APPENDIX PART I. то BOOK II. No I. Letters from Barillon, which fhew the dangerous connections of Louis and James from the beginning of his reign. Tranflation. Extract of a dispatch from Mr. Barillon to Louis the XIVth. -James's apology to France for calling a parliament. His averfion to parliaments.-His arbitrary views.His zeal for popery. Gives a hint for money from France. February 19, 1685. YESTERDAY evening the King of England took me into his closet, and after having talked to me upon feveral home affairs of no great importance, he faid, "You may be perhaps surprised, but I hope you will be of my opinion when I have told you my reafons. I have refolved to call a parliament immediately, and to assemble it in the month of May. I fhall publish at the fame time a declaration that I am to maintain myself in the enjoyment of the fame revenues the King my brother had. Without this proclamation for a parliament, I fhould hazard too much by taking poffeffion directly of the revenue which was established during the lifetime of my VOL. II. deceafed A deceased brother. It is a decifive ftroke for me to enter into poffeffion and enjoyment: For hereafter it will be much more easy for me either to put off the affembling of parliament, or to maintain myself by other means which may appear more convenient for me. Many people will say that I determine too haftily in calling a parliament; but if I waited longer, I fhould lofe the merit of it. I know the English: You must not fhew them any fear in the beginning: The malecontents would have formed cabals to demand a parliament, and thereby have gained the favour of the nation, which they would afterwards have abused. I know very well that I fhall yet find difficulties to furmount; but I fhall get the better of them, and put myself in a condition to fhew my gratitude for the infinite obligations I am under to the King your mafter. "I know into what difficulties the deceased King my brother was thrown, when he suffered himself to waver with regard to France: I will take good care to hinder parliament from meddling in foreign affairs, and will put an end to the feffion as soon as I fee the members fhew any ill will. "It is your part to explain to the King your master what I fay to you, that he may have no cause to complain of my having taken so hastily so important a refolution, without confulting him, as I ought to do, and will do in every thing But I should have hurt my affairs extremely, if I had deferred it only eight days; for I should have continued deprived of revenues which I now preserve, and the least oppofition on the part of those who refused to pay the duties, would have engaged me in levying them by force; instead of which, I shall pretend now that I have the law on my fide, and it will be very eafy for me to reduce those who would oppose what I do.” To To this the King of England added all kinds of proteftations of gratitude and attachment to your Majesty. He told me, That without your fupport and protection, he could undertake nothing of what he defigned in favour of the catholics: That he knew well enough he should never be in fafety, till a liberty of confcience was established firmly in their favour in England: That it was to this he was wholly to apply himself as foon as he faw a poffibility: That I had feen with what facility he had been acknowledged and proclaimed King; and that the reft would come about in the fame manner, by his conducting himfelf with firmness and wifdom. I told his Britannic Majefty, I would not take upon me to make an answer upon the spot to what he had done me the honour to say to me: That I could never doubt the fincerity of his fentiments with regard to your Majefty, and believed him too wife and too able to do any thing which might alter an union founded on fo much experience and reafon : That I would give your Majesty an account of what he had faid, and when I had thought upon it, would tell him my fentiments freely, which ought to be of no weight till I spoke to him on your Majefty's part: That I could, however, tell him of myself, without thinking more of it, that your Majesty is in such, a fituation as to have nothing to defire for the augmentation of your power and grandeur: That you had put limits to your conquefts at a time when you might easily have augmented them: That your friendship for the deceased King of England, and for him to whom I had the honour to fpeak, had engaged you to fupport their interefts, and thofe of monarchy in this country: That God had bleffed your Majefty's defigns every where; and I was affured you would feel a sensible joy at his elevation to the government of three kingdoms: That I doubted not but his conduct would always be conform* A 2 able able to what he owed to his reputation, and to his real interests, which were to preferve your Majefty's friendship; and that it was juft he fhould act with regard to the interior affairs of his kingdom at he fhould judge proper himself. I did not think myfelf, Sire, obliged to difpute without mature deliberation a refolution already. taken, and which my arguments would not have altered. I even esteemed it for your Majefty's dignity, that I should not appear intimidated by a meeting of parliament on account of your Majefty's interefts alone, when the King of England fhewed fo little apprehenfion of his own. Lord Rochester came to me this morning from his Britannic Majefty, to explain more at large his motives for calling a parliament: He added to what the King of England had faid, that if he had not prevented the requests which would have been made to him, the Keeper of the Great Seal and the Marquis of Halifax would not have failed to prefs him to affemble a parliament; that the prefent advantage he means to draw from this declaration is, to put himself in poffeffion of the revenue which the late King had, as well as of his crown; that it would have been chargeable to your Majefty, if he had been obliged to afk of you fuch confiderable fupplies as thofe he would have had occafion for; that what he does, does not however exempt him from having recourse to your Majesty; ́and he hoped, that in the beginning of his reign, your Majefty would help him to fupport the weight of it; and that this fresh obligation, joined to many others, would engage him ftill more not to depart from the road which he uled to think the deceafed King his brother fhould have kept with regard to your Majefty: That this will be the means to make him independent of Parliament, and to put him in a condition of fupporting himfelf without parliament, if they should refufe him the continuation of the revenues which the deceased King enjoyed. Lord Lord Rochefter omitted none of the arguments which he thought would convince me that your Majefty hazarded nothing in fupporting the King of England at prefent with a confiderable fum of money; that it is fupporting the work of this Prince, and putting it out of his power ever to swerve from it; that as for himself, he had not changed his fentiments, and his opinion was, that the King his mafter could not support himself without your Majefty's aid and fupplies; that it would leave him to the mercy of his people, and in a condition of being ruined, if your Majefty did not give him new marks of your friendship in fo decifive a conjuncture; and that from this beginning depended all his mafter's good fortune." Such were the views of James. Louis, on his part again, prepared to make the fame ufe of that Prince which he had made of his brother, and by the fame means: For, without waiting for James's hints for money mentioned in this letter of the 19th of February, he had, as foon as he heard of the death of Charles, ordered money to be remitted to Barillon for the service of King James. What effect that produced in the court of England will be seen in the following difpatch. Tranflation. Extract of a dispatch from Monfieur Barillon to Louis the XIVth.-Louis fends James 500,000 livres.-James receives it with tears in his eyes.-The joy of Sunderland, Rochefter, and Godolphin.-Churchill fent to France to afk more money. February 26, 1685... I RECEIVED the day before yesterday your Majesty's dispatch of the 20th of this month by the return of the courier I fent. I went that inftant to wait on the King of |