Reign of Charles II. (Concluded) page 7

One of the first uses which he made of this beautiful tranquillity, was to destroy the ancient seminaries of freedom - the corporations of the country. Writs of quo warranto were issued, and the corporations, like the nation at large, prostrate at the feet of the polluted throne, were compelled by threats and promises to resign their ancient privileges. "Neither," says Lingard, " had the boroughs much reason to complain. By the renewal of their charters they lost no franchise which it was reasonable they should retain; many acquired rights which they did not previously possess; but individuals suffered, because the exercise of authority was restricted to a smaller number of burgesses, and these, according to custom, were in the first instance named by the crown"

There, indeed, lay the gist and mischief of the whole matter. Charles cared little what other privileges they enjoyed so that he could deprive them of their most important privilege - their independence, and make them not only slavish institutions, but instruments for the general enslavement of the country. " In the course of time," says the same historian, " several boroughs, by the exercise of those exclusive privileges, which had been conferred on them by ancient grants from the crown, had grown into nests or asylums of public malefactors, and on that account were presented as nuisances by the grand juries of the county assizes." An excellent reason why those "several boroughs" should have been reformed; but none whatever, why all boroughs should by force be compelled to surrender their independence to a despotic monarch. The great instrument in this sweeping usurpation, was the lord chief justice Jeffreys, a man admirably calculated for the work by his power of coaxing, jeering, brow-beating, and terrifying the reluctant corporations. Before he set out on his summer circuit this year, Charles presented him with a ring from his own finger, as a mark of his especial esteem, at the same time giving him a very necessary piece of advice, chief justice as he was, to beware of drinking too much, as the weather would be hot. The ring was called Jeffreys' bloodstone, being presented to him just after the execution of Sir Thomas Armstrong.

Though blood had ceased to flow, persecution of the whigs had not ceased. Sir Samuel Barnadiston, the foreman of the grand jury which had ignored the bill against lord Shaftesbury, was not forgotten. He was tried for a libel, and fined ten thousand pounds, and ordered to find security for his good behaviour during life. Williams, the speaker of the house of commons, was prosecuted for merely having discharged the duties of his office, in signing the votes; Braddon and Speke were tried and punished severely for slandering the king and duke by charging them with the murder of Essex. And James now indulged his spleen against the great Titus Oates for his proceedings against the catholics, and his endeavour to exclude James from the succession. The pretence seized upon was, that Oates and Dutton Colt had declared that the duke of York was a traitor, and that before he should come to the succession, he should be banished or hanged, the hanging being the fittest. Jeffreys, who tried them, had a particular pleasure in sentencing Oates, who, in the days of his popularity, had hit the rascally lawyer hard. In 1680 Jeffreys had fallen under the censure of parliament for interfering in its concerns, and they had 'not only brought him to his knees at their bar, but had compelled him to resign the recordership of London. On the trial of College, the protestant joiner, Gates had appealed to Jeffreys, then serjeant Jeffreys, to confirm a part of his evidence. Jeffreys indignantly said he did not intend becoming evidence for a man like him; whereupon Oates coolly replied, " I don't desire Sir George Jeffreys to become an evidence for me; I have had credit in parliaments, and Sir George had disgrace in one of them." Jeffreys was stunned by this repartee, and merely replied, "Your servant, doctor; you are a witty man and a philosopher." But now the tide had turned; Jeffreys had the witty man at his mercy, and he fined him and Colt one hundred thousand pounds, or imprisonment till paid, which meant so long as they lived.

Tardy justice was at length also done to the remaining catholic peers who were in the Tower. Lord Stafford had fallen the victim of protestant terrors during the ascendancy of the whigs; lord Petre died, worn out by his confinement, but the lords Powis, Arundell, and Bellasis, after lying five years, were brought up by writ of habeas corpus, and were discharged on each entering into recognisances of ten thousand pounds for himself, and five thousand pounds each for four sureties, to appear at the bar of the house if called for. The judges, now that the duke of York, the catholic prince, was in power, could admit that these victims of a political faction "ought in justice and conscience to have been admitted to bail long ago." Danby, too, was liberated on the same terms, though he never could be forgiven by the king or duke for his patronage of Oates, and his zeal in hunting out the plot.

The influence of James was every day more manifest. Charts restored James to his former status, by placing him at the head of the admiralty; and, to avoid subjecting him to the penalties of the test act, signed all the papers himself which required the signature of the lord high admiral. Seeing that this was received with perfect complacency, he went a step further, and in defiance of the test act, he introduced James again into the council. This, indeed, excited some murmurs, even the tories being scandalised at his thus coolly setting aside an act of parliament.

No sooner was James reinstated in the council, than he planned yet more daring changes. Under the plea of relieving the dissenters, which he afterwards carried so far in his own reign, he sought to relieve the catholics from their penalties. What his regard was for the dissenters has been sufficiently shown by their cruel persecution in England, and by his own especial oppression of the covenanters in Scotland.

One morning, however, Jeffreys, who had lately been admitted to the council, appeared at the board with an immense bundle of papers and parchments, and informed the king that they were the rolls of the names of the recusants that he had collected during his late circuit. He declared that the gaols were crammed with them, and that their case deserved the serious attention of the king. Lord- keeper North, who saw instantly the drift of the motion, and who had a profound jealousy of Jeffreys, who, he knew, was anxiously looking for the seals, asked whether all the names in the list belonged to persons who were in prison? Jeffreys replied no, for the prisons could not hold all the persons convicted of recusancy. North then observed, that besides catholics there were vast numbers of nonconformists and other persons included in those lists, who were professed enemies of the king, and of church and state, and that it would be far easier and safer to grant particular pardons to catholics, than thus at once to set at liberty all the elements of commotion in the kingdom. The blow was struck. Strong as was the government then, it dared not give a measure of exemption exclusively to the catholics. The scheme, it was obviously seen, was transparent, and there was a significant silence. Neither Halifax, Rochester, nor the more protestant members had occasion to open their mouths, the council passed to other business.

But Halifax saw with alarm the advancing influence of the duke, and trembled for his own hold of office, for the duke, he knew, hated him mortally. He, therefore, as a certain resource against this advancing power, advised Charles to call a parliament, but that Charles had resolved never to do. He still received a considerable sum from Louis, though not so large in amount, nor so regularly paid as when his services were more needful, and to decrease his expenditure, he had, during the last year, sent a squadron under lord Dartmouth to destroy the fortification of Tangier, which he had received as part of the dowry of the queen. Had that settlement been well managed, it would have given England great advantages in the Mediterranean; but nothing of that kind was well managed by this unpatriotic king. To spare the expenditure necessary for its maintenance, he thus destroyed the defences, and left the place to the Moors, to the great indignation of Portugal, Which thought rightly, that if he did not value it, he might have returned it.

Defeated in that quarter, Halifax next endeavoured to stop the growing advancement of lord Rochester. This was the second son of the late lord chancellor Clarendon, and the especial favourite and protege of the duke. He had lately not only been created earl of Rochester, but made first commissioner of the treasury. Halifax beheld in his rise an ominous competitor, especially as the duke was the mainspring of his prosperity. He therefore accused Rochester of negligence or embezzlement in his office, and succeeded in removing him, but only from the treasury-board to the presidency of the council. This Halifax called kicking a man upstairs. Nor did Rochester's promotion end here. He was soon after appointed to the government of Ireland, the old and veteran colleague of Rochester's father, and the stanch champion of Charles in the days of his adversity, being removed to make way for him. The great object, however, was not simply Rochester's promotion, but the organisation of a powerful catholic army in Ireland, for which it was deemed Ormond was not active enough, this army having reference to James's views on England, which afterwards proved his ruin.

By this appointment Rochester was removed from immediate rivalry with Halifax; but sufficient elements of danger still surrounded that minister. Halifax and his colleagues had succeeded in strengthening the protestant succession, by the marriage of the second daughter of the duke, Anne, to a protestant prince; but even in that event the influence of Louis had been active. Through the medium of Sunderland, who continued in office, and maintained a close intimacy with the French mistress, the duchess of Portland, Louis took care, that though the nation would not tolerate any but a protestant prince for her husband, it should be one of no great importance. George, prince of Hanover, afterwards George I., had been selected, and made a visit to London, but returned without the princess. The fortune, it has been suggested, was not enough for the penurious German, his father recalled him to marry the princess of Zell, a circumstance which Anne never forgot or forgave. In the midst of the agitation of the Rye House plot, and but two days before the execution of lord Russell, another wooer appeared in George, brother of the king of Denmark- This young man also had the approbation of Louis, and the match took place in a week after his arrival.

Still Halifax felt a growing insecurity in the royal favour. The whole influence of the duke of York was exerted to ruin him, and he therefore determined once more to attempt to re-establish Monmouth in the king's favour. This popular but weak young man was living in great honour at the court of the prince of Orange. Many remonstrances had been made by the duke of York to his daughter and son-in- law, against their encouragement of a son who had taken so determined a part both against his own father, the king, and himself, their father. But the prince and princess were well aware of Charles's affection for his undutiful son, and therefore did not fear seriously offending him. Under the management of Halifax, Van Citters, the Dutch ambassador in London, went over to the Hague on pretence of negotiating some measure of importance betwixt the two countries. The prince of Orange affected to comply with the wishes of Charles for the removal of Monmouth. But that nobleman, instead of taking up his residence at Brussels, as was given out, suddenly returned to London privately, had an interview with his father, and as suddenly returned to the Hague, saying that in three months he should be publicly admitted at court, and the duke of York be banished afresh. Charles, meantime, had proposed to James to go and hold a parliament in Scotland, as if conferring a mark of particular honour and confidence on him. But the private visit of Monmouth had not escaped James, nor the correspondence of Halifax with him, and this caused a fresh energy of opposition to that minister to be infused into the duke's creatures at court. Halifax had recommended a most enlightened measure to the king as it regarded the-American colonies, which, had it been adopted, might have prevented their loss at a later period. He represented that the grant of local representative legislatures to them would be the best means of developing their resources, and governing them in peace; but on this admirable suggestion the duke's partisans seized as something especially anti-monarchical and injurious to the power of the king. The duke, the duchess of Portland, the earl of Sunderland, re-echoed these opinions, and ' drew from Charles a promise that unless Halifax retired of himself, he should be dismissed on the first plausible occasion. The influence of the French king was also at work to effect the overthrow of Halifax. It was in vain «that Louis had endeavoured to buy him as he had done the king, the duke, and the other ministers; and as he could not be bought, the only alternative was to drive him from office. He was feebly supported by the lord-keeper North, he was actively and zealously undermined by his colleagues, Sunderland and Godolphin; but still Charles hesitated He enjoyed the wit and brilliant conversation of Halifax; he knew well his ability, and, still more, he was in a most indolent and undecided tone of mind. Macaulay has well described him at this moment: - "The event depended wholly on the will of Charles, and Charles could not come to a decision. In his perplexity he promised everything to everybody. He would stand by France, he would break with France; he would never meet another parliament; he would order writs for a parliament without delay. He assured the duke of York that Halifax should be dismissed from office, and Halifax that the duke should be sent to Scotland. In public he affected implacable resentment against Monmouth, and in private conveyed to Monmouth assurances of unalterable affection. How long, if the king's life had been protracted, his hesitation would have lasted, and what would have been his resolve, can only be conjectured."