dry, withered,
ill nature! had not those brave fellows' swords' defended you, your
house had been a bonfire ere this about your ears. "]
[Footnote 7: L'Hermitage, January 11/21]
[Footnote 8: That a portion at least of the native population of Ireland
looked to the Parliament at Westminster for protection against the
tyranny of the Parliament at Dublin appears from a paper entitled The
Case of the Roman Catholic Nation of Ireland. This paper, written in
1711 by one of the oppressed race and religion, is in a MS. belonging to
Lord Fingall. The Parliament of Ireland is accused of treating the Irish
worse than the Turks treat the Christians, worse than the Egyptians
treated the Israelites. "Therefore," says the writer, "they (the
Irish) apply themselves to the present Parliament of Great Britain as
a Parliament of nice honour and stanch justice. . . Their request then is
that this great Parliament may make good the Treaty of Limerick in all
the Civil Articles. " In order to propitiate those to whom he makes this
appeal, he accuses the Irish Parliament of encroaching on the supreme
authority of the English Parliament, and charges the colonists generally
with ingratitude to the mother country to which they owe so much. ]
[Footnote 9: London Gazette, Jan 6. 1697/8; Postman of the same date;
Van Cleverskirke, Jan. 7/17; L'Hermitage, Jan. 4/14/, 7/17; Evelyn's
Diary; Ward's London Spy; William to Heinsius, Jan. 7/17. "The loss,"
the King writes, "is less to me than it would be to another person,
for I cannot live there. Yet it is serious. " So late as 1758 Johnson
described a furious Jacobite as firmly convinced that William burned
down Whitehall in order to steal the furniture. Idler, No. 10. Pope,
in Windsor Forest, a poem which has a stronger tinge of Toryism than
anything else that he ever wrote, predicts the speedy restoration of the
fallen palace.
"I see, I see, where two fair cities bend
their ample bow, a new Whitehall ascend. "
See Ralph's bitter remarks on the fate of Whitehall. ]
[Footnote 10: As to the Czar: London Gazette; Van Citters, 1698; Jan.
11/21. 14/24 Mar 11/21, Mar 29/April 8; L'Hermitage 11/21, 18/28, Jan
25/Feb 4, Feb 1/11 8/18, 11/21 Feb 22/Mar 4; Feb 25/Mar 7, Mar 1/4, Mar
29/April 8/ April 22/ May 2 See also Evelyn's Diary; Burnet Postman,
Jan. 13. 15. , Feb. 10 12, 24. ; Mar. 24. 26. 31. As to Russia, see
Hakluyt, Purchas, Voltaire, St. Simon. Estat de Russie par Margeret,
Paris, 1607. State of Russia, London, 1671. La Relation des Trois
Ambassades de M. Le Comte de Carlisle, Amsterdam, 1672. (There is an
English translation from this French original. ) North's Life of Dudley
North. Seymour's History of London, ii. 426. Pepys and Evelyn on the
Russian Embassies; Milton's account of Muscovy. On the personal habits
of the Czar see the Memoirs of the Margravine of Bayreuth. ]
[Footnote 11: It is worth while to transcribe the words of the
engagement which Lewis, a chivalrous and a devout prince, violated
without the smallest scruple. "Nous, Louis, par la grace de Dieu, Roi
tres Chretien de France et de Navarre, promettons pour notre honneur, en
foi et parole de Roi, jurons sue la croix, les saints Evangiles, et
les canons de la Messe, que nous avons touches, que nous observerons
et accomplirons entierement de bonne foi tous et chacun des points et
articles contenus au traite de paix, renonciation, et amitie. "]
[Footnote 12: George Psalmanazar's account of the state of the south
of France at this time is curious. On the high road near Lyons he
frequently passed corpses fastened to posts. "These," he says, "were the
bodies of highwaymen, or rather of soldiers, sailors, mariners and even
galley slaves, disbanded after the peace of Reswick, who, having neither
home nor occupation, used to infest the roads in troops, plunder towns
and villages, and, when taken, were hanged at the county town by dozens,
or even scores sometimes, after which their bodies were thus exposed
along the highway in terrorem. "]
[Footnote 13: "Il est de bonne foi dans tout ce qu'il fait. Son procede
est droit et sincere. " Tallard to Lewis, July 3. 1698. ]
[Footnote 14: "Le Roi d'Angleterre, Sire, va tres sincerement jusqu'a
present; et j'ose dire que s'il entre une fois en traite avec Votre
Majeste, il le tiendra de bonne foi. "--"Si je l'ose dire a V. M. , il
est tres penetrant, et a l'esprit juste. Il s'apercevra bientôt qu'on
barguigne si les choses trainent trop de long. " July 8. ]
[Footnote 15: I will quote from the despatches of Lewis to Tallard three
or four passages which show that the value of the kingdom of the Two
Sicilies was quite justly appreciated at Versailles. "A l'egard du
royaume de Naples et de Sicile le roi d'Angleterre objectera que les
places de ces etats entre mes mains me rendront maitre du commerce de
la Mediteranee. Vous pourrez en ce cas laissez entendre, comme de vous
meme, qu'il serait si difficile de conserver ces royaumes unis a ma
couronne, que les depenses necessaires pour y envoyer des secours
seraient si grands, et qu'autrefois il a tant coute a la France pour les
maintenir dans son obeissance, que vraisemblablement j'etablirois un roi
pour les gouverner, et que peut-etre ce serait le partage d'un de mes
petits-fils qui voudroit regner independamment. " April 7/17 1698. "Les
royaumes de Naples et de Sicile ne peuvent se regarder comme un partage
dont mon fils puisse se contenter pour lui tenir lieu de tous ses
droits. Les exemples du passe n'ont que trop appris combien ces etats
content a la France le peu d'utilite dont ils sont pour elle, et la
difficulte de les conserver. " May 16. 1698. "Je considere la cession de
ces royaumes comme une source continuelle de depenses et d'embarras. Il
n'en a que trop coute a la France pour les conserver; et l'experience
a fait voir la necessite indispensable d'y entretenir toujours des
troupes, et d'y envoyer incessamment des vaisseaux, et combien toutes
ces peines ont ete inutiles. " May 29. 1698. It would be easy to cite
other passages of the same kind.
had appealed to arms. But with the House of Austria alone the House of
Bourbon could easily deal. Other powers were still looking in doubt to
England for the signal; and England, though her aspect was sullen and
menacing, still preserved neutrality. That neutrality would not have
lasted so long, if William could have relied on the support of his
Parliament and of his people. In his Parliament there were agents of
France, who, though few, had obtained so much influence by clamouring
against standing armies, profuse grants, and Dutch favourites, that they
were often blindly followed by the majority; and his people, distracted
by domestic factions, unaccustomed to busy themselves about continental
politics, and remembering with bitterness the disasters and burdens of
the last war, the carnage of Landen, the loss of the Smyrna fleet, the
land tax at four shillings in the pound, hesitated about engaging
in another contest, and would probably continue to hesitate while he
continued to live. He could not live long. It had, indeed, often been
prophesied that his death was at hand; and the prophets had hitherto
been mistaken. But there was now no possibility of mistake. His cough
was more violent than ever; his legs were swollen; his eyes, once bright
and clear as those of a falcon, had grown dim; he who, on the day of the
Boyne, had been sixteen hours on the backs of different horses, could
now with great difficulty creep into his state coach. [22] The vigorous
intellect, and the intrepid spirit, remained; but on the body fifty
years had done the work of ninety. In a few months the vaults of
Westminster would receive the emaciated and shattered frame which was
animated by the most far-sighted, the most daring, the most commanding
of souls. In a few months the British throne would be filled by a woman
whose understanding was well known to be feeble, and who was believed to
lean towards the party which was averse from war. To get over those few
months without an open and violent rupture should have been the first
object of the French government. Every engagement should have been
punctually fulfilled; every occasion of quarrel should have been
studiously avoided. Nothing should have been spared which could quiet
the alarms and soothe the wounded pride of neighbouring nations.
The House of Bourbon was so situated that one year of moderation might
not improbably be rewarded by thirty years of undisputed ascendency.
Was it possible the politic and experienced Lewis would at such a
conjuncture offer a new and most galling provocation, not only to
William, whose animosity was already as great as it could be, but to
the people whom William had hitherto been vainly endeavouring to inspire
with animosity resembling his own? How often, since the Revolution of
1688, had it seemed that the English were thoroughly weary of the new
government. And how often had the detection of a Jacobite plot, or the
approach of a French armament, changed the whole face of things. All at
once the grumbling had ceased, the grumblers had crowded to sign loyal
addresses to the usurper, had formed associations in support of his
authority, had appeared in arms at the head of the militia, crying God
save King William. So it would be now. Most of those who had taken a
pleasure in crossing him on the question of his Dutch guards, on the
question of his Irish grants, would be moved to vehement resentment when
they learned that Lewis had, in direct violation of a treaty, determined
to force on England a king of his own religion, a king bred in his own
dominions, a king who would be at Westminster what Philip was at Madrid,
a great feudatory of France.
These arguments were concisely but clearly and strongly urged by Torcy
in a paper which is still extant, and which it is difficult to believe
that his master can have read without great misgivings. [23] On one side
were the faith of treaties, the peace of Europe, the welfare of France,
nay the selfish interest of the House of Bourbon. On the other side were
the influence of an artful woman, and the promptings of vanity which, we
must in candour acknowledge, was ennobled by a mixture of compassion and
chivalrous generosity. The King determined to act in direct opposition
to the advice of all his ablest servants; and the princes of the blood
applauded his decision, as they would have applauded any decision which
he had announced. Nowhere was he regarded with a more timorous, a more
slavish, respect than in his own family.
On the following day he went again to Saint Germains, and, attended by
a splendid retinue, entered James's bedchamber. The dying man scarcely
opened his heavy eyes, and then closed them again. "I have something,"
said Lewis, "of great moment to communicate to Your Majesty. " The
courtiers who filled the room took this as a signal to retire, and were
crowding towards the door, when they were stopped by that commanding
voice: "Let nobody withdraw. I come to tell Your Majesty that, whenever
it shall please God to take you from us, I will be to your son what I
have been to you, and will acknowledge him as King of England, Scotland
and Ireland. " The English exiles who were standing round the couch fell
on their knees. Some burst into tears. Some poured forth praises and
blessings with clamour such as, was scarcely becoming in such a place
and at such a time. Some indistinct murmurs which James uttered, and
which were drowned by the noisy gratitude of his attendants, were
interpreted to mean thanks. But from the most trustworthy accounts it
appears that he was insensible to all that was passing around him. [24]
As soon as Lewis was again at Marli, he repeated to the Court assembled
there the announcement which he had made at Saint Germains. The whole
circle broke forth into exclamations of delight and admiration.
What piety! What humanity! What magnanimity! Nor was this enthusiasm
altogether feigned. For, in the estimation of the greater part of that
brilliant crowd, nations were nothing and princes every thing. What
could be more generous, more amiable, than to protect an innocent boy,
who was kept out of his rightful inheritance by an ambitious kinsman?
The fine gentlemen and fine ladies who talked thus forgot that, besides
the innocent boy and that ambitious kinsman, five millions and a half
of Englishmen were concerned, who were little disposed to consider
themselves as the absolute property of any master, and who were still
less disposed to accept a master chosen for them by the French King.
James lingered three days longer. He was occasionally sensible during a
few minutes, and, during one of these lucid intervals, faintly expressed
his gratitude to Lewis. On the sixteenth he died. His Queen retired
that evening to the nunnery of Chaillot, where she could weep and pray
undisturbed. She left Saint Germains in joyous agitation. A herald
made his appearance before the palace gate, and, with sound of trumpet,
proclaimed, in Latin, French and English, King James the Third of
England and Eighth of Scotland. The streets, in consequence doubtless of
orders from the government, were illuminated; and the townsmen with loud
shouts wished a long reign to their illustrious neighbour. The poor lad
received from his ministers, and delivered back to them, the seals of
their offices, and held out his hand to be kissed. One of the first acts
of his mock reign was to bestow some mock peerages in conformity with
directions which he found in his father's will. Middleton, who had as
yet no English title, was created Earl of Monmouth. Perth, who had stood
high in the favour of his late master, both as an apostate from the
Protestant religion, and as the author of the last improvements on the
thumb screw, took the title of Duke.
Meanwhile the remains of James were escorted, in the dusk of the
evening, by a slender retinue to the Chapel of the English Benedictines
at Paris, and deposited there in the vain hope that, at some future
time, they would be laid with kingly pomp at Westminster among the
graves of the Plantagenets and Tudors.
Three days after these humble obsequies Lewis visited Saint Germains in
form. On the morrow the visit was returned. The French Court was now at
Versailles; and the Pretender was received there, in all points, as his
father would have been, sate in his father's arm chair, took, as his
father had always done, the right hand of the great monarch, and wore
the long violet coloured mantle which was by ancient usage the mourning
garb of the Kings of France. There was on that day a great concourse
of ambassadors and envoys; but one well known figure was wanting.
Manchester had sent off to Loo intelligence of the affront which had
been offered to his country and his master, had solicited instructions,
and had determined that, till these instructions should arrive, he would
live in strict seclusion. He did not think that he should be justified
in quitting his post without express orders; but his earnest hope was
that he should be directed to turn his back in contemptuous defiance on
the Court which had dared to treat England as a subject province.
As soon as the fault into which Lewis had been hurried by pity, by
the desire of applause, and by female influence was complete and
irreparable, he began to feel serious uneasiness. His ministers were
directed to declare everywhere that their master had no intention of
affronting the English government, that he had not violated the Treaty
of Ryswick, that he had no intention of violating it, that he had merely
meant to gratify an unfortunate family nearly related to himself by
using names and observing forms which really meant nothing, and that
he was resolved not to countenance any attempt to subvert the throne
of William. Torcy, who had, a few days before, proved by irrefragable
arguments that his master could not, without a gross breach of contract,
recognise the Pretender, imagined that sophisms which had not imposed on
himself might possibly impose on others. He visited the English embassy,
obtained admittance, and, as was his duty, did his best to excuse the
fatal act which he had done his best to prevent. Manchester's answer to
this attempt at explanation was as strong and plain as it could be in
the absence of precise instructions. The instructions speedily arrived.
The courier who carried the news of the recognition to Loo arrived there
when William was at table with some of his nobles and some princes of
the German Empire who had visited him in his retreat. The King said not
a word; but his pale cheek flushed; and he pulled his hat over his
eyes to conceal the changes of his countenance. He hastened to send off
several messengers. One carried a letter commanding Manchester to quit
France without taking leave. Another started for London with a despatch
which directed the Lords Justices to send Poussin instantly out of
England.
England was already in a flame when it was first known there that
James was dying. Some of his eager partisans formed plans and made
preparations for a great public manifestation of feeling in different
parts of the island. But the insolence of Lewis produced a burst of
public indignation which scarcely any malecontent had the courage to
face.
In the city of London, indeed, some zealots, who had probably swallowed
too many bumpers to their new Sovereign, played one of those senseless
pranks which were characteristic of their party. They dressed themselves
in coats bearing some resemblance to the tabards of heralds, rode
through the streets, halted at some places, and muttered something which
nobody could understand. It was at first supposed that they were merely
a company of prize fighters from Hockley in the Hole who had taken
this way of advertising their performances with back sword, sword and
buckler, and single falchion. But it was soon discovered that these
gaudily dressed horsemen were proclaiming James the Third. In an instant
the pageant was at an end. The mock kings at arms and pursuivants threw
away their finery and fled for their lives in all directions, followed
by yells and showers of stones. [25] Already the Common Council of
London had met, and had voted, without one dissentient voice, an address
expressing the highest resentment at the insult which France had offered
to the King and the kingdom. A few hours after this address had been
presented to the Regents, the Livery assembled to choose a Lord
Mayor. Duncombe, the Tory candidate, lately the popular favourite, was
rejected, and a Whig alderman placed in the chair. All over the kingdom,
corporations, grand juries, meetings of magistrates, meetings of
freeholders, were passing resolutions breathing affection to William,
and defiance to Lewis. It was necessary to enlarge the "London Gazette"
from four columns to twelve; and even twelve were too few to hold the
multitude of loyal and patriotic addresses. In some of those addresses
severe reflections were thrown on the House of Commons. Our deliverer
had been ungratefully requited, thwarted, mortified, denied the means
of making the country respected and feared by neighbouring states. The
factious wrangling, the penny wise economy, of three disgraceful years
had produced the effect which might have been expected. His Majesty
would never have been so grossly affronted abroad, if he had not first
been affronted at home. But the eyes of his people were opened. He had
only to appeal from the representatives to the constituents; and he
would find that the nation was still sound at heart.
Poussin had been directed to offer to the Lords Justices explanations
similar to those with which Torcy had attempted to appease Manchester.
A memorial was accordingly drawn up and presented to Vernon; but Vernon
refused to look at it. Soon a courier arrived from Loo with the letter
in which William directed his vicegerents to send the French agent out
of the kingdom. An officer of the royal household was charged with the
execution of the order. He repaired to Poussin's lodgings; but Poussin
was not at home; he was supping at the Blue Posts, a tavern much
frequented by Jacobites, the very tavern indeed at which Charnock and
his gang had breakfasted on the day fixed for the murderous ambuscade
of Turnham Green. To this house the messenger went; and there he found
Poussin at table with three of the most virulent Tory members of the
House of Commons, Tredenham, who returned himself for Saint Mawes;
Hammond, who had been sent to Parliament by the high churchmen of the
University of Cambridge; and Davenant, who had recently, at Poussin's
suggestion, been rewarded by Lewis for some savage invectives against
the Whigs with a diamond ring worth three thousand pistoles. This supper
party was, during some weeks, the chief topic of conversation. The
exultation of the Whigs was boundless. These then were the true English
patriots, the men who could not endure a foreigner, the men who would
not suffer His Majesty to bestow a moderate reward on the foreigners who
had stormed Athlone, and turned the flank of the Celtic army at Aghrim.
It now appeared they could be on excellent terms with a foreigner,
provided only that he was the emissary of a tyrant hostile to the
liberty, the independence, and the religion of their country. The
Tories, vexed and abashed, heartily wished that, on that unlucky day,
their friends had been supping somewhere else. Even the bronze of
Davenant's forehead was not proof to the general reproach. He defended
himself by pretending that Poussin, with whom he had passed whole days,
who had corrected his scurrilous pamphlets, and who had paid him his
shameful wages, was a stranger to him, and that the meeting at the Blue
Posts was purely accidental. If his word was doubted, he was willing to
repeat his assertion on oath. The public, however, which had formed a
very correct notion of his character, thought that his word was worth as
much as his oath, and that his oath was worth nothing.
Meanwhile the arrival of William was impatiently expected. From Loo
he had gone to Breda, where he had passed some time in reviewing his
troops, and in conferring with Marlborough and Heinsius. He had hoped
to be in England early in October. But adverse winds detained him
three weeks at the Hague. At length, in the afternoon of the fourth of
November, it was known in London that he had landed early that morning
at Margate. Great preparations were made for welcoming him to his
capital on the following day, the thirteenth anniversary of his landing
in Devonshire. But a journey across the bridge, and along Cornhill and
Cheapside, Fleet Street, and the Strand, would have been too great an
effort for his enfeebled frame. He accordingly slept at Greenwich, and
thence proceeded to Hampton Court without entering London. His return
was, however, celebrated by the populace with every sign of joy and
attachment. The bonfires blazed, and the gunpowder roared, all night. In
every parish from Mile End to Saint James's was to be seen enthroned on
the shoulders of stout Protestant porters a pope, gorgeous in robes
of tinsel and triple crown of pasteboard; and close to the ear of His
Holiness stood a devil with horns, cloven hoof, and a snaky tail.
Even in his country house the king could find no refuge from the
importunate loyalty of his people. Reputations from cities, counties,
universities, besieged him all day. He was, he wrote to Heinsius, quite
exhausted by the labour of hearing harangues and returning answers. The
whole kingdom meanwhile was looking anxiously towards Hampton Court.
Most of the ministers were assembled there. The most eminent men of the
party which was out of power had repaired thither, to pay their duty
to their sovereign, and to congratulate him on his safe return. It was
remarked that Somers and Halifax, so malignantly persecuted a few months
ago by the House of Commons, were received with such marks of esteem
and kindness as William was little in the habit of vouchsafing to his
English courtiers. The lower ranks of both the great factions were
violently agitated. The Whigs, lately vanquished and dispirited, were
full of hope and ardour. The Tories, lately triumphant and secure,
were exasperated and alarmed. Both Whigs and Tories waited with intense
anxiety for the decision of one momentous and pressing question. Would
there be a dissolution? On the seventh of November the King propounded
that question to his Privy Council. It was rumoured, and is highly
probable, that Jersey, Wright and Hedges advised him to keep the
existing Parliament. But they were not men whose opinion was likely to
have much weight with him; and Rochester, whose opinion might have had
some weight, had set out to take possession of his Viceroyalty just
before the death of James, and was still at Dublin. William, however,
had, as he owned to Heinsius, some difficulty in making up his mind. He
had no doubt that a general election would give him a better House of
Commons; but a general election would cause delay; and delay might cause
much mischief. After balancing these considerations, during some hours,
he determined to dissolve.
The writs were sent out with all expedition; and in three days the whole
kingdom was up. Never--such was the intelligence sent from the Dutch
Embassy to the Hague--had there been more intriguing, more canvassing,
more virulence of party feeling. It was in the capital that the first
great contests took place. The decisions of the Metropolitan constituent
bodies were impatiently expected as auguries of the general result. All
the pens of Grub Street, all the presses of Little Britain, were hard
at work. Handbills for and against every candidate were sent to every
voter. The popular slogans on both sides were indefatigably repeated.
Presbyterian, Papist, Tool of Holland, Pensioner of France, were the
appellations interchanged between the contending factions. The Whig
cry was that the Tory members of the last two Parliaments had, from a
malignant desire to mortify the King, left the kingdom exposed to danger
and insult, had unconstitutionally encroached both on the legislature
and on the judicial functions of the House of Lords, had turned the
House of Commons into a new Star Chamber, had used as instruments of
capricious tyranny those privileges which ought never to be employed but
in defence of freedom, had persecuted, without regard to law, to natural
justice, or to decorum, the great Commander who had saved the state
at La Hogue, the great Financier who had restored the currency and
reestablished public credit, the great judge whom all persons not
blinded by prejudice acknowledged to be, in virtue, in prudence,
in learning and eloquence, the first of living English jurists and
statesmen. The Tories answered that they had been only too moderate,
only too merciful; that they had used the Speaker's warrant and the
power of tacking only too sparingly; and that, if they ever again had
a majority, the three Whig leaders who now imagined themselves secure
should be impeached, not for high misdemeanours, but for high treason.
It soon appeared that these threats were not likely to be very speedily
executed. Four Whig and four Tory candidates contested the City of
London. The show of hands was for the Whigs. A poll was demanded; and
the Whigs polled nearly two votes to one. Sir John Levison Gower,
who was supposed to have ingratiated himself with the whole body of
shopkeepers by some parts of his parliamentary conduct, was put up for
Westminster on the Tory interest; and the electors were reminded by
puffs in the newspapers of the services which he had rendered to
trade. But the dread of the French King, the Pope, and the Pretender,
prevailed; and Sir John was at the bottom of the poll. Southwark not
only returned Whigs, but gave them instructions of the most Whiggish
character.
In the country, parties were more nearly balanced than in the capital.
Yet the news from every quarter was that the Whigs had recovered part
at least of the ground which they had lost. Wharton had regained his
ascendency in Buckinghamshire. Musgrave was rejected by Westmoreland.
Nothing did more harm to the Tory candidates than the story of Poussin's
farewell supper. We learn from their own acrimonious invectives that the
unlucky discovery of the three members of Parliament at the Blue
Posts cost thirty honest gentlemen their seats. One of the criminals,
Tredenham, escaped with impunity. For the dominion of his family over
the borough of St. Mawes was absolute even to a proverb. The other two
had the fate which they deserved. Davenant ceased to sit for Bedwin.
Hammond, who had lately stood high in the favour of the University of
Cambridge, was defeated by a great majority, and was succeeded by the
glory of the Whig party, Isaac Newton.
There was one district to which the eyes of hundreds of thousands were
turned with anxious interest, Gloucestershire. Would the patriotic and
high spirited gentry and yeomanry of that great county again confide
their dearest interests to the Impudent Scandal of parliaments, the
renegade, the slanderer, the mountebank, who had been, during thirteen
years, railing at his betters of every party with a spite restrained by
nothing but the craven fear of corporal chastisement, and who had in the
last Parliament made himself conspicuous by the abject court which he
had paid to Lewis and by the impertinence with which he had spoken of
William.
The Gloucestershire election became a national affair. Portmanteaus full
of pamphlets and broadsides were sent down from London. Every freeholder
in the county had several tracts left at his door. In every market
place, on the market day, papers about the brazen forehead, the viperous
tongue, and the white liver of Jack Howe, the French King's buffoon,
flew about like flakes in a snow storm. Clowns from the Cotswold Hills
and the forest of Dean, who had votes, but who did not know their
letters, were invited to hear these satires read, and were asked
whether they were prepared to endure the two great evils which were
then considered by the common people of England as the inseparable
concomitants of despotism, to wear wooden shoes, and to live on frogs.
The dissenting preachers and the clothiers were peculiarly zealous. For
Howe was considered as the enemy both of conventicles and of factories.
Outvoters were brought up to Gloucester in extraordinary numbers. In the
city of London the traders who frequented Blackwell Hall, then the great
emporium for woollen goods, canvassed actively on the Whig side.
[Here the revised part ends. --EDITOR. ]
Meanwhile reports about the state of the King's health were constantly
becoming more and more alarming. His medical advisers, both English and
Dutch, were at the end of their resources. He had consulted by letter
all the most eminent physicians of Europe; and, as he was apprehensive
that they might return flattering answers if they knew who he was, he
had written under feigned names. To Fagon he had described himself as a
parish priest. Fagon replied, somewhat bluntly, that such symptoms could
have only one meaning, and that the only advice which he had to give
to the sick man was to prepare himself for death. Having obtained
this plain answer, William consulted Fagon again without disguise, and
obtained some prescriptions which were thought to have a little retarded
the approach of the inevitable hour. But the great King's days were
numbered. Headaches and shivering fits returned on him almost daily. He
still rode and even hunted; [26] but he had no longer that firm seat or
that perfect command of the bridle for which he had once been renowned.
Still all his care was for the future. The filial respect and tenderness
of Albemarle had been almost a necessary of life to him. But it was of
importance that Heinsius should be fully informed both as to the whole
plan of the next campaign and as to the state of the preparations.
Albemarle was in full possession of the King's views on these subjects.
He was therefore sent to the Hague. Heinsius was at that time suffering
from indisposition, which was indeed a trifle when compared with the
maladies under which William was sinking. But in the nature of William
there was none of that selfishness which is the too common vice of
invalids. On the twentieth of February he sent to Heinsius a letter in
which he did not even allude to his own sufferings and infirmities. "I
am," he said, "infinitely concerned to learn that your health is not yet
quite reestablished. May God be pleased to grant you a speedy recovery.
I am unalterably your good friend, William. " Those were the last lines
of that long correspondence.
On the twentieth of February William was ambling on a favourite horse,
named Sorrel, through the park of Hampton Court. He urged his horse to
strike into a gallop just at the spot where a mole had been at work.
Sorrel stumbled on the mole-hill, and went down on his knees. The King
fell off, and broke his collar bone. The bone was set; and he returned
to Kensington in his coach. The jolting of the rough roads of that time
made it necessary to reduce the fracture again. To a young and vigorous
man such an accident would have been a trifle. But the frame of William
was not in a condition to bear even the slightest shock. He felt that
his time was short, and grieved, with a grief such as only noble spirits
feel, to think that he must leave his work but half finished. It was
possible that he might still live until one of his plans should be
carried into execution. He had long known that the relation in which
England and Scotland stood to each other was at best precarious, and
often unfriendly, and that it might be doubted whether, in an estimate
of the British power, the resources of the smaller country ought not
to be deducted from those of the larger. Recent events had proved that,
without doubt, the two kingdoms could not possibly continue for another
year to be on the terms on which they had been during the preceding
century, and that there must be between them either absolute union or
deadly enmity. Their enmity would bring frightful calamities, not on
themselves alone, but on all the civilised world. Their union would
be the best security for the prosperity of both, for the internal
tranquillity of the island, for the just balance of power among European
states, and for the immunities of all Protestant countries. On the
twenty-eighth of February the Commons listened with uncovered heads to
the last message that bore William's sign manual. An unhappy accident,
he told them, had forced him to make to them in writing a communication
which he would gladly have made from the throne. He had, in the first
year of his reign, expressed his desire to see an union accomplished
between England and Scotland. He was convinced that nothing could more
conduce to the safety and happiness of both. He should think it
his peculiar felicity if, before the close of his reign, some happy
expedient could be devised for making the two kingdoms one; and he, in
the most earnest manner, recommended the question to the consideration
of the Houses. It was resolved that the message should betaken into
consideration on Saturday, the seventh of March.
But on the first of March humours of menacing appearance showed
themselves in the King's knee. On the fourth of March he was attacked by
fever; on the fifth his strength failed greatly; and on the sixth he was
scarcely kept alive by cordials. The Abjuration Bill and a money bill
were awaiting his assent. That assent he felt that he should not be able
to give in person. He therefore ordered a commission to be prepared
for his signature. His hand was now too weak to form the letters of
his name, and it was suggested that a stamp should be prepared. On the
seventh of March the stamp was ready. The Lord Keeper and the clerks of
the parliament came, according to usage, to witness the signing of the
commission. But they were detained some hours in the antechamber while
he was in one of the paroxysms of his malady. Meanwhile the Houses were
sitting. It was Saturday, the seventh, the day on which the Commons
had resolved to take into consideration the question of the union with
Scotland. But that subject was not mentioned. It was known that the King
had but a few hours to live; and the members asked each other anxiously
whether it was likely that the Abjuration and money bills would be
passed before he died. After sitting long in the expectation of a
message, the Commons adjourned till six in the afternoon. By that time
William had recovered himself sufficiently to put the stamp on the
parchment which authorised his commissioners to act for him. In the
evening, when the Houses had assembled, Black Rod knocked. The Commons
were summoned to the bar of the Lords; the commission was read, the
Abjuration Bill and the Malt Bill became laws, and both Houses adjourned
till nine o'clock in the morning of the following day. The following day
was Sunday. But there was little chance that William would live through
the night. It was of the highest importance that, within the shortest
possible time after his decease, the successor designated by the Bill
of Rights and the Act of Succession should receive the homage of the
Estates of the Realm, and be publicly proclaimed in the Council: and the
most rigid Pharisee in the Society for the Reformation of Manners could
hardly deny that it was lawful to save the state, even on the Sabbath.
The King meanwhile was sinking fast. Albemarle had arrived at Kensington
from the Hague, exhausted by rapid travelling. His master kindly bade
him go to rest for some hours, and then summoned him to make his report.
That report was in all respects satisfactory. The States General were
in the best temper; the troops, the provisions and the magazines were
in the best order. Every thing was in readiness for an early campaign.
William received the intelligence with the calmness of a man whose
work was done. He was under no illusion as to his danger. "I am fast
drawing," he said, "to my end. " His end was worthy of his life. His
intellect was not for a moment clouded. His fortitude was the more
admirable because he was not willing to die. He had very lately said to
one of those whom he most loved: "You know that I never feared death;
there have been times when I should have wished it; but, now that this
great new prospect is opening before me, I do wish to stay here a little
longer. " Yet no weakness, no querulousness, disgraced the noble close
of that noble career. To the physicians the King returned his thanks
graciously and gently. "I know that you have done all that skill
and learning could do for me; but the case is beyond your art; and I
submit. " From the words which escaped him he seemed to be frequently
engaged in mental prayer. Burnet and Tenison remained many hours in
the sick room. He professed to them his firm belief in the truth of the
Christian religion, and received the sacrament from their hands with
great seriousness. The antechambers were crowded all night with lords
and privy councillors. He ordered several of them to be called in,
and exerted himself to take leave of them with a few kind and cheerful
words. Among the English who were admitted to his bedside were
Devonshire and Ormond. But there were in the crowd those who felt as no
Englishman could feel, friends of his youth who had been true to him,
and to whom he had been true, through all vicissitudes of fortune; who
had served him with unalterable fidelity when his Secretaries of State,
his Treasury and his Admiralty had betrayed him; who had never on any
field of battle, or in an atmosphere tainted with loathsome and deadly
disease, shrunk from placing their own lives in jeopardy to save his,
and whose truth he had at the cost of his own popularity rewarded
with bounteous munificence. He strained his feeble voice to thank
Auverquerque for the affectionate and loyal services of thirty years.
To Albemarle he gave the keys of his closet, and of his private drawers.
"You know," he said, "what to do with them. " By this time he could
scarcely respire. "Can this," he said to the physicians, "last long? " He
was told that the end was approaching. He swallowed a cordial, and asked
for Bentinck. Those were his last articulate words. Bentinck instantly
came to the bedside, bent down, and placed his ear close to the King's
mouth. The lips of the dying man moved; but nothing could be heard. The
King took the hand of his earliest friend, and pressed it tenderly to
his heart. In that moment, no doubt, all that had cast a slight passing
cloud over their long and pure friendship was forgotten. It was now
between seven and eight in the morning. He closed his eyes, and gasped
for breath. The bishops knelt down and read the commendatory prayer.
When it ended William was no more.
When his remains were laid out, it was found that he wore next to his
skin a small piece of black silk riband. The lords in waiting ordered
it to be taken off. It contained a gold ring and a lock of the hair of
Mary.
*****
[Footnote 1: Evelyn saw the Mentz edition of the Offices among Lord
Spencer's books in April 1699. Markland in his preface to the Sylvae of
Statius acknowledges his obligations to the very rare Parmesan edition
in Lord Spencer's collection. As to the Virgil of Zarottus, which
his Lordship bought for 46L, see the extracts from Warley's Diary, in
Nichols's Literary Anecdotes, i. 90. ]
[Footnote 2: The more minutely we examine the history of the decline and
fall of Lacedaemon, the more reason we shall find to admire the sagacity
of Somers. The first great humiliation which befel the Lacedaemonians
was the affair of Sphacteria. It is remarkable that on this occasion
they were vanquished by men who made a trade of war. The force which
Cleon carried out with him from Athens to the Bay of Pyles, and to which
the event of the conflict is to be chiefly ascribed, consisted entirely
of mercenaries, archers from Scythia and light infantry from Thrace. The
victory gained by the Lacedaemonians over a great confederate army
at Tegea retrieved that military reputation which the disaster of
Sphacteria had impaired. Yet even at Tegea it was signally proved that
the Lacedaemonians, though far superior to occasional soldiers, were not
equal to professional soldiers. On every point but one the allies were
put to rout; but on one point the Lacedaemonians gave way; and that was
the point where they were opposed to a brigade of a thousand Argives,
picked men, whom the state to which they belonged had during many years
trained to war at the public charge, and who were, in fact a standing
army. After the battle of Tegea, many years elapsed before the
Lacedaemonians sustained a defeat. At length a calamity befel them which
astonished all their neighbours. A division of the army of Agesilaus was
cut off and destroyed almost to a man; and this exploit, which seemed
almost portentous to the Greeks of that age, was achieved by Iphicrates,
at the head of a body of mercenary light infantry. But it was from the
day of Leuctya that the fall of Spate became rapid and violent. Some
time before that day the Thebans had resolved to follow the example
set many years before by the Argives. Some hundreds of athletic youths,
carefully selected, were set apart, under the names of the City Band and
the Sacred Band, to form a standing army. Their business was war. They
encamped in the citadel; they were supported at the expense of the
community; and they became, under assiduous training, the first soldiers
in Greece. They were constantly victorious till they were opposed
to Philip's admirably disciplined phalanx at Charonea; and even at
Chaeronea they were not defeated but slain in their ranks, fighting to
the last. It was this band, directed by the skill of great captains,
which gave the decisive blow to the Lacedaemonian power. It is to be
observed that there was no degeneracy among the Lacedaemonians. Even
down to the time of Pyrrhus they seem to have been in all military
qualities equal to their ancestors who conquered at Plataea. But their
ancestors at Plataea had not such enemies to encounter. ]
[Footnote 3: L'Hermitage, Dec. 3/13 7/17, 1697. ]
[Footnote 4: Commons' Journals, Dec. 3. 1697. L'Hermitage, Dec 7/17. ]
[Footnote 5: L'Hermitage, Dec. 15/24. , Dec. 14/24. , Journals. ]
[Footnote 6: The first act of Farquhar's Trip to the Jubilee, the
passions which about his time agitated society are exhibited with much
spirit. Alderman Smuggler sees Colonel Standard and exclaims, "There's
another plague of the nation a red coat and feather. " "I'm disbanded,"
says the Colonel. "This very morning, in Hyde Park, my brave regiment, a
thousand men that looked like lions yesterday, were scattered and looked
as poor and simple as the herd of deer that grazed beside them. " "Fal al
deral! " cries the Alderman: "I'll have a bonfire this night, as high as
the monument. " "A bonfire! " answered the soldier; "then dry, withered,
ill nature! had not those brave fellows' swords' defended you, your
house had been a bonfire ere this about your ears. "]
[Footnote 7: L'Hermitage, January 11/21]
[Footnote 8: That a portion at least of the native population of Ireland
looked to the Parliament at Westminster for protection against the
tyranny of the Parliament at Dublin appears from a paper entitled The
Case of the Roman Catholic Nation of Ireland. This paper, written in
1711 by one of the oppressed race and religion, is in a MS. belonging to
Lord Fingall. The Parliament of Ireland is accused of treating the Irish
worse than the Turks treat the Christians, worse than the Egyptians
treated the Israelites. "Therefore," says the writer, "they (the
Irish) apply themselves to the present Parliament of Great Britain as
a Parliament of nice honour and stanch justice. . . Their request then is
that this great Parliament may make good the Treaty of Limerick in all
the Civil Articles. " In order to propitiate those to whom he makes this
appeal, he accuses the Irish Parliament of encroaching on the supreme
authority of the English Parliament, and charges the colonists generally
with ingratitude to the mother country to which they owe so much. ]
[Footnote 9: London Gazette, Jan 6. 1697/8; Postman of the same date;
Van Cleverskirke, Jan. 7/17; L'Hermitage, Jan. 4/14/, 7/17; Evelyn's
Diary; Ward's London Spy; William to Heinsius, Jan. 7/17. "The loss,"
the King writes, "is less to me than it would be to another person,
for I cannot live there. Yet it is serious. " So late as 1758 Johnson
described a furious Jacobite as firmly convinced that William burned
down Whitehall in order to steal the furniture. Idler, No. 10. Pope,
in Windsor Forest, a poem which has a stronger tinge of Toryism than
anything else that he ever wrote, predicts the speedy restoration of the
fallen palace.
"I see, I see, where two fair cities bend
their ample bow, a new Whitehall ascend. "
See Ralph's bitter remarks on the fate of Whitehall. ]
[Footnote 10: As to the Czar: London Gazette; Van Citters, 1698; Jan.
11/21. 14/24 Mar 11/21, Mar 29/April 8; L'Hermitage 11/21, 18/28, Jan
25/Feb 4, Feb 1/11 8/18, 11/21 Feb 22/Mar 4; Feb 25/Mar 7, Mar 1/4, Mar
29/April 8/ April 22/ May 2 See also Evelyn's Diary; Burnet Postman,
Jan. 13. 15. , Feb. 10 12, 24. ; Mar. 24. 26. 31. As to Russia, see
Hakluyt, Purchas, Voltaire, St. Simon. Estat de Russie par Margeret,
Paris, 1607. State of Russia, London, 1671. La Relation des Trois
Ambassades de M. Le Comte de Carlisle, Amsterdam, 1672. (There is an
English translation from this French original. ) North's Life of Dudley
North. Seymour's History of London, ii. 426. Pepys and Evelyn on the
Russian Embassies; Milton's account of Muscovy. On the personal habits
of the Czar see the Memoirs of the Margravine of Bayreuth. ]
[Footnote 11: It is worth while to transcribe the words of the
engagement which Lewis, a chivalrous and a devout prince, violated
without the smallest scruple. "Nous, Louis, par la grace de Dieu, Roi
tres Chretien de France et de Navarre, promettons pour notre honneur, en
foi et parole de Roi, jurons sue la croix, les saints Evangiles, et
les canons de la Messe, que nous avons touches, que nous observerons
et accomplirons entierement de bonne foi tous et chacun des points et
articles contenus au traite de paix, renonciation, et amitie. "]
[Footnote 12: George Psalmanazar's account of the state of the south
of France at this time is curious. On the high road near Lyons he
frequently passed corpses fastened to posts. "These," he says, "were the
bodies of highwaymen, or rather of soldiers, sailors, mariners and even
galley slaves, disbanded after the peace of Reswick, who, having neither
home nor occupation, used to infest the roads in troops, plunder towns
and villages, and, when taken, were hanged at the county town by dozens,
or even scores sometimes, after which their bodies were thus exposed
along the highway in terrorem. "]
[Footnote 13: "Il est de bonne foi dans tout ce qu'il fait. Son procede
est droit et sincere. " Tallard to Lewis, July 3. 1698. ]
[Footnote 14: "Le Roi d'Angleterre, Sire, va tres sincerement jusqu'a
present; et j'ose dire que s'il entre une fois en traite avec Votre
Majeste, il le tiendra de bonne foi. "--"Si je l'ose dire a V. M. , il
est tres penetrant, et a l'esprit juste. Il s'apercevra bientôt qu'on
barguigne si les choses trainent trop de long. " July 8. ]
[Footnote 15: I will quote from the despatches of Lewis to Tallard three
or four passages which show that the value of the kingdom of the Two
Sicilies was quite justly appreciated at Versailles. "A l'egard du
royaume de Naples et de Sicile le roi d'Angleterre objectera que les
places de ces etats entre mes mains me rendront maitre du commerce de
la Mediteranee. Vous pourrez en ce cas laissez entendre, comme de vous
meme, qu'il serait si difficile de conserver ces royaumes unis a ma
couronne, que les depenses necessaires pour y envoyer des secours
seraient si grands, et qu'autrefois il a tant coute a la France pour les
maintenir dans son obeissance, que vraisemblablement j'etablirois un roi
pour les gouverner, et que peut-etre ce serait le partage d'un de mes
petits-fils qui voudroit regner independamment. " April 7/17 1698. "Les
royaumes de Naples et de Sicile ne peuvent se regarder comme un partage
dont mon fils puisse se contenter pour lui tenir lieu de tous ses
droits. Les exemples du passe n'ont que trop appris combien ces etats
content a la France le peu d'utilite dont ils sont pour elle, et la
difficulte de les conserver. " May 16. 1698. "Je considere la cession de
ces royaumes comme une source continuelle de depenses et d'embarras. Il
n'en a que trop coute a la France pour les conserver; et l'experience
a fait voir la necessite indispensable d'y entretenir toujours des
troupes, et d'y envoyer incessamment des vaisseaux, et combien toutes
ces peines ont ete inutiles. " May 29. 1698. It would be easy to cite
other passages of the same kind.
