Изображения страниц
PDF
EPUB

self, praying that, in consideration of her ancient and honourable descent, she might be beheaded instead of being burned alive. A careful search was made for precedents, and the utmost extent of the royal mercy was to sign a warrant for the beheading, which was performed at Winchester on the 2d of September.

2

(the other judges were mere ciphers) took the field on the 27th of August, at Winchester, where his whole fury was directed against an aged and infirm woman. This was Mrs. Alicia Lisle, widow of Mr. Lisle, one of the Commonwealth judges of Charles I., whose murder in Switzerland by royalist assassins has been recorded.' She was charged with having given shelter in From Winchester, with a train of guards and her house, for one night, to Hickes and Nel- prisoners at his heels, Jeffreys proceeded on to thorpe, two fugitives from Sedgemoor-" an office Salisbury, and thence (having increased his train) of humanity," says Sir James Mackintosh," which he went to Dorchester, and there hoisted his then was and still is treated as high treason by | bloody flag.' The fierce nature of the chief-justhe law of England." She had no counsel to as-tice was made fiercer by an agonizing disorder, sist her; she was so deaf that she could very which was probably brought on and increased imperfectly hear the evidence, and so lethargic by excess of drinking. In writing to Sunderland from advanced age, as frequently to slumber at from Dorchester on the 16th of September, he the bar where the remnant of her life was called says, "I this day began with the rebels, and have for. Her atrocious sentence was, that, according despatched ninety-eight; but am at this time so to the old law relating to female traitors, she tortured with the stone, that I must beg your should be burned alive on the afternoon of that lordship's intercession to his majesty for the invery day. The clergy of the cathedral of Win- coherency of what I have adventured to give his chester had the rare merit of interfering with majesty the trouble of." But if honours and this monstrous decree, and they succeeded in ob- promotions could have soothed the pangs of distaining a respite for three days. During this ease, Jeffreys was not without those lenitives. interval powerful and touching applications were On the 5th of September Lord-keeper North made to the king: the aged victim was obnoxious departed from life and office together; and three on account of her husband, who had been sent to days after that is, between the execution of a bloody grave twenty-one years ago; but testi- Mrs. Lisle at Winchester and his arrival at Dormony was borne to her own loyalty or exceeding chester--he was raised by his applauding and humanity the Lady St. John and the Lady grateful sovereign to be lord-chancellor. At DorAbergavenny testified "that she had been a fa- chester this chancellor and chief-justice, to save vourer of the king's friends in their greatest time, began to declare that if any of the prisoners extremities during the late Civil war," among would repent and plead guilty, they should find others, of these ladies themselves; and upon these him a merciful judge; but that those who put grounds, as well as for her general behaviour, themselves upon their trial should, if found they earnestly recommended her to pardon. Her guilty, be led to immediate execution. In all, son, so far from taking arms for Monmouth, had eighty persons were hanged at Dorchester in the served in the royal army against that invader; course of a very few days: the remainder were she herself had often declared that she shed more transported, severely whipped, or imprisoned. tears than any woman in England on the day of Those transported were sold as slaves, and the Charles I.'s execution; and it was a fact notori- bodies of those that were executed were quarous to all that, after the Restoration and the at- tered and stuck upon gibbets. Jeffreys then tainder of Mr. Lisle, his estate had been granted proceeded to Exeter, where another red list of to her at the intercession of Chancellor Claren- 243 prisoners was laid before him. He then don, for her excellent conduct during the preva- went into Somersetshire, the centre of the late lence of her husband's party. As it was perfectly insurrection, where, at Taunton and Wells, nearly well known to the friends of the aged victim that 1100 prisoners were arraigned for high treason: money was more powerful at court than mercy, 1040 confessed themselves guilty, only six ven£1000 were promised to Lord Feversham for a tured to put themselves on their trial, and 239, pardon; but the king declared to this favourite at the very least,' were executed with astounding that he would not reprieve her for one day. A rapidity. In order to spread the terror more petition was then presented from Mrs. Lisle her- widely, and to appal the neighbours, friends, and

1 See vol. ii. p. 668.

2 Mackintosh; Ralph; Roger Coke,

3 Ralph.

. From the last clause of the sentence quoted in the text, and from several expressions in other letters, we are justified in giving credit to the assertion of Burnet, that the king had a particular account of these proceedings written to him every day. Jeffreys concludes this present epistle to Sunderland in a very characteristic manner: "My dearest lord, may I ever be

tortured with the stone if I forget to approve myself, my dearest lord, your most faithfully devoted servant, &c." Sunderland, in reply, assured the chief justice that the king approved of all his proceedings.

5 The names of 239 are preserved; but as no judgments wero entered, it is not known how many more may have suffered Three persons were executed in the village of Wrington, the birth place of Mr. Locke.

relatives of the victims, these executions took place in thirty-six towns and villages. The dripping heads and limbs of the dead were affixed in the most conspicuous places-in the streets, by the highways, over the town-halls, and over the very churches devoted to a merciful God. "All

With the evidence of these letters alone, we may confidently reject the dreams of those who pretend that James was unacquainted with his judge's manner of proceeding; and, if other proofs were wanting to show the want of heart and feeling in this wretched prince, they are assuredly to be found in the Gazettes of the day, that report his progresses and amusements. He went to Winchester soon after the iniquitous execution of Mrs. Lisle, and there he remained, diverting himself with horse-races during the hottest part of Jeffreys' campaign. But there is still further an indisputable proof of James's approbation of Jeffreys' proceedings; for when (on the 30th of September) that precious new chancellor returned to court, his promotion was announced in the Gazette with an unusually emphatic panegyric on his person and services; and some months after this, when Jeffreys had brought on a dangerous attack by one of his furious debauches, James expressed great concern, and declared, with perfect truth, that such another man would not easily be found in England. Besides, wherever the king was directly and personally concerned, there was the same unflinching severity. By a warrant signed by the king, Elizabeth Gaunt, of Wapping, was burned alive at Tyburn. The offence with which the poor woman was charged was, having compassed the king's death by favouring the escape into Holland of one Burton, accused of participation in the Rye House Plot, and giving succour to the same Burton after the battle of Sedgemoor; and the principal witness against her was the execrable Burton himself, whose life she had twice saved.

[graphic]

THE WHITE HART, TAUNTON, Jeffreys' residence during "the Bloody Assizes." From a sketch by J. W. Archer.

the highroads of the country were no longer to be travelled, while the horrors of so many quarters of men, and the offensive stench of them, lasted." Sunderland apprised Jeffreys of the king's pleasure to bestow 1000 of the convicts on several of his courtiers, and 100 or 200 on a favourite of the queen, upon condition that the persons receiving them thus as a gift should find security that the prisoners should be enslaved for ten years in some West India island, where, as James must have known, field-labour was death to Europeans. The chancellor remonstrated with his majesty, directly, against this giving away of the prisoners, who, he said, would be worth £10 or £15 a-piece. In a subsequent letter from Bristol, he yields to the proposed distribution of the convicts, boasts of his victory over that "most factious city," and pledges his life, and that which was dearer to him, his loyalty, "that Taunton and Bristol, and the county of Somerset too, should know their duty, both to God and their king, before he leaves them."

1 Lord Lonsdale's Memoirs. Other writers, who were eyewitnesses, though violent men, and given to exaggeration, have left still more horrible pictures. Shirley, the author of The Bloody Assizes, which was published after the Revolution, says, "Nothing could be liker hell than these parts: cauldrons hissing, carcasses boiling, pitch and tar sparkling and glowing, bloody limbs boiling, and tearing, and mangling."

2 Letter from Jeffreys to the king, dated Taunton, 19th September, from MSS. in State Paper Office, as cited by Mackintosh. In the same letter Jeffreys returns thanks for his majesty's gracious acceptance of his services in the west.

In London, as in the west, corruption and bribery were the only checks to infernal cruelty. Thus Prideaux, who was thrown into the Tower by an arbitrary warrant upon mere suspicion, bought himself off with £1500; and Hampden, still in prison for his misdemeanour, put aside the new and capital charge of high treason by paying £6000, to be divided between Jeffreys and Father Petre, the king's confessor and chief adviser. The queen's maids of honour, as pocketmoney, were allowed to take from £50 to £100 from each of the fair damsels of Taunton who had presented Monmouth with flags and a Bible, and who thus were saved. In consequence of the suspicions of the court, and of the disclosures

made by Lord Grey, the Lords Brandon, Dela- | and thirty peers, was unanimously acquitted, mere, and Stamford were proceeded against for though the falsehood, and infamy, and perjury high treason. Brandon was convicted by perjured of those who swore against him were not more witnesses; but, having a sister-in-law in favour at conspicuous than the same vices in the evidence court, he escaped, not being, however, enlarged upon which many obscurer persons had been upon bail till fourteen months, nor receiving his hanged and quartered. Stamford took the benefit pardon till two years after his trial. Delamere, of a subsequent amnesty, and thus escaped the who was tried before the Lord-steward Jeffreys forfeiture of a traitor.

CHAPTER VI.-CIVIL AND MILITARY HISTORY.-A. D. 1685-1688.

JAMES II.

Arrogant declaration of James to his parliament-His resolution to dispense with the test act-Resistance of parliament James prorogues it-Revocation of the Edict of Nantes-Efforts of James to make converts to Popery-The court cabal by which the government is managed-Papists introduced into office-Alarm of the Protestant clergy-Quarrel of James with certain of the bishops-He endeavours to obtain the control of the seminaries and schools-His attempts to introduce Papists into office in the university of Oxford-Bold resistance of the university-James suspends the penal laws against Nonconformists and Papists-His measure proves unpopular and ineffective-The ambassador of the pope publicly introduced at Windsor-Popish ecclesiastics publicly consecrated and installed in office-James's hopes of an heir-New declaration of indulgence ordered to be read from the pulpit-The clergy refuse to comply-Remonstrance of the seven bishops on the subject with James-Their refusal to obey his order-He resolves to prosecute them-They refuse to plead on trial, and are sent to the Tower-Their trial-Verdict returned of "Not guilty"-Popular triumph at the acquittal of the bishops-A son born to James-The royal birth of the child denounced as an imposture -The hopes of the nation directed to the Prince of Orange-He is invited to land in England-His preparations for the purpose-Cowardice and infatuation of James-He attempts to conciliate the Protestants by concessions-His endeavours to establish the verity of his son's royal birth-Embarkation of the Prince of Orange from Holland-He is driven back by a storm-Interview of James with the bishops-Their ambiguous answers and excuses-The Prince of Orange lands at Torbay-Desertion of the military adherents of JamesHe is deserted by his children-Flight of the king, queen, and infant prince-James arrested by a mob at Sheppey-Riot in London upon the king's flight-Provisional government established in his absence-James returns to London-He is induced once more to flee-His safe arrival in France.

HE Marquis of Halifax had remained in the ministry during all the atrocities of Jeffreys' campaign, sitting at the council-board with Sunderland, with Rochester (whose vices of drinking and swearing did not prevent his being considered the head of the high-church party), and with Godolphin, whose business habits were held to be indispensable. Halifax, however, had been "kicked up stairs" into the sounding but empty office of president of the council, and now it was resolved to deprive him of office altogether, for James suspected him of a determination to oppose the repeal of the test and habeas corpus acts, and he had not penetration enough to perceive the danger he ran in driving that crafty and able politician to extremities. Nor would the despotic blunderer delay this dismissal till the approaching session of parliament should be over. That session, as appointed, opened on the 9th of November. Uplifted with his mighty doings during the recess, and with the appearance of universal timidity

and submission, James now presumed that the parliament of England would bend before him, and, like the parliament of Paris, content themselves for the future with the honour of receiving his commands and registering his decrees. After speaking briefly of the storm that was past, he told them, in a dictatorial style, that the militia, which had hitherto been so much depended on, was an inefficient force, and that there was nothing but a standing army of well-disciplined troops that could secure the nation at home and abroad. "And," continued he, "let no man take exception that now there are some officers in this army not qualified, according to the late tests, for their employments." Without this declaration, both lords and commons knew very well that he had commissioned Catholic lords to levy Catholic troops against Monmouth, and, in the choice of officers, had shown a marked preference for men of the ancient religion. And now the old hatred of Popery came in to revive the languishing cause of civil liberty; and high churchmen and low churchmen, Tories and Whigs, became for a season

united. The commons, in coming to a resolution about a supply, voted an address to his majesty for the discharge of all such officers as refused the Protestant test. James, in reply, said, "Whatever you may do, I will adhere to all my promises." The house was thrown into a ferment; and Mr. John Kok, member for Derby, said, "I hope we are Englishmen, and not to be frightened out of our duty by a few high words." But the majority of the Englishmen there committed him to the Tower for his honest, intrepid speech. Still, however, with all their servile loyalty, they were resolute about the Popish officers; and the lords showed equal or superior zeal. The exminister Halifax led the van against the court; and Jeffreys, the chancellor and main manager, was checked in his high career of insolence and arrogance, and made to crouch in the dust. On the eleventh day of the session, James, disappointed and furious, prorogued the parliament, which never met again for the despatch of business; and the houses were deserted and silent till they echoed his expulsion and dethronement, as pronounced by the convention. James had not obtained a sixA.D. 1686. pence from the late session; but, for a time, he counted upon money from France. His minister, Sunderland, accepted a French pension of 25,000 crowns; and, after some shuffling, and an attempt to save a sort of false pride and dignity, the King of England tied himself to the triumphal car of Louis XIV., by which he made his political existence absolutely incompatible with that of his son-in-law the Prince of Orange, and at the same time rendered himself doubly odious to his Protestant subjects, as the ally and tool of one who had waged a most pitiless warfare against the Reformed religion in France; for it was just at this critical moment, when Englishmen were filled with doubts and terrors as to the intentions of their Popish king, that Louis revoked the tolerant Edict of Nantes,' and drove many thousands of his Huguenot subjects into exile. It was known at the time that James and Father Petre were busily engaged in attempts to convert many of the Protestants about court; and with a standing army encamped upon Hounslow Heath, and which kept still increasing, it was reasonably apprehended that such zealots would not always confine themselves to polemical arguments, persuasions, and promises. Sunderland had privately embraced Catholicism, and, in appearance, adopted all his master's partiality in favour of Roman Catholics. Other converts, both male and female, more openly proclaimed 'The Edict of Nantes, which is said to have been composed by the great historian De Thou, was passed by Henry IV. in the year 1598. It was suddenly repealed by Louis XIV., on the 18th of October, 1686, just three weeks before the meeting of the English parliament.

their abandonment of the Protestant faith. Some of these proceedings are a complete banquet to the cynic. James, like Louis XIV., reconciled his breaches of the seventh commandment with his ardent religionism. His reigning mistress was Catherine Sedley, who had some of her father's wit, though no pretensions to personal beauty. She was installed at Whitehall, and created Countess of Dorchester; but James and his priests failed in converting her to Popery, and the champions of the Protestant church did not disdain to pay court to the orthodox mistress. Rochester, that other pillar of the church, clung to her; while his rival Sunderland made common cause with the queen, who was jealous, and with the confessor, who considered a mistress of such decided Protestantism a very dangerous appendage. Between them, the queen, confessor, and prime minister prevailed upon the king to send his mistress into Ireland, where a good estate had been given to her. The convert Sunderland then rose, and his rival Rochester sunk. The ministry was, in fact, converted into a close cabal of seven persons: the king, Sunderland, Father Petre, and the Catholic Lords Bellasis, Powis, Arundel, and Dover, who assembled sometimes in Sunderland's house, and sometimes in the apartments of Chiffinch of the back-stairs. Roger Palmer, Earl of Castlemaine by right of his wife's prostitution to the late king, was sent on an embassy to Rome, and an ambassador from the pope was openly received in London. After a few preludes in the courts of law, where it was endeavoured to convert the test act into a dead letter, James, with blind and headlong haste, proceeded to assert a dispensing, a suspending, and a repealing power over all laws or acts of parliament whatsoever, and to put Catholics into the highest civil and military offices, from which the Protestants were dismissed. By means of quo warranto writs, the corporations throughout the kingdom were remodelled. Papists were admitted into all of them; and Papists were made lieutenants of counties, sheriffs, and justices of the peace. In Scotland, the same measures were resorted to; and the high-church Tory ministry was dismissed to make room for one of an entirely Catholic complexion. In Ireland, the Protestants, who alone had been intrusted with arms, were disarmed by Tyrconnel. Indeed, in that country, the scales were entirely turned; and the Protestants were treated in all things as badly as they had been accustomed to treat the Papists ever since the days of Elizabeth. Four thousand Protestant soldiers were cashiered, stripped of their uniforms, and left to wander, hungry and half naked, through the land. Their officers, for the most part, retired into Holland, and gathered round the Prince of Orange.

A.D. 1687.

All this was too much for the endurance even | by precipitation; and the wary Italian informed of Tories and high churchmen; and, in despite his court that men's minds were embittered by of the dogma of passive. obedience, the pulpits the belief that Rochester had been dismissed began to resound with warnings and denuncia- because he would not turn Catholic, and that tions. To quench the flame in its infancy, James there was a design for the extermination of all issued letters mandatory to the bishops of Eng- Protestants. Yet still James kept his course, land, prohibiting the clergy to preach upon points and looked with satisfaction and pride to his of controversy, and establishing an ecclesiastical encampment on Hounslow Heath, in which were commission with more power than had been pos- now inclosed 15,000 men, horse and foot. sessed by the abominable court over which Laud presided.' But James could not fill this court with men of the same views. The Archbishop of Canterbury (Sancroft) would not act at all; upon which the less scrupulous Cartwright, Bishop of Chester, was put in his place. The other members were Crewe, Bishop of Durham, who was more than half a Papist; Sprat, Bishop of Rochester, who preferred the king to the church; Rochester, the head of the high-church party; Sunderland, the concealed Papist; Jeffreys; and Lord Chief-justice Herbert. With this court, such as it was, James ventured to issue a mandate to Compton, Bishop of London (who had declared boldly in the House of Lords against the Popish standing army), to suspend Dr. Sharp, who had preached in the pulpit against Popery | in general. Compton replied, through Lord Sunderland, that he could not legally punish Sharp without hearing him in his own defence. Upon this, the new commission was put into play, and the bishop himself was summoned before it. Compton argued that the court was illegal; that he was subject, in ecclesiastical matters, to his metropolitan and suffragans alone; that he was a prelate of England, a lord of parliament, and could be tried only by the laws of his country. James ordered the commissioners to suspend him; and, after some differences among themselves, the Bishop of London was suspended accordingly. Rochester, who is said to have affronted the king in a personal conference and argument about the merits of their respective religions, was turned out of the commission and his other offices shortly after; but he received a pension of £4000 a-year on the post-office, together with a regular grant of an annuity of £1700 a-year out of the estate of Lord Grey. Even D'Adda, the pope's minister, saw clearly that James was ruining his cause

'Books of the privy council, as cited by Dalrymple. 2 Evelyn.

"The dismission of the two brothers is a great epoch in the reign of James. From that time it was clear that what he really wanted was not liberty of conscience for the members of his own church, but liberty to persecute the members of other churches. Pretending to abhor tests, he had himself imposed a test.

He thought it hard, he thought it monstrous, that able and loyal men should be excluded from the public service solely for being Roman Catholics: yet he had himself turned out of office a treasurer, whom he admitted to be both loyal and able, solely for being a Protestant. The cry was that a general proscription was at hand, and that every public functionary must

One of his great objects was to obtain the control of the seminaries and schools. Of these, the Charter-house in London was a very important one; and accordingly he commanded the governors of that establishment to admit into it one Andrew Popham, a Papist, without test or oath. But the majority of the governors, headed by the Duke of Ormond, Compton, the suspended Bishop of London, and the ex-minister Lord Halifax, resisted the mandate. Yet, after failing in this attempt, he demanded from the university of Oxford that they should acknowledge an hereditary right in Father Petre to name seven fellows of Exeter College; and from the university of Cambridge the degree of master of arts for one Alban Francis, a Benedictine friar. Both these learned bodies, in spite of their recent declarations of non-resistance, resisted to the very utmost. The Oxford question was referred to the courts of Westminster; but the new ecclesiastical commission took up the Cambridge case, and summarily deprived Pechell, the vice-chancellor, of his office, and suspended him from the mastership of Magdalen College. James then commanded the fellows of Magdalen to elect as their master one Anthony Farmer, a concealed Papist. The fellows petitioned his majesty; but finding him not to be moved, they exercised their own undoubted right, and elected Dr. Howe. The ecclesiastical commission declared this election to be void; and then a new mandate was issued to the college to elect Parker, Bishop of Oxford, who had several qualifications which Farmer had not, but who was also suspected of being a Papist in disguise. The fellows, with unexpected spirit, stuck to the master of their own choosing; and Howe exercised his authority in spite of the ecclesiastical commission and the king. In the course of a summer progress James

make up his mind to lose his soul or to lose his place. Who indeed could hope to stand where the Hydes had fallen? They were the brothers-in-law of the king-the uncles and natural guardians of his children-his friends from early youth-his steady adherents in adversity and peril-his obsequious servants since he had been on the throne. Their sole crime was their religion; and for this crime they had been discarded. In great perturbation men began to look round for help; and soon all eyes were fixed on one whom a rare concurrence both of personal qualities and of fortuitous circumstances pointed out as the deliverer."--Hallam.

3 Estratti delle lettere di Monsignor D'Adda, Nunzio Apostolico, &c. -Mackintosh, Appendix.

« ПредыдущаяПродолжить »