Chapter XXXII: William And Mary (2)

William returned to England, after meeting with a repulse before the walls of Limerick, defended by the Irish with the patriotic and sectarian zeal which had before animated the Protestant citizens of Londonderry. Lauzun and the auxiliary regiments, after withdrawing to Galway, had just embarked for France. King William bid Marlborough to make a descent upon Cork and Kinsale. The two places fell into the hands of that able general, and five weeks from his departure from Portsmouth he paid his respects to the king at Kensington. "There is not in Europe a general, having so little experience in war, who is worthier of great commands than the Earl of Marlborough," William said generously, for he did not like him. The return of the king, and his journey from Bristol to London, had been greeted with national transports of joy. He had left in Ireland the Dutch general Ginckel, a resolute and prudent man, at the head of an army, well disciplined, well equipped, and well victualled. Before the close of the following year, Ginckel had completed his task of pacifying Ireland. On the 20th of June, 1691, in spite of the presence and exertions of Saint-Ruth, who had come with reinforcements from France, he carried by storm the town of Athlone, the true key of Connaught, and the strongest place in Ireland. "His master should have him hanged for attempting to take Athlone," said the French general, "and my master can do the same to me, if I lose it." On the 12th of July Saint-Ruth was killed at the battle of Aghrim, and the Irish signally defeated. On the 26th of August, Ginckel laid siege to Limerick.

{38}

Tyrconnel had just breathed his last, old and prematurely worn out by fatigue and debauches. King James's troops were commanded by Lord Sarsfield, the most able and brilliant of the Irish officers. On the 1st of August a capitulation was signed, and was soon followed by a treaty. The Irish regiments were permitted to choose between the service of William and that of Louis XIV. A large number of soldiers went over spontaneously to France, forming in the armies of Louis XIV. and Louis XV. that Irish brigade, whose name has become famous. "Has this last campaign altered your opinion of our military qualities?" asked Sarsfield of the English officers. "To tell the truth," answered they, "we think almost the same of them as we have always thought." "Well," replied Sarsfield, "whatever bad opinion you may have of us, only let us change our king and begin again, and you will see." Ginckel was raised to the dignity of Earl of Athlone and Aghrim. King William and Parliament had ratified the terms offered by the general to the Irish; the struggle was over, the conquest consummated; the Protestant colonists, lately oppressed, became the masters, and often the oppressors of the indigenous race, which was dejected and decimated. Scotland was absorbed with the triumph of the Presbyterians, who had just legally recovered the religious supremacy in their country, to the great detriment of Episcopalians and Cameronians. The English Parliament had voted supplies generously, the Jacobite plots were exploded; the trial of Lord Torrington had ended in an acquittal, which never succeeded in erasing from the king's mind a distrust, which was merited by the dissolute life and known intemperance of the admiral. {39} William had not waited for this first interval of domestic peace to respond to the needs of his soul, and the imperious call of political necessity. On the 18th of January, 1691, in spite of the severity of the season, he had embarked at Gravesend for Holland. "I yearn for this moment more than I can express to you," he wrote six months before to Heinsius.

The English fleet had arrived in sight of the coasts of Holland. The voyage had been unpleasant; disembarkation seemed impossible: enormous blocks of ice encumbered the channel, while a thick fog hid the land. For eighteen hours the four little ships were obliged to keep to sea. The king was, as usual, weak and suffering, yet he had wished to put off in an open boat, to gain his natal soil the quicker. The whole night was spent before he could step on dry land; the cold was intense, and the danger serious. Some of the sailors were in despair. "Fie!" said William to them, "are you afraid to die with me?" Some great British noblemen, the Dukes of Ormond and Norfolk, the Earls of Devonshire, Dorset and Monmouth, were with him; Portland and Zulestein were glad to accompany their beloved sovereign to Holland. It was only at daybreak, by the feeble light of a winter's morning, that they were able at last to land on the island of Goree. The king rested there some hours before taking the road to the Hague.

Joy beamed on the face which the English were accustomed to find stern and haughty. Heart was responding to heart; England had accepted its deliverance from the hand of William III., without affinity for him and through necessity. The Dutch loved the heir of the greatest name in their nation and of their race, the liberator of their country, the man who had carried to the throne of England the glory, the name and the manners of his Dutch fatherland. {40} The people pressed upon his steps. "Let them alone," said the king; "let them come near me and all be my friends." A splendid reception had been prepared at the Hague: he was opposed to the pageant and the ceremonies, and murmured against this useless expenditure. "It is quite enough to have to bear the cost of the war," he observed. His countrymen spared him neither a speech nor a salvo of artillery; the joy of the population was at its height. "It would be quite another thing if Mary had accompanied me," said the king to those who congratulated him upon his triumph; "she is more popular than I."

The States-General were solemnly convened. William was more moved than he had been formerly on leaving his native country. "When I took leave of you," he said, "I informed you of my intention to cross over to England, to save, thanks to your aid, that kingdom from a deluge of evils present and to come. Providence has blessed my enterprise, and the nation has offered me the crown of the three kingdoms. I have accepted it, not from ambition, God is my witness, but to put the religion, the welfare, the peace of Great Britain beyond the power of any assault, and to be able to protect the allies, the republic in particular, against the supremacy of France. I have loved this country from my earliest youth, and, if anything could increase this love, it is the certainty that I have found a reciprocal attachment in the hearts of my countrymen. If it pleases God that I should become the instrument which Providence may deign to use in order to restore repose to Europe and re-establish security in your state, I shall have lived long enough and shall go down tranquilly to the grave."

{41}

It was at the Hague that the Congress of the Grand Alliance had met. Having become King of England, and controlling the forces of a great kingdom, William of Orange remained its chief, notwithstanding princely jealousies and rivalries, by that ascendancy of genius which had carried him to the first rank when he was as yet but the stadtholder of a petty republic. The assembled princes or their envoys were not used to hear such bold language employed against the all-powerful king of France as that of William at the opening of the Diet. "The states of Europe," said the king, "have been too long given up to a spirit of division, indolence, or attention to their private interests. We may rest assured that the interest of each is inseparable from the general interest of all. The King of France's forces are great; he will sweep away everything like a torrent. It will be vain to oppose him with murmurs and protests against injustice. It is not the resolutions of diets, or hopes founded on fanciful rumors, but powerful armies, and a firm union among the allies which can stay the common enemy in his triumphant career and in the effervescence of his power. It is with the sword that we must wrest from his hands the liberties of Europe which he aims at smothering, or we must endure the yoke of slavery forever. For my part I shall spare neither my credit, my forces nor my person, to attain this glorious result, and I shall come in the spring at the head of my troops to conquer or die with my allies."

The spring had not come yet, and Mons had been already invested on the 15th of March by a French army. Louis XIV. arrived there with the Dauphin on the 12th, and, despite the impetuous efforts of William to relieve the place in time, it capitulated almost in sight of the allied army. The vigilance of Marshal de Luxembourg baffled William's maneuvres throughout the campaign.

{42}

When he returned to England in October, the advantage was with France everywhere on the Continent. The Duke of Savoy had adhered to the Grand Alliance, but Nice had fallen into the power of Catinat. Opening the session of Parliament, the King spoke complacently of the successful issue of the war in Ireland; at the same time he warned the representatives of the nation that a great effort would be necessary against the King of France, and in order to support the Grand Alliance. The subsidies had been voted without opposition, and the House was engaged with the affairs of the East India Company, when a strange report was spread abroad: the Earl of Malborough, lately at the head of the English contingent to the allied army, while the king of England was absent, had been suddenly stripped of his employment and his dignities. The Princess Anne, who persisted in keeping her favorite with her, had to retire with her to the country. The causes of Malborough's disgrace remained a mystery, which occasioned the most diverse conjectures, and allowed the enemies of William and Mary to attribute unworthy or frivolous motives to them. The cause was grave, and the necessity absolute: the Earl of Marlborough was hatching a new treason. In the Parliament and the army all was ready to attempt a Jacobite restoration.

James II. himself wrote in November, 1692: "Last year my friends formed the design of recalling me by act of Parliament. The method was arranged, and Lord Churchill was to propose in Parliament to expel all foreigners, as well from the army and the council as from the kingdom. If the Prince of Orange had agreed to this measure, they would have had him in their hands; if he had resisted it, they would have made Parliament declare against him, and at the same time Lord Churchill with the army was to declare himself for the Parliament; the fleet was to do the same, and they were to recall me. They had commenced to move in the matter and had gained a large party, when some indiscreet subjects, thinking they were serving me, and that what Lord Churchill was doing was not for me, but for the Princess of Denmark, had the imprudence to discover the whole thing to Bentinck, and thus averted the blow."

[Image] Duke And Duchess Of Marlborough.

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The original manuscript of Burnet's Memoirs also contains the following: "Marlborough busied himself with decrying the conduct of the king and with depreciating him in all his conversations, seeking to rouse the dislike of the English for the Dutch, who, he said, enjoyed a larger share of the king's confidence and favor than they did. It was a point on which it was easy to excite the English, too much inclined, as they are, to despise all other nations and to esteem themselves immoderately. This was the subject of all the conversations at Marlborough's residence, where English officers met incessantly. The king had told me that he had good reasons for believing also that the earl had made his peace with King James, and had opened a correspondence with France."

William III. had learned clemency in his dealings with English statesmen: the treason of Lord Clarendon and of Lord Dartmouth had been treated with mildness; when Lord Preston's plot had been discovered, and Elliot, one of the accomplices, was multiplying denunciations, the king, who was present, had touched Caermarthen's shoulder. "There is enough of this, my lord," he had said; thus imposing silence upon useless revelations about an impotent discontent against which he did not wish to be severe. Yet he feared the Earl of Marlborough's perfidy: he knew at once his rare abilities and his profound baseness, and wished to secure himself against a treason which threatened his throne and life. {44} Through excessive magnanimity or prudence he persistently concealed the motives of his determination; but Marlborough's disgrace was to be long-lived. The silence of William left a formidable foe to France and a superlatively able head to the coalition against her, who, had the details of his treason been generally known, would have been irrecoverably ruined in the public opinion of England.

William was about to leave England to take command of the allied forces on the continent. At his departure he wished to finish the pacification of Scotland. His late deputy, Lord Melville, had allowed the Presbyterians to assume a dominating position which seriously threatened the liberty of the Episcopalians. He was replaced by Sir John Dalrymple, known in history as the Master of Stair. Eloquent and able, he had conceived the idea of detaching a certain number of Highland chiefs from the Jacobite cause by bribery. A considerable sum had been effectively spent among men proud and uncultured, but poor and exhausted by their warlike efforts and their domestic feuds. Numerous chiefs made their submission, notwithstanding the repugnance inspired by Lord Breadalbane, who was employed by the Master of Stair in these negotiations, and whom his connection with the Campbells rendered suspected by the mountaineers. On the 31st of December, 1691, Macdonald of Glencoe, or MacLean, as he was called in the Highlands, found himself almost the only one to refuse the oath of allegiance.

He made up his mind, at last, but too late. When he presented himself at Fort William, the fixed time had expired, and no magistrate was present. The old chief, alarmed at last, betook himself to Inverary; they refused for a long time to accept his submission. McLean returned to his mountains, whither an unjust and cruel vengeance was about to pursue him.

{45}

The Master of Stair had consented to become the instrument of the hereditary hate of the Campbells; it had been represented to him that this was the price of the pacification of Scotland. His orders had been issued in advance for the destruction of all the clans which should not have made their submission before the 1st of January, 1692. "Your troops will ravage all the district of Lochaber, the domains of Lochiel, Keppoch, Glengarry, and Glencoe. Your powers will be sufficient for the purpose. I hope your soldiers will not embarrass the government with prisoners." Lochiel, Keppoch and Glengarry had acted in time. All the hate of the Campbells and all the administrative zeal of the Master of Stair were turned upon Glencoe. King William signed his sentence without reading it, Burnet asserts, and amid the mass of papers which were presented to him every day. He did not, doubtless, understand its purport. "It is a charitable duty," wrote the Master of Stair, "to destroy this nest of robbers."

On the 1st of February, 1692, a detachment of Argyle's regiment entered the territory of Glencoe, peacefully, and as if animated by the most friendly intentions. "It would be better to do nothing in the matter than to do it unsuccessfully," the Master of Stair had said. "Since the thing is resolved on, it must be executed secretly and suddenly." The commander of the small body, Captain Campbell, commonly called Glenlyon from the name of his estate, had a niece married to the second son of Glencoe. The soldiers were well received and housed among the cottages.

{46}

They passed twelve days there waiting for the time when Lieutenant-colonel Hamilton should have occupied the defiles of the mountains. The 13th of February had been fixed on as the fatal day; the Highlanders had felt some uneasiness, but their guests had reassured them, "If there was any danger," Glenlyon had said to the chiefs eldest son, "should I not have warned your brother and his wife?" At the appointed hour Hamilton had not yet arrived; nevertheless the massacre began. Under every roof, beside every hearth, Glenlyon's soldiers shot down their hosts, men, women and children; the Master of Stair's orders had allowed them to spare old men above seventy. In their bloody intoxication the troops gave no quarter; the aged Glencoe perished among the first. His wife, assassinated beside him, was stripped of her jewelry, and did not expire till the next day. At every door was seen a corpse. When Hamilton appeared at the head of his troops, they plundered all the houses, and long lines of cattle were driven down the mountain passes by the light of the flames which were consuming the villages.

God does not suffer crime, though cleverly conceived, to gain a complete triumph. The passes had not been guarded; the murderers had not all arrived in time, and a large number of the Macdonalds of Glencoe succeeded in escaping, at the cost of new sufferings--exposed to hunger, cold, and unceasing dangers. They repaired to the midst of their mountains, above their ruined houses and their blood stained hearths. The cry of their calamity mounted slowly to Heaven. The Jacobites assisted in spreading it abroad: they had eagerly seized this weapon against King William. When the latter, far away and imperfectly informed, wished to open an inquiry into the authors of the crime, so many and so important persons were compromised in it, that the Master of Stair alone was removed for a time from public life. The massacre of Glencoe has remained a dark stain on the reign of William III., a sad contrast to the leniency and humanity which usually characterized his government.

{47}

Hardly had the king left England before the nation, as well as Queen Mary, was a prey to serious uneasiness. Louvois had died suddenly on the 17th of July, 1691, without Louis XIV., with whom his influence had been decreasing, appearing particularly distressed at his loss. "Tell the King of England that I have lost a good minister," was the answer he had made to King James's condolences, "but that his affairs and mine will fare none the worse for it."

Louvois would not have consented to the schemes which James was urging Louis XIV. to execute. Still convinced of the attachment of his English subjects, especially of the navy, he was for some time in correspondence with Admiral Russell, a sincere Whig, and Protestant, but morose, discontented, unreasonable and easily led away by his temperament into guilty intrigues. A camp had lately been formed on the coasts of Normandy; all the Irish regiments were there, under command of Lord Sarsfield; French forces were to join them. James called on the English people to pronounce in his favor by a manifesto so arrogant, so obstinate in the errors and faults which had caused his downfall, that the ministers of William III. had it printed and widely circulated in the kingdom.

Some English Jacobites attempted to combat the disastrous effect of the manifesto by another paper, drawn up with care and with a full knowledge of the state of feeling in England; but nobody let himself be taken in by this maneuvre. A popular movement was displayed in favor of the government; the militia responded spiritedly to the call; the coasts were covered with troops; the fleet of the allies entered the Channel. Those of the British sailors who had given hopes to King James, recovered their fidelity in presence of the enemy. {48} "I should like to serve King James," said Admiral Russell to the Bishop of St. Asaph. "It might be done, if he was willing to let us alone; but he does not know how to act with us. Let him forget the whole past, and grant a general amnesty, and I will see what I can do for him."

The bishop tried some hints about the personal favor reserved for the admiral. The latter interrupted him: "I am not uneasy about that, I only think of the public; and don't imagine I should ever let the French conquer us on our own seas. Be it well known that I shall fight them if I meet them, were His Majesty himself on board!"

This outburst of patriotism, in a malcontent, who had lately been on the point of becoming a traitor, did not suffice to open King James's eyes: at his request the formal orders of Louis XIV. forced the hand of Admiral de Tourville, who was hesitating, to fight. He had been instructed to protect the disembarkation of the invading forces upon the English coasts; but the wind retarded his sailing from Brest. The Dutch fleet had joined the English, and Tourville wished to await the squadrons of Estrées and Rochefort.

Pontchartrain was minister of Marine as well as of Finance since Seignelay, son of Colbert, had died, in 1690. He sent this answer from Versailles to the experienced sailor, who was used to fighting from the age of fourteen: "It is not for you to discuss the king's orders; it is your business to execute them and enter the Channel. If you don't wish to do so, the king will appoint in your place some one more obedient and less cautious than you." Tourville set out and met the hostile squadrons between the capes of La Hague and Barfleur. He had forty-four vessels against ninety-nine which the English and Dutch numbered. Tourville convened his council of war; all the officers advised him to retire; but the king's command was peremptory, and the admiral gave battle. {49} After three days' desperate resistance, aided by the most skilful maneuvering, Tourville was forced to retreat under the forts of La Hogue in the hope of stranding his vessels. King James and Marshal de Bellefonds were opposed to this. The vessels were attacked and burned by the English in sight of the French and Irish camp. The dethroned king was divided between his desire for victory and his patriotic instincts. Seeing the sailors who fought against him gallantly scaling the French vessels, he could not help exclaiming: "Oh, my brave Englishmen!" Previously, on the occasion of a trifling advantage that Tourville had gained in the Bay of Bantry, while James II. was in Ireland, when they came to announce to the latter that the French had beaten the English, the king had said, not without bitterness: "Then it is the first time." Tourville had lost a dozen vessels. The conduct of the English officers and sailors had been heroic; the admiral had himself inspected all the vessels and addressed the crews. "If your commanders betray you," he had said, "throw them overboard, and me the first!" King James counted wrongly on Rear-Admiral Carter, who had made him promises, while at the same time he warned Queen Mary of the fact. Severely wounded, Carter, who was the first to break the French lines, would not let go his sword. "Fight, fight," he said, dying, "until the ship sinks!"

The news of the victory of La Hogue caused great joy in England: it calmed the minds of the population, distracted by repeated rumors of conspiracies. The plot denounced by Fuller in February, and Young's plot in April, both invented, and the creations of false witnesses, worthy rivals of Titus Oates and Dangerfield, had disturbed men's spirits. Lord Huntingdon had been arrested; the Earl of Marlborough had been sent to the Tower for a short time: the Bishop of Rochester had been tried. Marlborough was guilty of intrigues more serious, and unknown to the public. {50} The Bishop, rich and indolent, had nothing to do with any plot. He easily proved his innocence; the false witnesses were severely punished; and Marlborough was set at liberty, with a caution, after forty-eight hours. His accusers had done him the service of dispelling the vague suspicions that had brought his disgrace upon him.

At the close of the same year, the plot of Grandval, aimed at the King's life, was to wake again the public disquiet that was destined to be revived more than once in his reign. In Europe, as well as England, King William's courage and thoughtfulness stood in the way of many great designs, and disappointed many hopes. The sentence which condemned the criminal publicly compromised the Marquis de Barbezieux, son of Louvois, and secretary of state for war. Louis' ministers kept silence and did not refute the charge.

The fortune of war continued to favor France: Namur had capitulated on the 20th of June, and its citadel surrendered on the 30th. "The allies learned it by three salvas from the army of the Marshal de Luxembourg and that of the Marquis de Boufflers," wrote Louis XIV. in his Memoirs. "They fell into a consternation which rendered them immovable for three days; so much so that the Marshal de Luxembourg having resolved to repass the Sombre, they thought neither of annoying him on his march nor of attacking him in his retreat."

{51}

When William III. came up with Luxembourg on the 31st of August, between Enghien and Steinkerque, a new victory, due to the brilliant gallantry of the French infantry, completed the uneasiness of the allies. At the end of the year, William, always clear-sighted and often a pessimist, in spite of his unbending determination, wrote to Heinsius "I have to tell you frankly that, if we could obtain peace just now--which certainly would not be on favorable terms--we should yet have to accept it; for, to my grief, I don't see that we have anything better to expect--far from it, for things go from bad to worse. It will not, for that reason, be less needful for one to do his best; and for my part, I will do everything in my power."

The war was to continue several years more, pressing heavily on England and Holland, which almost alone were in a condition to furnish pecuniary resources to the allies. The English Houses of Parliament, sometimes lavish and sometimes penurious, always extremely touchy about the position of foreigners in the King's service, often disputed with William the reinforcements of men and moneys which he demanded for the army; thus arousing the wrath and distrust with which parliamentary debates and dissensions inspired him. He had with great difficulty kept in power Lord Nottingham, who was vigorously attacked by the Whigs, and in whom he had a just confidence, in spite of the repugnance which the earl had at first shown to the revolution. On the other hand, Somers had been entrusted with the seals, and this partial return of power into the hands of the Whigs had momentarily calmed the dissensions of the parties. Yet the session had been much agitated: the land tax and a large loan had been voted on the motion of Charles Montague. The King was gloomy and pre-occupied with the campaign which was about to open. "At a juncture when we ought to be able to make an extraordinary effort on all sides to resist the enemy," wrote he to Heinsius at the beginning of 1693, "it tries me not to be able to contribute more to the general cause. It is distressing to see that this nation only thinks of indulging its private passions, without reflecting the least on the general interests. {52} The funds which Parliament has allowed me will not cover the necessary expenses I have to incur, so that I find myself in a very embarrassing condition. I leave you to imagine how much this, joined to the critical state of our affairs, and my inability to supply a remedy therefor, must torment me."

France was much more exhausted than England; and the losses which Tourville, Jean Bart or Duguay-Trouin caused English commerce to endure, did not prevent money flowing to London for the new loan. Yet the strong will of Louis XIV. and the effective action of a central power, had sufficed to continue the war during nearly the whole winter. On the 25th of July, 1693, the battle of Neerwinden was lost by King William in person to the Marshal de Luxembourg. Almost invariably unlucky in war, notwithstanding his conspicuous bravery, he charged sword in hand at the head of two regiments of English cavalry, which made the enemy give way, till they came to the household guard of the king. This select corps had remained motionless for four hours under the fire of the allies. William believed at one time that his gunners were aiming badly, and hastened to the batteries; the French squadrons were moving only to close their ranks as the files were carried off. The King of England uttered an exclamation of rage and admiration: "Oh, the insolent nation!" he cried. The admiration was mutual. "The Prince of Orange was near being taken after having done wonders," wrote Racine to Boileau. "It is painful for me to tell you," William informed Heinsius, "that the enemy attacked us yesterday morning, and that, after an obstinate contest, we have been defeated. We march to-morrow to encamp between Vilvorde and Malines, to rally our forces there and impede the plans of the enemy as far as possible."

{53}

Luxembourg was ill and soon afterwards died. The victory of Neerwinden brought little advantage to France. The same was the case in Italy with the success of Catinat at Marsala: the Duke of Schomberg, eldest son of the Marshal, charged there at the head of the troops paid by England. "Things have come to such a pass that it is necessary to conquer or to die," he had said, as he threw himself into the _mêlee_. This was his master's advice. "The crisis has been terrible," wrote the latter to Heinsius and to Portland. "God has judged it right to send me great trials in succession: I try to accept His will without murmuring and to deserve his anger less. God be praised for the issue he has granted us, and may we be able by our gratitude worthily to requite his mercy!" The strife of parties in Parliament involved, as usual, the grant of the subsidies on which the military preparations depended. "The increase of the army meets with violent opposition here," wrote William on the 4th of December; "yet I am led to hope that finally everything will turn out as I desire. May God will it!"

Power was passing away from the Tories. Lord Sunderland, who had lately emerged from his retreat, still able and engaging after his treason and shame, advised William to recall the Whigs. The king had been wearied by their arrogance and tyranny; yet he agreed to place Admiral Russell at the head of the Admiralty and to make Lord Shrewsbury Secretary of State. The latter hesitated long before accepting. He began to excuse himself before the king, pleading his ill-health. "That is not your only reason," said William; "when have you seen Montgomery?" This clever and enterprising Scot, formerly leader of the Parliament in Edinborough, had fallen into disfavor and was serving as agent in the Jacobite intrigues. Shrewsbury grew pale, and William repeated to him a part of his conversation with Montgomery. "Sire," said the earl, "since your Majesty is so well informed, you ought to know that I have not encouraged the attempts of this man to detach me from my allegiance."

{54}

The king smiled; he knew the strange weakness that weighed like an enchantment on Lord Shrewsbury's noblest qualities. "The best way to silence suspicions," he said, "is to take office. That will put me at my ease: I know that you are a man of honor, and that if you undertake to serve me, you will do so faithfully." Shrewsbury was soon made a duke, at the same time with the Earls of Bedford and Devonshire. Charles Montague, who had lately conceived the idea of a Bank of England, and helped to establish it, was named Chancellor of the Exchequer. Measures new, or renewed with persistency, were violently debated. The bill of procedure in trials for treason, the bill of disqualifications or of appointments, which interdicted the House of Commons to office-holders, and finally the often debated question of the length of Parliaments, which it was wished to limit to three years; such were the preliminary movements in parliamentary reform which delayed William's departure for the Continent. "It is a dreadful thing to be upon this island, as it were banished from the world," wrote the King of England. Some days later he arrived in Holland.

A great naval expedition was being secretly prepared at Portsmouth, intended to thwart the designs of Louis XIV. on the Mediterranean. Marlborough, always well informed, had warned King James of it. "Twelve regiments of infantry and two of marines are soon to embark, under command of Talmash, to destroy the port of Brest and the squadron which is collected there. It would be a great success for England, but nothing shall ever prevent me from letting you know what may be useful to you. I have been trying for a long time to learn this from Russell, but he has always denied it, though he has been informed of it more than six weeks. This gives me a bad opinion of the man's intentions."

{55}

On the 16th of June, 1694, the English fleet was fifteen leagues west of Cape Finisterre. Talmash proposed to disembark in the Bay of Cadsant. Lord Caermarthen, eldest son of the statesman lately made Duke of Leeds, undertook to explore the bay in his yacht. He found the approaches well defended. Talmash was resolved to attack. Caermarthen advanced, first signalling to Admiral Berkeley the difficulties which he met. Batteries were suddenly unmasked and swept the decks. Talmash was convinced that the coast was defended by peasants who would fly at the sight of the English soldiers: a well sustained fire replied to their attempts to land. The general was severely wounded in the thigh as he was being carried to his launch; the troops re-entered their boats pell-mell. The enterprise was a failure; the fleet had to return to Portsmouth. Talmash died on his arrival, declaring aloud that he had been drawn into a trap by traitors. The outwork whence the fatal bullet came is called, to this day, _The Englishman's Death_.

The rage and uneasiness in England were great: people said aloud that English forces ought to be commanded by Englishmen. Talmash was dead, and Marlborough ought not to remain longer in disgrace with the king. All the maneuvres and all the treacheries of the earl aimed at this. He had the audacity to present himself at Whitehall to offer his services to the queen. Lord Shrewsbury exerted himself to have the offer accepted; King William absolutely refused it. The English squadron was ravaging the coast of Normandy; Admiral Russell was keeping the fleets of Louis XIV. in check in the Mediterranean. {56} The campaign in the Netherlands was passed in skilful marches and counter-marches, accompanied by some trifling advantages for King William, who captured Huy. When he returned to England, on the 9th of November, the queen was waiting for him at Margate, happy at meeting the man who was the only joy of her life. "Now that you have the king, don't let him go away again, madame," cried the assembled women, as the royal couple passed. She was to be the first to go away, and death was threatening her already.

Before Queen Mary, Tillotson, archbishop of Canterbury, fell sick and died, towards the middle of November. He had rendered the Church of England the great service of throwing the weight of his character and eloquence on the side of submission to the new power, by frankly and simply accepting the oaths of allegiance. He had been strongly urged to do so by Lady Russell. "The time seems to me to have come," she had written to him, in 1691, "to put in practice anew that principle of submission which you have formerly asserted so much yourself and recommended so much to others. You will be a true public benefactor, I am convinced. Reflect how few capable and upright men the present time produces, I beg you, and do not turn your resolution over endlessly in your mind: when one has considered a question in all its aspects, one only succeeds, by returning incessantly to it, in throwing oneself into new difficulties without seeing any the clearer into the matter."

Sancroft having obstinately refused the oath, Tillotson had become Archbishop of Canterbury, in 1691, to the great disgust of Compton, Bishop of London, who had hoped for the primate's see. Henceforward, the nonjuring bishops and clergy loaded Tillotson with their wrath and contempt. {57} Gentle, sensitive, used to the admiration aroused by his eloquence and the esteem for his irreproachable life, the new archbishop suffered cruelly from the injuries of which he was the object. When he died there was found among his papers a packet of pamphlets published against him, with this phrase in his handwriting: "I pray God to pardon them; I pardon them." "I have lost the best friend I have ever had, and the best man I have ever known," wrote William to Heinsius. He loaded the widow with favors. Such was the popularity of the archbishop as a preacher, that the publisher of his sermons bought their ownership at the price of; £2,500, a sum unheard of at that period. Milton had sold the manuscript of the "Paradise Lost" for five pounds sterling, and Dryden, at that time the most illustrious of English poets, had received £1300 for his translation of Virgil's complete works.

A more poignant grief was about to strike William. He had come to Whitehall to give his assent to the bill for Triennial Parliaments, which he had once objected to. The many members of the two Houses who pressed into the hall of sessions found the King's face changed and his mood gloomy. He hastened to return to Kensington. The report spread that the queen was ill, and it was soon known that she had the small-pox.

As soon as Mary had reason to think herself stricken by the scourge which desolated households every year, she had ordered that all persons of her retinue who had not yet had the disease should leave Kensington; then, shutting herself up in her study, she had put her papers in order, burning a portion of them herself. "I have not waited for this day to prepare myself for death," she said, when the disease left her no more hope. The grief of her husband exceeded all anticipations, astonishing even those who had been constant witnesses of the absolute devotion of the queen. {58} He did not leave her for a single instant, sleeping beside her bed and rendering her the tenderest cares. Mary had triumphed over that stern heart which neither victories nor defeats had ever been able to disturb. He could not keep in his tears, when he looked at her. When Tenison, the new Archbishop of Canterbury, had undertaken to announce her approaching end to the queen, William drew Burnet into a corner of the room. "There is no more hope," he said; "I was the happiest of men--I am the most miserable. She had no faults, not one; you knew her well, but you do not know, no one can know, her worth." Twice the dying woman wished to bid good-bye to him whom she had loved alone, and twice her voice failed her: she now thought only of eternity. Several times William had been seized with convulsions: when they bore him from the queen's chamber just before she breathed her last sigh, he had almost lost consciousness.

Mary died at thirty-two, lamented by all who had known her. "So charitable," says Evelyn, "that in the midst of the most violent political strifes, she never inquired into the views of those who asked her aid;" gentle and kind to all, often attracting censure through the fullness of her wifely devotion, which seemed to have absorbed all other affections in her soul--the only sort of tenderness that could have satisfied the reserved and proud heart of the prince her husband. She had welcomed, during her illness, the advances of her sister. When she had shut her eyes, the Princess Anne sent to ask her brother-in-law permission to see him. Somers offered to mediate between the princess and the king. He found William in his study, his head between his hands, absorbed in grief; he represented to him the necessity of putting an end to a family quarrel, of which the political consequences might become grave. {59} "Do what you wish, my lord," replied the king; "I cannot think about anything." Yet the interview that was asked for took place. William assigned the palace of St. James to the princess for her residence. At the same time he sent her her sister's jewels; but he kept his resolution about the Earl of Marlborough. The princess's favorites were not admitted to the presence of the king, and the general remained excluded from every honorable or lucrative post. Yet Mary's death had changed all the views of Marlborough: a single life, precarious by nature, shaken by fatigues and cares, now stood in the way of the greatness of Princess Anne, and the supreme exaltation of her all-powerful adherents. The earl and his wife no longer retained their regard for the fallen monarch; they no longer admitted the legitimacy of the Prince of Wales. They patiently awaited the day of triumph; other more guilty hands were going to undertake to hasten it.

For some days William had seemed incapable of taking part in public affairs. "I thank you with all my heart for your kindness," he had replied to the condolences of the houses, "but still more for your so well appreciating our great loss: it exceeds everything that I could express, and I am not in a condition to think of anything else." He had written to Heinsius: "I tell you in confidence, I feel myself no longer capable of commanding the troops. Yet I shall try to do my duty, and I hope God will give me strength for it." The charges of corruption preferred before the houses against several prominent Tories, first roused him from his dejection. The great corporations of the city of London and the East India Company were convicted of having frequently bought the influence of the ministers. The Speaker of the House of Commons, Sir John Trevor, was the first condemned. The charges brought against the Duke of Leeds were grave. {60} The witnesses had disappeared; the charge fell through; but public rage and indignation pronounced his sentence. He was forever lost to political life. When William set out for the Continent, on the 12th of May, 1695, the name of the Duke of Leeds had been erased from the roll of the Council entrusted henceforth with the government in the king's absence. The intelligent, firm and devoted woman, who formerly governed wisely in his name, and willingly surrendered the power into his hands, was no more. William rejected all the hints that were given him to replace her by the Princess Anne.

The Marshal Luxembourg had died on the 4th of January, 1695, and Louis XIV. had put at the head of his armies Marshal Villeroi, a life-long friend of his, a clever courtier, a mediocre officer, who soon lost the prestige of victory which had been so long and resolutely maintained for France by so many triumphant hands.

The results of this change was soon apparent. In vain did Marshal Boufflers shut himself up in Namur and defend it heroically, till he finally retired into the citadel, were he held out more than a month longer; the place was not relieved in time by Villeroi, who was embarrassed in his movements by the presence and the cowardice of the Duke of Maine. William III. personally conducted the siege, and was constantly present at the trenches, giving his commands in a rain of bullets with a coolness which sometimes made the bystanders underrate the danger in which he was. Mr. Godfrey, an envoy from the Bank of England, had come to ask him for certain instructions. He ventured beneath the walls of Namur during an assault. "What are you doing here, Mr. Godfrey?" said the king roughly. "You are running great risk, and you cannot be of any use to us."--"I am not more in danger than your Majesty," replied the banker. {61} "You are mistaken." answered William; "I am where my duty calls me; I can therefore, without presumption, put my life in the hands of God; but you"--As he spoke these words, a ball struck the unfortunate Godfrey, who fell dead at his feet. William never willingly permitted civilians in his army. The brave Walker, formerly the defender of Derry, and whom he had raised to the rank of bishop, was killed not far from him at the battle of the Boyne: "What took him there?" growled the king, on learning the news of his death. It was said among his soldiers that he had been obliged to use the rod to make curious persons withdraw out of range of the cannons.

At last Namur capitulated, the citadel as well as the town. All the honors of war were granted to Marshal Boufflers, whom Louis XIV. loaded with his favors. "I am very unfortunate," said King William, "to have always to envy the lot of a monarch who rewards the loss of a place more liberally than I can reward my friends and followers who have conquered one." On the 10th of October he set sail for England, determined to dissolve Parliament. The new houses were convoked for the 22nd of November.

William's return to his kingdom was marked by a genuine triumph: the elections were favorable to him almost everywhere, and the difficulties that had been raised by a bill for the reminting of coins, which were then seriously depreciated, had just been surmounted. But a disagreement was already springing up between the king and Parliament in relation to the gifts with which he had loaded his Dutch friends. Following the example of Charles II. and James II., William had detached from the possessions of the crown certain rich domains with which he had recompensed his faithful servants, notably Bentwick. {62} He had just assigned to him a considerable estate in Wales, over which the crown possessed sovereign rights, which were comprised in the cession made to Portland. The country and the House of Commons demanded the retrocession of these rights in a petition bitterly stamped with the jealousy with which the favors enjoyed by the Dutch inspired the English nation. William was hurt by it; but with that moderation and justice which counterbalanced the reserve of his character and his lack of ductility, he replied to the petitioners: "I have an affection for Lord Portland, which he has deserved by his long and faithful services. If I had believed that the house would have to be consulted in this gift, I should not have made it; I shall recall my letters patent and shall give him an equivalent elsewhere." The estates conferred upon Bentinck were scattered in distant parts of the country. "They shall not say that I want to create a princedom for Lord Portland," said the king.

Domestic quarrels, as well as the jealousies aroused in England by the formation of a Scotch commercial company, whose rivalry the English merchants feared, were soon to be stilled in presence of a great national commotion. Rumors of invasion began to circulate anew. With the hopes of foreign aid, the intrigues of the Jacobites had caught a fresh enthusiasm. The Duke of Berwick had been commissioned to excite the zeal of King James's friends, who had secretly arrived in England, and was visited mysteriously by the leaders of the Jacobite party. The Duke was not ignorant of the more dangerous and less honorable mission that had been entrusted to Sir George Barclay. The latter had already united at London a certain number of partisans, ready for any enterprise; he was bearer of a commission written entirely in King James's hand, authorizing him to execute, at a proper time, against the Prince of Orange and his adherents, all acts of hostility which might be serviceable to his Majesty. {63} The act of hostility which Sir George Barclay and his accomplices were preparing was none other than an attempt to assassinate. The 15th of February, 1696, had been fixed for its execution. Certain men, ruined by the revolution, recently converted to Catholicism by personal ambition, Charnock, Porter, Goodman, had long ago been admitted into the conspiracy; and Sir William Parkyn was not ignorant of it, though he had taken the oath of allegiance to William to save the office which he held in the Court of Chancery. Sir John Fenwick, an insolent Jacobite, who had once insulted Queen Mary in the park, had, it was said, refused to take part in the criminal attempt; yet he held the secret of the conspirators which was soon to cost him his life. A certain number of King James's guards had arrived successively in London to reinforce this little band of assassins. The Duke of Berwick had returned to France, anxious to avoid all appearance of complicity. The English Jacobites refused to attempt a rising without the aid of a foreign invasion. King Louis XIV. was beginning to grow weary of the ineffectual efforts he had so generously lavished in aid of King James. The latter had met Berwick at Clermont. "After having learned from him the state of things in England, and the reasons which had made him return so hastily, his Majesty sent him to the King of France and continued his route to Calais. He always hoped that some event would give him the opportunity of demanding that the troops should be embarked without further delay, and it was for this reason that he continued his journey to Calais; but he had no sooner arrived there than, with his usual luck, he found all his hopes blighted. He learned that several gentlemen had been arrested for an attempt against the life of the Prince of Orange, and that this had raised such an excitement throughout the kingdom that there was no possibility of the Jacobites thinking of a revolt, still less of the king's thinking of a landing, even had the French desired it."

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This event, which King James awaited at Calais, and on which he counted for the success of his projects, had been delayed from day to day by a series of mischances usual in conspiracies, but which never opened the eyes of the conspirators. On the 15th, the king's hunt, during which the forty plotters were to throw themselves upon him, had been put off, under pretext that the weather was stormy and cold. On the 21st all the accomplices met again in a tavern: their posts were assigned, their rôles were distributed. Eight men were to be armed with fire-arms, the others had sharpened their swords. "Tomorrow," they cried, "we shall be masters of the situation." "Don't be afraid to break the windows of the carriage, Mr. Pendergrass," said King to one of the other conspirators, to whom a musket had been assigned. Suddenly a sentinel, who had been sent out to reconnoitre, appeared at the door, pale and alarmed. "The king does not hunt to-morrow," he said; "the carriages have been countermanded; the guards who were sent to Richmond have returned at a gallop--their horses are covered with foam." The conspirators dispersed, and the most enthusiastic were already projecting new ambuscades. The next day before noon almost all of them were arrested; the population of London, suddenly moved, had lent the police thousands of eyes and ears, eager to discover the guilty. The remorse of three conspirators successively had revealed the plot to the Duke of Portland.

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