No More Learning

Before the end of April the English fleet was ready to
sail. Three noble ships, just launched from our dockyards, appeared
for the first time on the water. [263] William had been hastening the
maritime preparations of the United Provinces; and his exertions had
been successful. On the twenty-ninth of April a fine squadron from the
Texel appeared in the Downs. Soon came the North Holland squadron,
the Maes squadron, the Zealand squadron. [264] The whole force of the
confederate powers was assembled at Saint Helen's in the second week
of May, more than ninety sail of the line, manned by between thirty and
forty thousand of the finest seamen of the two great maritime nations.
Russell had the chief command. He was assisted by Sir Ralph Delaval,
Sir John Ashley, Sir Cloudesley Shovel, Rear Admiral Carter, and Rear
Admiral Rooke. Of the Dutch officers Van Almonde was highest in rank.

No mightier armament had ever appeared in the British Channel. There was
little reason for apprehending that such a force could be defeated in a
fair conflict. Nevertheless there was great uneasiness in London. It was
known that there was a Jacobite party in the navy. Alarming rumours had
worked their way round from France. It was said that the enemy reckoned
on the cooperation of some of those officers on whose fidelity, in this
crisis, the safety of the State might depend. Russell, as far as can now
be discovered, was still unsuspected. But others, who were probably less
criminal, had been more indiscreet. At all the coffee houses admirals
and captains were mentioned by name as traitors who ought to be
instantly cashiered, if not shot. It was even confidently affirmed that
some of the guilty had been put under arrest, and others turned out of
the service. The Queen and her counsellors were in a great strait. It
was not easy to say whether the danger of trusting the suspected persons
or the danger of removing them were the greater. Mary, with many painful
misgivings, resolved, and the event proved that she resolved wisely,
to treat the evil reports as calumnious, to make a solemn appeal to the
honour of the accused gentlemen, and then to trust the safety of her
kingdom to their national and professional spirit.

On the fifteenth of May a great assembly of officers was convoked at
Saint Helen's on board the Britannia, a fine three decker, from which
Russell's flag was flying. The Admiral told them that he had received a
despatch which he was charged to read to them. It was from Nottingham.
The Queen, the Secretary wrote, had been informed that stories deeply
affecting the character of the navy were in circulation. It had
even been affirmed that she had found herself under the necessity of
dismissing many officers. But Her Majesty was determined to believe
nothing against those brave servants of the State. The gentlemen who
had been so foully slandered might be assured that she placed entire
reliance on them. This letter was admirably calculated to work on those
to whom it was addressed. Very few of them probably had been guilty of
any worse offence than rash and angry talk over their wine. They were as
yet only grumblers. If they had fancied that they were marked men, they
might in selfdefence have become traitors. They became enthusiastically
loyal as soon as they were assured that the Queen reposed entire
confidence in their loyalty. They eagerly signed an address in
which they entreated her to believe that they would, with the utmost
resolution and alacrity, venture their lives in defence of her rights,
of English freedom and of the Protestant religion, against all foreign
and Popish invaders. "God," they added, "preserve your person, direct
your counsels, and prosper your arms; and let all your people say Amen. "
[265]

The sincerity of these professions was soon brought to the test. A
few hours after the meeting on board of the Britannia the masts
of Tourville's squadron were seen from the cliffs of Portland. One
messenger galloped with the news from Weymouth to London, and roused
Whitehall at three in the morning. Another took the coast road, and
carried the intelligence to Russell. All was ready; and on the morning
of the seventeenth of May the allied fleet stood out to sea. [266]

Tourville had with him only his own squadron, consisting of forty-four
ships of the line. But he had received positive orders to protect the
descent on England, and not to decline a battle. Though these orders had
been given before it was known at Versailles that the Dutch and
English fleets had joined, he was not disposed to take on himself the
responsibility of disobedience. He still remembered with bitterness the
reprimand which his extreme caution had drawn upon him after the fight
of Beachy Head. He would not again be told that he was a timid and
unenterprising commander, that he had no courage but the vulgar courage
of a common sailor. He was also persuaded that the odds against him were
rather apparent than real. He believed, on the authority of James and
Melfort, that the English seamen, from the flag officers down to the
cabin boys, were Jacobites. Those who fought would fight with half
a heart; and there would probably be numerous desertions at the most
critical moment. Animated by such hopes he sailed from Brest, steered
first towards the north east, came in sight of the coast of Dorsetshire,
and then struck across the Channel towards La Hogue, where the army
which he was to convoy to England had already begun to embark on board
of the transports. He was within a few leagues of Barfleur when, before
daybreak, on the morning of the nineteenth of May, he saw the great
armament of the allies stretching along the eastern horizon. He
determined to bear down on them. By eight the two lines of battle were
formed; but it was eleven before the firing began. It soon became plain
that the English, from the Admiral downward, were resolved to do their
duty. Russell had visited all his ships, and exhorted all his crews.
"If your commanders play false," he said, "overboard with them, and
with myself the first. " There was no defection. There was no slackness.
Carter was the first who broke the French line. He was struck by a
splinter of one of his own yard arms, and fell dying on the deck. He
would not be carried below. He would not let go his sword. "Fight the
ship," were his last words: "fight the ship as long as she can swim. "
The battle lasted till four in the afternoon. The roar of the guns
was distinctly heard more than twenty miles off by the army which was
encamped on the coast of Normandy. During the earlier part of the day
the wind was favourable to the French; they were opposed to half of the
allied fleet; and against that half they maintained the conflict with
their usual courage and with more than their usual seamanship. After a
hard and doubtful fight of five hours, Tourville thought that enough had
been done to maintain the honour of the white flag, and began to draw
off. But by this time the wind had veered, and was with the allies. They
were now able to avail themselves of their great superiority of force.
They came on fast. The retreat of the French became a flight. Tourville
fought his own ship desperately. She was named, in allusion to Lewis's
favourite emblem, the Royal Sun, and was widely renowned as the finest
vessel in the world. It was reported among the English sailors that she
was adorned with an image of the Great King, and that he appeared there,
as he appeared in the Place of Victories, with vanquished nations in
chains beneath his feet. The gallant ship, surrounded by enemies, lay
like a great fortress on the sea, scattering death on every side from
her hundred and four portholes. She was so formidably manned that all
attempts to board her failed. Long after sunset, she got clear of her
assailants, and, with all her scuppers spouting blood, made for the
coast of Normandy. She had suffered so much that Tourville hastily
removed his flag to a ship of ninety guns which was named the Ambitious.
By this time his fleet was scattered far over the sea. About twenty of
his smallest ships made their escape by a road which was too perilous
for any courage but the courage of despair. In the double darkness of
night and of a thick sea fog, they ran, with all their sails spread,
through the boiling waves and treacherous rocks of the Race of Alderney,
and, by a strange good fortune, arrived without a single disaster at
Saint Maloes. The pursuers did not venture to follow the fugitives into
that terrible strait, the place of innumerable shipwrecks. [267]

Those French vessels which were too bulky to venture into the Race of
Alderney fled to the havens of the Cotentin. The Royal Sun and two other
three deckers reached Cherburg in safety. The Ambitious, with twelve
other ships, all first rates or second rates, took refuge in the Bay of
La Hogue, close to the headquarters of the army of James.

The three ships which had fled to Cherburg were closely chased by an
English squadron under the command of Delaval. He found them hauled
up into shoal water where no large man of war could get at them. He
therefore determined to attack them with his fireships and boats. The
service was gallantly and successfully performed. In a short time the
Royal Sun and her two consorts were burned to ashes. Part of the crews
escaped to the shore; and part fell into the hands of the English. [268]

Meanwhile Russell with the greater part of his victorious fleet had
blockaded the Bay of La Hogue. Here, as at Cherburg, the French men of
war had been drawn up into shallow water. They lay close to the camp
of the army which was destined for the invasion of England. Six of them
were moored under a fort named Lisset. The rest lay under the guns of
another fort named Saint Vaast, where James had fixed his headquarters,
and where the Union flag, variegated by the crosses of Saint George
and Saint Andrew, hung by the side of the white flag of France. Marshal
Bellefonds had planted several batteries which, it was thought, would
deter the boldest enemy from approaching either Fort Lisset or Fort
Saint Vaast. James, however, who knew something of English seamen, was
not perfectly at ease, and proposed to send strong bodies of soldiers on
board of the ships. But Tourville would not consent to put such a slur
on his profession.

Russell meanwhile was preparing for an attack. On the afternoon of the
twenty-third of May all was ready. A flotilla consisting of sloops, of
fireships, and of two hundred boats, was entrusted to the command
of Rooke. The whole armament was in the highest spirits. The rowers,
flushed by success, and animated by the thought that they were going
to fight under the eyes of the French and Irish troops who had been
assembled for the purpose of subjugating England, pulled manfully and
with loud huzzas towards the six huge wooden castles which lay close to
Fort Lisset. The French, though an eminently brave people, have always
been more liable to sudden panics than their phlegmatic neighbours the
English and Germans. On this day there was a panic both in the fleet and
in the army. Tourville ordered his sailors to man their boats, and would
have led them to encounter the enemy in the bay. But his example and his
exhortations were vain. His boats turned round and fled in confusion.
The ships were abandoned. The cannonade from Fort Lisset was so feeble
and ill directed that it did no execution. The regiments on the beach,
after wasting a few musket shots, drew off. The English boarded the
men of war, set them on fire, and having performed this great service
without the loss of a single life, retreated at a late hour with the
retreating tide. The bay was in a blaze during the night; and now and
then a loud explosion announced that the flames had reached a powder
room or a tier of loaded guns. At eight the next morning the tide came
back strong; and with the tide came back Rooke and his two hundred
boats. The enemy made a faint attempt to defend the vessels which were
near Fort Saint Vaast. During a few minutes the batteries did some
execution among the crews of our skiffs; but the struggle was soon
over. The French poured fast out of their ships on one side; the English
poured in as fast on the other, and, with loud shouts, turned the
captured guns against the shore. The batteries were speedily silenced.
James and Melfort, Bellefonds and Tourville, looked on in helpless
despondency while the second conflagration proceeded. The conquerors,
leaving the ships of war in flames, made their way into an inner basin
where many transports lay. Eight of these vessels were set on fire.
Several were taken in tow. The rest would have been either destroyed or
carried off, had not the sea again begun to ebb. It was impossible to do
more, and the victorious flotilla slowly retired, insulting the hostile
camp with a thundering chant of "God save the King. "

Thus ended, at noon on the twenty-fourth of May, the great conflict
which had raged during five days over a wide extent of sea and shore.
One English fireship had perished in its calling. Sixteen French men of
war, all noble vessels, and eight of them three-deckers, had been sunk
or burned down to the keel. The battle is called, from the place where
it terminated, the battle of La Hogue. [269]

The news was received in London with boundless exultation. In the fight
on the open sea, indeed, the numerical superiority of the allies had
been so great that they had little reason to boast of their success. But
the courage and skill with which the crews of the English boats had,
in a French harbour, in sight of a French army, and under the fire of
French batteries, destroyed a fine French fleet, amply justified the
pride with which our fathers pronounced the name of La Hogue. That we
may fully enter into their feelings, we must remember that this was
the first great check that had ever been given to the arms of Lewis the
Fourteenth, and the first great victory that the English had gained over
the French since the day of Agincourt. The stain left on our fame by the
shameful defeat of Beachy Head was effaced. This time the glory was all
our own. The Dutch had indeed done their duty, as they have always done
it in maritime war, whether fighting on our side or against us, whether
victorious or vanquished. But the English had borne the brunt of the
fight. Russell who commanded in chief was an Englishman. Delaval who
directed the attack on Cherburg was an Englishman. Rooke who led the
flotilla into the Bay of La Hogue was an Englishman. The only two
officers of note who had fallen, Admiral Carter and Captain Hastings of
the Sandwich, were Englishmen. Yet the pleasure with which the good news
was received here must not be ascribed solely or chiefly to national
pride. The island was safe. The pleasant pastures, cornfields and
commons of Hampshire and Surrey would not be the seat of war. The houses
and gardens, the kitchens and dairies, the cellars and plate chests, the
wives and daughters of our gentry and clergy would not be at the mercy
of Irish Rapparees, who had sacked the dwellings and skinned the cattle
of the Englishry of Leinster, or of French dragoons accustomed to live
at free quarters on the Protestants of Auvergne. Whigs and Tories joined
in thanking God for this great deliverance; and the most respectable
nonjurors could not but be glad at heart that the rightful King was not
to be brought back by an army of foreigners.

The public joy was therefore all but universal. During several days the
bells of London pealed without ceasing. Flags were flying on all the
steeples. Rows of candles were in all the windows. Bonfires were at
all the corners of the streets. [270] The sense which the government
entertained of the services of the navy was promptly, judiciously and
gracefully manifested. Sidney and Portland were sent to meet the fleet
at Portsmouth, and were accompanied by Rochester, as the representative
of the Tories. The three Lords took down with them thirty-seven thousand
pounds in coin, which they were to distribute as a donative among the
sailors. [271] Gold medals were given to the officers. [272] The remains
of Hastings and Carter were brought on shore with every mark of honour.
Carter was buried at Portsmouth, with a great display of military pomp.
[273] The corpse of Hastings was brought up to London, and laid, with
unusual solemnity, under the pavement of Saint James's Church. The
footguards with reversed arms escorted the hearse. Four royal state
carriages, each drawn by six horses, were in the procession; a crowd
of men of quality in mourning cloaks filled the pews; and the Bishop of
Lincoln preached the funeral sermon. [274] While such marks of respect
were paid to the slain, the wounded were not neglected. Fifty surgeons,
plentifully supplied with instruments, bandages, and drugs, were sent
down in all haste from London to Portsmouth. [275] It is not easy for us
to form a notion of the difficulty which there then was in providing at
short notice commodious shelter and skilful attendance for hundreds of
maimed and lacerated men. At present every county, every large town,
can boast of some spacious palace in which the poorest labourer who has
fractured a limb may find an excellent bed, an able medical attendant, a
careful nurse, medicines of the best quality, and nourishment such as an
invalid requires. But there was not then, in the whole realm, a single
infirmary supported by voluntary contribution. Even in the capital the
only edifices open to the wounded were the two ancient hospitals of
Saint Thomas and Saint Bartholomew. The Queen gave orders that in both
these hospitals arrangements should be made at the public charge for
the reception of patients from the fleet. [276] At the same time it
was announced that a noble and lasting memorial of the gratitude which
England felt for the courage and patriotism of her sailors would soon
rise on a site eminently appropriate. Among the suburban residences of
our kings, that which stood at Greenwich had long held a distinguished
place. Charles the Second liked the situation, and determined to rebuild
the house and to improve the gardens. Soon after his Restoration, he
began to erect, on a spot almost washed by the Thames at high tide, a
mansion of vast extent and cost. Behind the palace were planted long
avenues of trees which, when William reigned, were scarcely more than
saplings, but which have now covered with their massy shade the summer
rambles of several generations. On the slope which has long been the
scene of the holiday sports of the Londoners, were constructed flights
of terraces, of which the vestiges may still be discerned. The Queen now
publicly declared, in her husband's name, that the building commenced by
Charles should be completed, and should be a retreat for seamen disabled
in the service of their country. [277]

One of the happiest effects produced by the good news was the calming
of the public mind. During about a month the nation had been hourly
expecting an invasion and a rising, and had consequently been in an
irritable and suspicious mood. In many parts of England a nonjuror could
not show himself without great risk of being insulted. A report that
arms were hidden in a house sufficed to bring a furious mob to the door.
The mansion of one Jacobite gentleman in Kent had been attacked, and,
after a fight in which several shots were fired, had been stormed and
pulled down. [278] Yet such riots were by no means the worst symptoms of
the fever which had inflamed the whole society. The exposure of Fuller,
in February, had, as it seemed, put an end to the practices of that vile
tribe of which Oates was the patriarch. During some weeks, indeed, the
world was disposed to be unreasonably incredulous about plots. But in
April there was a reaction. The French and Irish were coming. There was
but too much reason to believe that there were traitors in the island.
Whoever pretended that he could point out those traitors was sure to be
heard with attention; and there was not wanting a false witness to avail
himself of the golden opportunity.

This false witness was named Robert Young. His history was in his own
lifetime so fully investigated, and so much of his correspondence has
been preserved, that the whole man is before us. His character is indeed
a curious study. His birthplace was a subject of dispute among three
nations. The English pronounced him Irish. The Irish, not being
ambitious of the honour of having him for a countryman, affirmed that he
was born in Scotland. Wherever he may have been born, it is impossible
to doubt where he was bred; for his phraseology is precisely that of
the Teagues who were, in his time, favourite characters on our stage. He
called himself a priest of the Established Church; but he was in truth
only a deacon; and his deacon's orders he had obtained by producing
forged certificates of his learning and moral character. Long before the
Revolution he held curacies in various parts of Ireland; but he did
not remain many days in any spot. He was driven from one place by the
scandal which was the effect of his lawless amours. He rode away from
another place on a borrowed horse, which he never returned. He settled
in a third parish, and was taken up for bigamy. Some letters which he
wrote on this occasion from the gaol of Cavan have been preserved. He
assured each of his wives, with the most frightful imprecations, that
she alone was the object of his love; and he thus succeeded in inducing
one of them to support him in prison, and the other to save his life by
forswearing herself at the assizes.
The only specimens which remain to
us of his method of imparting religious instruction are to be found in
these epistles. He compares himself to David, the man after God's own
heart, who had been guilty both of adultery and murder. He declares
that he repents; he prays for the forgiveness of the Almighty, and then
intreats his dear honey, for Christ's sake, to perjure herself. Having
narrowly escaped the gallows, he wandered during several years about
Ireland and England, begging, stealing, cheating, personating, forging,
and lay in many prisons under many names. In 1684 he was convicted at
Bury of having fraudulently counterfeited Sancroft's signature, and was
sentenced to the pillory and to imprisonment. From his dungeon he wrote
to implore the Primate's mercy. The letter may still be read with all
the original bad grammar and bad spelling. [279] The writer acknowledged
his guilt, wished that his eyes were a fountain of water, declared that
he should never know peace till he had received episcopal absolution,
and professed a mortal hatred of Dissenters. As all this contrition
and all this orthodoxy produced no effect, the penitent, after swearing
bitterly to be revenged on Sancroft, betook himself to another device.
The Western Insurrection had just broken out. The magistrates all over
the country were but too ready to listen to any accusation that might be
brought against Whigs and Nonconformists. Young declared on oath that,
to his knowledge, a design had been formed in Suffolk against the life
of King James, and named a peer, several gentlemen, and ten Presbyterian
ministers, as parties to the plot. Some of the accused were brought to
trial; and Young appeared in the witness box; but the story which he
told was proved by overwhelming evidence to be false. Soon after the
Revolution he was again convicted of forgery, pilloried for the fourth
or fifth time, and sent to Newgate. While he lay there, he determined to
try whether he should be more fortunate as an accuser of Jacobites than
he had been as an accuser of Puritans. He first addressed himself to
Tillotson. There was a horrible plot against their Majesties, a plot as
deep as hell; and some of the first men in England were concerned in it.
Tillotson, though he placed little confidence in information coming
from such a source, thought that the oath which he had taken as a Privy
Councillor made it his duty to mention the subject to William. William,
after his fashion, treated the matter very lightly. "I am confident," he
said, "that this is a villany; and I will have nobody disturbed on such
grounds. " After this rebuff, Young remained some time quiet. But when
William was on the Continent, and when the nation was agitated by the
apprehension of a French invasion and of a Jacobite insurrection, a
false accuser might hope to obtain a favourable audience. The mere oath
of a man who was well known to the turnkeys of twenty gaols was not
likely to injure any body. But Young was master of a weapon which is, of
all weapons, the most formidable to innocence. He had lived during
some years by counterfeiting hands, and had at length attained such
consummate skill in that bad art that even experienced clerks who
were conversant with manuscript could scarcely, after the most minute
comparison, discover any difference between his imitations and the
originals. He had succeeded in making a collection of papers written by
men of note who were suspected of disaffection. Some autographs he had
stolen; and some he had obtained by writing in feigned names to ask
after the characters of servants or curates. He now drew up a paper
purporting to be an Association for the Restoration of the banished
King. This document set forth that the subscribers bound themselves in
the presence of God to take arms for His Majesty, and to seize on the
Prince of Orange, dead or alive. To the Association Young appended the
names of Marlborough, of Cornbury, of Salisbury, of Sancroft, and of
Sprat, Bishop of Rochester and Dean of Westminster.

The next thing to be done was to put the paper into some hiding place in
the house of one of the persons whose signatures had been counterfeited.
As Young could not quit Newgate, he was forced to employ a subordinate
agent for this purpose. He selected a wretch named Blackhead, who
had formerly been convicted of perjury and sentenced to have his ears
clipped. The selection was not happy; for Blackhead had none of the
qualities which the trade of a false witness requires except wickedness.
There was nothing plausible about him. His voice was harsh. Treachery
was written in all the lines of his yellow face. He had no invention, no
presence of mind, and could do little more than repeat by rote the lies
taught him by others.

This man, instructed by his accomplice, repaired to Sprat's palace at
Bromley, introduced himself there as the confidential servant of an
imaginary Doctor of Divinity, delivered to the Bishop, on bended knee,
a letter ingeniously manufactured by Young, and received, with the
semblance of profound reverence, the episcopal benediction. The servants
made the stranger welcome. He was taken to the cellar, drank their
master's health, and entreated them to let him see the house. They could
not venture to show any of the private apartments. Blackhead, therefore,
after begging importunately, but in vain, to be suffered to have one
look at the study, was forced to content himself with dropping the
Association into a flowerpot which stood in a parlour near the kitchen.

Every thing having been thus prepared, Young informed the ministers that
he could tell them something of the highest importance to the welfare of
the State, and earnestly begged to be heard. His request reached them
on perhaps the most anxious day of an anxious month. Tourville had just
stood out to sea. The army of James was embarking. London was agitated
by reports about the disaffection of the naval officers. The Queen was
deliberating whether she should cashier those who were suspected, or try
the effect of an appeal to their honour and patriotism. At such a moment
the ministers could not refuse to listen to any person who professed
himself able to give them valuable information. Young and his accomplice
were brought before the Privy Council. They there accused Marlborough,
Cornbury, Salisbury, Sancroft and Sprat of high treason. These great
men, Young said, had invited James to invade England, and had promised
to join him. The eloquent and ingenious Bishop of Rochester had
undertaken to draw up a Declaration which would inflame the nation
against the government of King William. The conspirators were bound
together by a written instrument. That instrument, signed by their
own hands, would be found at Bromley if careful search was made. Young
particularly requested that the messengers might be ordered to examine
the Bishop's flowerpots.

The ministers were seriously alarmed. The story was circumstantial; and
part of it was probable. Marlborough's dealings with Saint Germains were
well known to Caermarthen, to Nottingham, and to Sidney. Cornbury was
a tool of Marlborough, and was the son of a nonjuror and of a notorious
plotter. Salisbury was a Papist. Sancroft had, not many months before,
been, with too much show of reason, suspected of inviting the French to
invade England. Of all the accused persons Sprat was the most unlikely
to be concerned in any hazardous design. He had neither enthusiasm
nor constancy. Both his ambition and his party spirit had always been
effectually kept in order by his love of ease and his anxiety for his
own safety. He had been guilty of some criminal compliances in the hope
of gaining the favour of James, had sate in the High Commission, had
concurred in several iniquitous decrees pronounced by that court, and
had, with trembling hands and faltering voice, read the Declaration of
Indulgence in the choir of the Abbey. But there he had stopped. As soon
as it began to be whispered that the civil and religious constitution
of England would speedily be vindicated by extraordinary means, he had
resigned the powers which he had during two years exercised in defiance
of law, and had hastened to make his peace with his clerical brethren.
He had in the Convention voted for a Regency; but he had taken the oaths
without hesitation; he had borne a conspicuous part in the coronation of
the new Sovereigns; and by his skilful hand had been added to the Form
of Prayer used on the fifth of November those sentences in which the
Church expresses her gratitude for the second great deliverance wrought
on that day. [280] Such a man, possessed of a plentiful income, of a
seat in the House of Lords, of one agreeable house among the elms
of Bromley, and of another in the cloisters of Westminster, was very
unlikely to run the risk of martyrdom. He was not, indeed, on perfectly
good terms with the government. For the feeling which, next to
solicitude for his own comfort and repose, seems to have had the
greatest influence on his public conduct, was his dislike of
the Puritans; a dislike which sprang, not from bigotry, but from
Epicureanism. Their austerity was a reproach to his slothful and
luxurious life; their phraseology shocked his fastidious taste; and,
where they were concerned, his ordinary good nature forsook him.
Loathing the nonconformists as he did, he was not likely to be
very zealous for a prince whom the nonconformists regarded as their
protector. But Sprat's faults afforded ample security that he would
never, from spleen against William, engage in any plot to bring back
James. Why Young should have assigned the most perilous part in an
enterprise full of peril to a man singularly pliant, cautious and
selfindulgent, it is difficult to say.

The first step which the ministers took was to send Marlborough to the
Tower. He was by far the most formidable of all the accused persons; and
that he had held a traitorous correspondence with Saint Germains was a
fact which, whether Young were perjured or not, the Queen and her chief
advisers knew to be true. One of the Clerks of the Council and several
messengers were sent down to Bromley with a warrant from Nottingham.
Sprat was taken into custody. All the apartments in which it could
reasonably be supposed that he would have hidden an important document
were searched, the library, the diningroom, the drawingroom, the
bedchamber, and the adjacent closets. His papers were strictly examined.
Much food prose was found, and probably some bad verse, but no treason.
The messengers pried into every flowerpot that they could find, but to
no purpose. It never occurred to them to look into the room in which
Blackhead had hidden the Association: for that room was near the offices
occupied by the servants, and was little used by the Bishop and his
family. The officers returned to London with their prisoner, but without
the document which, if it had been found, might have been fatal to him.

Late at night he was brought to Westminster, and was suffered to
sleep at his deanery. All his bookcases and drawers were examined; and
sentinels were posted at the door of his bedchamber, but with strict
orders to behave civilly and not to disturb the family.

On the following day he was brought before the Council. The examination
was conducted by Nottingham with great humanity and courtesy. The
Bishop, conscious of entire innocence, behaved with temper and firmness.
He made no complaints. "I submit," he said, "to the necessities of State
in such a time of jealousy and danger as this. " He was asked whether
he had drawn up a Declaration for King James, whether he had held
any correspondence with France, whether he had signed any treasonable
association, and whether he knew of any such association. To all these
questions he, with perfect truth, answered in the negative, on the
word of a Christian and a Bishop. He was taken back to his deanery. He
remained there in easy confinement during ten days, and then, as nothing
tending to criminate him had been discovered, was suffered to return to
Bromley.

Meanwhile the false accusers had been devising a new scheme. Blackhead
paid another visit to Bromley, and contrived to take the forged
Association out of the place in which he had hid it, and to bring
it back to Young. One of Young's two wives then carried it to the
Secretary's Office, and told a lie, invented by her husband, to explain
how a paper of such importance had come into her hands. But it was not
now so easy to frighten the ministers as it had been a few days before.
The battle of La Hogue had put an end to all apprehensions of invasion.
Nottingham, therefore, instead of sending down a warrant to Bromley,
merely wrote to beg that Sprat would call on him at Whitehall. The
summons was promptly obeyed, and the accused prelate was brought face
to face with Blackhead before the Council. Then the truth came out fast.
The Bishop remembered the villanous look and voice of the man who had
knelt to ask the episcopal blessing. The Bishop's secretary confirmed
his master's assertions. The false witness soon lost his presence of
mind. His cheeks, always sallow, grew frightfully livid. His voice,
generally loud and coarse, sank into a whisper. The Privy Councillors
saw his confusion, and crossexamined him sharply. For a time he answered
their questions by repeatedly stammering out his original lie in the
original words. At last he found that he had no way of extricating
himself but by owning his guilt. He acknowledged that he had given an
untrue account of his visit to Bromley; and, after much prevarication,
he related how he had hidden the Association, and how he had removed it
from its hiding place, and confessed that he had been set on by Young.

The two accomplices were then confronted. Young, with unabashed
forehead, denied every thing. He knew nothing about the flowerpots.
"If so," cried Nottingham and Sidney together, "why did you give
such particular directions that the flowerpots at Bromley should be
searched? " "I never gave any directions about the flowerpots," said
Young. Then the whole board broke forth. "How dare you say so? We all
remember it. " Still the knave stood up erect, and exclaimed, with an
impudence which Oates might have envied, "This hiding is all a trick got
up between the Bishop and Blackhead. The Bishop has taken Blackhead off;
and they are both trying to stifle the plot. " This was too much. There
was a smile and a lifting up of hands all round the board. "Man," cried
Caermarthen, "wouldst thou have us believe that the Bishop contrived
to have this paper put where it was ten to one that our messengers had
found it, and where, if they had found it, it might have hanged him? "

The false accusers were removed in custody. The Bishop, after warmly
thanking the ministers for their fair and honourable conduct, took his
leave of them. In the antechamber he found a crowd of people staring at
Young, while Young sate, enduring the stare with the serene fortitude
of a man who had looked down on far greater multitudes from half the
pillories in England. "Young," said Sprat, "your conscience must tell
you that you have cruelly wronged me. For your own sake I am sorry that
you persist in denying what your associate has confessed. " "Confessed! "
cried Young; "no, all is not confessed yet; and that you shall find
to your sorrow. There is such a thing as impeachment, my Lord. When
Parliament sits you shall hear more of me. " "God give you repentance,"
answered the Bishop. "For, depend upon it, you are in much more danger
of being damned than I of being impeached. " [281]

Forty-eight hours after the detection of this execrable fraud,
Marlborough was admitted to bail. Young and Blackhead had done him an
inestimable service. That he was concerned in a plot quite as criminal
as that which they had falsely imputed to him, and that the government
was to possession of moral proofs of his guilt, is now certain. But his
contemporaries had not, as we have, the evidence of his perfidy before
them. They knew that he had been accused of an offence of which he was
innocent, that perjury and forgery had been employed to ruin him, and
that, in consequence of these machinations, he had passed some weeks in
the Tower. There was in the public mind a very natural confusion between
his disgrace and his imprisonment. He had been imprisoned without
sufficient cause. Might it not, in the absence of all information, be
reasonably presumed that he had been disgraced without sufficient cause?
It was certain that a vile calumny, destitute of all foundation, had
caused him to be treated as a criminal in May. Was it not probable,
then, that calumny might have deprived him of his master's favour in
January?

Young's resources were not yet exhausted. As soon as he had been carried
back from Whitehall to Newgate, he set himself to construct a new
plot, and to find a new accomplice. He addressed himself to a man named
Holland, who was in the lowest state of poverty. Never, said Young, was
there such a golden opportunity. A bold, shrewd, fellow might easily
earn five hundred pounds. To Holland five hundred pounds seemed fabulous
wealth. What, he asked, was he to do for it? Nothing, he was told,
but to speak the truth, that was to say, substantial truth, a little
disguised and coloured. There really was a plot; and this would have
been proved if Blackhead had not been bought off. His desertion had made
it necessary to call in the help of fiction. "You must swear that you
and I were in a back room upstairs at the Lobster in Southwark. Some men
came to meet us there. They gave a password before they were admitted.
They were all in white camlet cloaks. They signed the Association in our
presence. Then they paid each his shilling and went away. And you must
be ready to identify my Lord Marlborough and the Bishop of Rochester as
two of these men. " "How can I identify them? " said Holland, "I never saw
them. " "You must contrive to see them," answered the tempter, "as soon
as you can. The Bishop will be at the Abbey. Anybody about the Court
will point out my Lord Marlborough. " Holland immediately went to
Whitehall, and repeated this conversation to Nottingham. The unlucky
imitator of Oates was prosecuted, by order of the government, for
perjury, subornation of perjury, and forgery. He was convicted and
imprisoned, was again set in the pillory, and underwent, in addition to
the exposure, about which he cared little, such a pelting as had seldom
been known. [282] After his punishment, he was, during some years, lost
in the crowd of pilferers, ringdroppers and sharpers who infested the
capital. At length, in the year 1700, he emerged from his obscurity,
and excited a momentary interest. The newspapers announced that Robert
Young, Clerk, once so famous, had been taken up for coining, then that
he had been found guilty, then that the dead warrant had come down, and
finally that the reverend gentleman had been hanged at Tyburn, and had
greatly edified a large assembly of spectators by his penitence. [283]




CHAPTER XIX

Foreign Policy of William--The Northern Powers--The Pope--Conduct of
the Allies--The Emperor--Spain--William succeeds in preventing the
Dissolution of the Coalition--New Arrangements for the Government of
the Spanish Netherlands--Lewis takes the Field--Siege of Namur--Lewis
returns to Versailles--Luxemburg--Battle of Steinkirk--Conspiracy
of Grandval--Return of William to England--Naval
Maladministration--Earthquake at Port Royal--Distress in England;
Increase of Crime--Meeting of Parliament; State of Parties--The King's
Speech; Question of Privilege raised by the Lords--Debates on the
State of the Nation--Bill for the Regulation of Trials in Cases of
Treason--Case of Lord Mohun--Debates on the India Trade--Supply--Ways
and Means; Land Tax--Origin of the National Debt--Parliamentary
Reform--The Place Bill--The Triennial Bill--The First Parliamentary
Discussion on the Liberty of the Press--State of Ireland--The King
refuses to pass the Triennial Bill--Ministerial Arrangements--The King
goes to Holland; a Session of Parliament in Scotland

WHILE England was agitated, first by the dread of an invasion, and then
by joy at the deliverance wrought for her by the valour of her seamen,
important events were taking place on the Continent. On the sixth of
March the King had arrived at the Hague, and had proceeded to make his
arrangements for the approaching campaign. [284]

The prospect which lay before him was gloomy. The coalition of which he
was the author and the chief had, during some months, been in constant
danger of dissolution. By what strenuous exertions, by what ingenious
expedients, by what blandishments, by what bribes, he succeeded in
preventing his allies from throwing themselves, one by one, at the feet
of France, can be but imperfectly known. The fullest and most authentic
record of the labours and sacrifices by which he kept together, during
eight years, a crowd of fainthearted and treacherous potentates,
negligent of the common interest and jealous of each other, is to
be found in his correspondence with Heinsius. In that correspondence
William is all himself. He had, in the course of his eventful life, to
sustain some high parts for which he was not eminently qualified; and,
in those parts, his success was imperfect. As Sovereign of England, he
showed abilities and virtues which entitle him to honourable mention in
history; but his deficiencies were great. He was to the last a stranger
amongst us, cold, reserved, never in good spirits, never at his ease.
His kingdom was a place of exile. His finest palaces were prisons. He
was always counting the days which must elapse before he should
again see the land of his birth, the clipped trees, the wings of the
innumerable windmills, the nests of the storks on the tall gables, and
the long lines of painted villas reflected in the sleeping canals. He
took no pains to hide the preference which he felt for his native soil
and for his early friends; and therefore, though he rendered great
services to our country, he did not reign in our hearts. As a general
in the field, again, he showed rare courage and capacity; but, from
whatever cause, he was, as a tactician, inferior to some of his
contemporaries, who, in general powers of mind, were far inferior to
him. The business for which he was preeminently fitted was diplomacy, in
the highest sense of the word. It may be doubted whether he has ever had
a superior in the art of conducting those great negotiations on which
the welfare of the commonwealth of nations depends. His skill in this
department of politics was never more severely tasked or more signally
proved than during the latter part of 1691 and the earlier part of 1692.

One of his chief difficulties was caused by the sullen and menacing
demeanour of the Northern powers. Denmark and Sweden had at one time
seemed disposed to join the coalition; but they had early become cold,
and were fast becoming hostile. From France they flattered themselves
that they had little to fear. It was not very probable that her armies
would cross the Elbe, or that her fleets would force a passage through
the Sound. But the naval strength of England and Holland united might
well excite apprehension at Stockholm and Copenhagen. Soon arose
vexatious questions of maritime right, questions such as, in almost
every extensive war of modern times, have arisen between belligerents
and neutrals.