non ball, in bringing forward his body of reserve, and his army was totally routed.(1)

The remains of the Irish forces, and the garrison of Galway, took refuge in Limerick, which was a second time besieged by a great army of English and foreign troops; and Tyrconnel being dead, the duke of Berwick recalled, and the impossibility of supporting the war evident, the place capitulated, after a siege of six weeks, and all Ireland submitted to the arms of William.(2) The terms granted to the garrison were highly favourable, not only to the besieged, but to all their countrymen in arms. It was agreed, that they should receive a general pardon; that their estates should be restored, their attainders annulled, and their outlawries reversed: that Roman Catholics should enjoy the same toleration, with respect to religion, as in the reign of Charles II.; that they should be restored to all the privileges of subjects, on merely taking the oaths of allegiance; and that such as chose to follow the fortunes of James, should be conveyed to the continent at the expense of government.(3)

Between twelve and twenty thousand men took advantage of this last article, and were regimented by the dethroned monarch, but paid by the king of France. Among the most distinguished of these refugees was majorgeneral Sarsfield, whom James had created earl of Lucan. He had rendered himself very popular in Ireland by opposing the moderate counsels of Tyrconnel, and was highly exalted in his own opinion, as well as in that of his countrymen, by his success in seizing a convoy on its way to the English camp before Limerick. He was, says the duke of Berwick, a man of an amazing stature, utterly void of sense, very good natured, and very brave.(4) We must now return to the affairs of England.

:

William, whose first care it had been to get the convention converted into a parliament, was soon disgusted with that assembly, to which he owed his crown. The obligations on one side, and the claims of gratitude on the other, were indeed too great to afford any rational prospect of a lasting harmony and other causes conspired to excite discord. The convention parliament, which consisted chiefly of whigs, the ever watchful guardians of liberty, refused to settle on William the revenue of the crown for life. Notwithstanding their good opinion of his principles, they were unwilling to render him independent: they, therefore, granted the revenue only for one year. The tories took advantage of this patriotic jealousy, to render their rivals odious to the king; who, although educated in a republic, was naturally imperious and fond of power. They represented the whigs as men who were enemies to kingly government, and whom the circumstances of the times only had thrown into the scale of monarchy. And William, who had publicly declared, that a king without a permanent revenue was no better than a pageant, and who considered so close a dependence on his subjects as altogether inconsistent with the regal authority, readily listened to such insinuations; and, in order to emancipate himself, dissolved the parliament.(5)

The new parliament, which consisted almost wholly of tories, not only settled the revenue of the crown on William for life, but granted liberal supplies for carrying on the war in Ireland, and on the continent. In those votes the whigs concurred, that they might not seem to destroy the work of their own hands. But the heads of the party were highly dissatisfied, at seeing that favour, and those offices, to which they thought themselves entitled by their past services, bestowed chiefly upon the tories. They entered into cabals with the Jacobites, and even held a secret correspondence with the dethroned monarch.(6) The presbyterians in Scotland, offended at the reservation of patronage, or the power of presenting ministers to the

(1) Ralph. King. Duke of Berwick. The duke of Berwick is by no means of opinion, that "the crown of Ireland depended on the opportune fall of St. Ruth." On the contrary, he declares, that the battle was already lost, and thinks it impossible for St. Ruth to have restored it with his body of reserve, which consisted only of six squadrons. Mem. vol. i. (2) Burnet. Ralph. Duke of Berwick. (4) Mem. vol. i.

(3) Articles of Capitulation.

(5) Burnet. Ralph.

6) Dalrymple's Append. James II. 1691.

vacant kirks, made by the king, in the proposed establishment of their religion, also joined in the same intrigues. But William, by permitting his commissioner to agree to any law, relative to their ecclesiastical government, that should to the majority of the general assembly seem most eligible, entirely quieted their discontents; and, in some measure, disconcerted the design of the disgusted whigs in England, with whom they had entered into the most intimate connexions, and who hoped to make use of the fanatical fury of the Scots, in disturbing that settlement which they had so lately founded.(1)

The adherents of James, however, were still numerous in the north of Scotland; and William, by a frightful example of severity, seemed determined to awe them into allegiance, or to rouse them to some desperate act of hostility, which might justify a general vengeance.

In consequence of a pacification with the Highlanders, a proclamation of indemnity had been issued to such insurgents as should take the oaths to the king and queen before the last day of December, in the year 1691. The heads of all the clans, who had been in arms for James, strictly complied with the terms of the proclamation, except Macdonald of Glenco:-and his neglect, in suffering the time limited to elapse, was occasioned rather by accident than design. His submission was afterward received by the sheriff, though not without scruple. This difficulty, however, being got over, he considered himself as under the protection of the laws, and lived in the most perfect security. But ruin was ready to overtake him for his unpardonable delay in tendering his allegiance. William, at the instigation of sir John Dalrymple, his secretary for Scotland, signed a warrant of military execution against Macdonald and his whole clan. And it was put in force by his countryman Campbell, of Glenlyon, with the most savage barbarity, accompanied with a breach of hospitality. Macdonald himself was shot dead with two bullets in the back part of the head, by one Lindsay, an officer whom he had entertained as his guest: his tenants were murdered by the soldiers to whom they had given free quarters: women were killed in defending their tender offspring; and boys, in imploring mercy, were butchered by the officers to whose knees they clung!(2)-Near forty persons were massacred, and many of those who escaped to the mountains perished of hunger or cold. All the houses in the valley of Glenco were reduced to ashes; the cattle were driven away, and with the other moveables divided as spoil among the officers and soldiers. (3) Never was military execution more complete.

This cruel massacre, which shocked all Europe, could not fail to rouse the resentment of the Jacobites in general, but more especially of the Highlanders; and the dissatisfied whigs made use of it, in order to render odious the government of William. An insurrection, in favour of the dethroned monarch, was projected both in England and Scotland. James himself had taken all the steps, which his own prudence or the advice of his friends could suggest, to render his return agreeable to his former subjects; and Lewis XIV., encouraged by favourable accounts from Britain, began seriously to think of an invasion. An army of twenty thousand Irish and French troops, under the mareschal de Bellafons, fell down towards the coast of Normandy; James, attended by the duke of Berwick, arrived in the camp, between Cherburg and La Hogue. Three hundred transports were assembled at Brest; and every thing was ready for the intended embarkation, when an unfortunate concurrence of circumstances defeated the whole enterprise.(4)

Lewis, victorious by sea as well as land, had appointed a powerful naval force to support this invasion. But the Toulon squadron, consisting of thirty sail, commanded by d'Estrees, was prevented, by contrary winds, from joining the Brest fleet, under Tourville. Meanwhile, the alarm of an invasion had spread to England, and the earl of Marlborough, and several other persons of 'ess note, were sent to the tower, on suspicion of holding a treasonable cor

(1) Burnet. Balcarras. Macpherson.

(2) Inquiry into the Massacre of Glenco. State Tracts, vol. iii. (4) Stuart Papers 1692. Duke of Berwick's Mem. vol. i.

(3) Id. ibid.

respondence with their dethroned sovereign.(1) Admiral Russell was ordered out with the English fleet; and having formed a junction with the Dutch squadron, he directed his course for La Hogue. Off that place, about four o'clock in the morning, he discovered Tourville; who, though sensible of the superiority of the enemy, resolved to hazard an engagement, in order to vindicate himself from an aspersion that had been thrown on his courage by M. de Seignelay, minister for the marine. He accordingly bore down in the Royal Sun, of one hundred and four guns, upon Russell, in the Britannia, of one hundred guns. The rest of the French fleet fell in with the English line, and a hot engagement ensued, in which the Dutch had little share. The two admirals plied their guns very warmly from eleven till one; when Tourville, being disabled, was towed off by his boats, and five fresh ships, with a furious fire, covered his retreat.(2)

A fog, which fell about four in the afternoon, preserved the French fleet from instant and inevitable ruin. But they were not suffered to escape without loss. Four of Tourville's ships, which had been set on fire during the engagement, blew up during the night. Next morning the chase was renewed; and the Royal Sun, the Admirable, another first rate, and the Conqueror, an eighty-gun ship, were destroyed near Cherburg. The day following, thirteen line of battle ships, which had sought safety by running ashore at La Hogue, were burnt, together with twenty transports, laden with military stores.(3) James, to the utter confusion of his hopes, beheld from the shore this destruction, which it was not in his power to prevent, and which totally broke the force of the French navy.(4)

The adherents of James in England, however, were not discouraged. They considered the failure of the invasion as an accident, which might soon be repaired, and continued to disturb the government with their intrigues. These intrigues, the perpetual opposition between the whigs and tories, and the necessity of large supplies to support the war on the continent, gave rise to two great and growing evils, intimately connected with each other; the national debt, and the corruption of the house of commons. At the same time that William, by a pernicious funding system, was loading the state with immense sums, borrowed to maintain its continental connexions, he was liberal of the public money to his servants at home; and employed it with little ceremony, to bring over his enemies, or to procure a majority in parliament.

In order to put a stop to this corruption, so far as it affected the represen tatives of the people, a bill was brought in for triennial parliaments; and William found himself under the necessity of passing it, or of losing the vote of supply, with which it was made to go hand in hand. He was besides afraid to exert the influence of the crown in defeating a bill of so much consequence to the nation; more especially as the queen, whose death he was sensible would weaken his authority, was then indisposed. (5) A similar bill,

(1) The earl of Marlborough certainly held a secret correspondence with James; but that unfortunate monarch never believed him to be sincere; he suspected him of a design to betray his sovereign a second time. Admiral Russell seems also to have entered into these intrigues: and James had no better opinion of his sincerity. He was apprehensive that Russell, as a man of republican principles, wanted only to unhinge the government, and to debase the crown in the person of fallen majesty. James II. 1692. See also Dalrymple's Append. and Macpherson's Original Papers.

Bat whatever opinion Russell might hold, or whatever views he might secretly entertain, his conduct proves him to have been an able and faithful servant to his country. Nor does any one feature in his character or circumstance in his life, afford us the smallest room to believe, whatever we may be told by the assassins of public virtue, that he could ever seriously intend to betray that country, and his trust as an English admiral, by carrying over the fleet under his command to the dethroned monarch, while a papist and pensioner of Lewis XIV. The ambitious and intriguing genius of Marlborough, his original treachery to James, and his long and intimate correspondence with his former master and benefactor whom he had betrayed, leave us more in the dark with respect to his ultimate designs. He appears to have had neither moral nor political principles, when they interfered with his avarice or ambition; and it seems certain that, from zeal for the service of James, or an aversion against William, he defeated, by his secret intelligence, an expedition against Brest, under admiral Russell, in 1694. Stuart Papers, May, 1694. James II. 1694.

(2) Russell's Letter to Nottingham, June 2, 1692.

(3) Id. ibid.

(4) "Ah!"-exclaimed the unfortunate monarch, with a mixture of admiration and regret, at seeing the French fleet set on fire,-" none but my brave English tars could have performed so gallant an action!" Dalrymple's Mem. (5) Burnet, book v.

as we have already seen, was extorted from Charles I., but repealed soon after the restoration, in compliment to Charles II. To this imprudent compliance may be ascribed the principal disorders during that and the subse quent reign. A house of commons, elected every three years, would have formed such a strong bulwark to liberty, as must have baffled and discouraged all the attacks of arbitrary power. The more honest and independent part of the community, therefore, zealously promoted the present law; which, while it continued in force, certainly contributed to stem the tide of corruption, and to produce a more fair representation of the people. How it came to be repealed, I shall afterward have occasion to notice.

The queen, as William had apprehended, died soon after the passing of this important bill. Mary was a woman of great equality of temper, and no small share of understanding. She was a sincere Protestant; and by her exemplary piety, the purity of her manners, and even by her notable industry, she contributed much to reform the court, which had been extremely licen tious during the two former reigns. Nor was she destitute of political address; which, in the absence of her husband, she employed in such a manner as to conciliate the affections of all parties. But here her praise must cease. She possessed few shining virtues or elegant accomplishments. And the character of an obedient wife, so justly her due, is shaded by the reproach of being a cruel sister, and an unfeeling daughter; who entered the palace of her father, soon after he had been forced to leave it, and ascended his throne with as much gayety as if he had been an enemy to her existence, instead of an indulgent parent, and the fountain of her blood.(1)

William appeared to be very much afflicted at the death of the queen; and however little regard he might have for her engaging person, from the coldness of his own disposition, his grief was possibly sincere. Her open and agreeable deportment, and her natural alliance to the throne, had chiefly contributed to reconcile the minds of men to his government. The whigs could forgive her every breach of filial duty, on account of her adherence to the Protestant religion and the principles of liberty; and even the tories were ready to ascribe her seeming want of sympathy with her father's misfortunes, to an obsequious submission to the will of her husband. With her, all natural title to the English crown expired, on the part of William; and although his authority, supported by the act of settlement, was too firmly established to be immediately shaken, the hopes of the Jacobites began daily to rise, and conspiracies were formed against his life, as the only bar to the restoration of James, and the succession of his son, the titular prince of Wales, whose legitimacy seemed now to be put beyond all question, by the queen's undisputed delivery of a daughter.(2)

The most dangerous of these conspiracies, conducted by sir George Barclay and other violent Jacobites, was intimately connected with a plan for an insurrection in England, and an invasion from France. The duke of Berwick was sent over to forward the insurrection. But the English nobility and gentry in the interest of James, though warmly disposed to serve him, very prudently refused to take arms until a body of troops should be landed to support them. Finding them obstinate in this resolution, and being informed of the conspiracy against the life of William, the duke immediately returned to France, that he might not be confounded with men, whose atrocious purpose had no connexion with his commission; though he thought himself bound in honour, he tells us, not to dissuade them from it.(3)

In the mean time, the troops intended for the invasion were assembled at Dunkirk and Calais. Four hundred transports were collected, and eighteen men of war were ready to escort them. James himself was on his way to join the army, when he was met by the duke of Berwick, after his return from England. Though he could not blame the caution of his friends, he was not

(1) Burnet, book iv. v.

(2) As the princess of Denmark had long held a secret correspondence with her father, and obtained his pardon for her undutiful conduct, it was presumed she would not oppose his restoration, by pleading her parliamentary title to the succession. (3) Mem. vol. i.

a little mortified at it, as Lewis XIV. had positively declared, that he would not allow his troops to embark before an insurrection had actually taken place. The disconsolate prince, however, proceeded to Calais, in anxious expectation of the issue of the assassination plot; from which, though undertaken without his authority, he hoped to derive advantage in his present distressing circumstances. Like a drowning mariner, he caught at a slippery rope, and rested his desperate fortune on the point of a ruffian's sword. But his suspense and embarrassment were soon removed. The plot was discovered; several of the conspirators were seized and executed, and all England was thrown into a ferment. The current of public opinion was suddenly changed. Even many of those who hated the person, and disliked the government of William, were shocked at the idea of a barbarous attempt upon his life; and his throne, which seemed lately to shake to its base, was now more firmly established than ever.(1)

Admiral Russell, on the first certain intelligence of the projected invasion, was ordered to repair to the Downs. Having hoisted his flag on board the Victory, he collected, with incredible diligence and despatch, a fleet of fifty sail, with which he appeared before Calais: and although he found it impracticable to destroy the French shipping, or greatly to injure the town, he spread terror all along the coast, and convinced the enemy of the necessity of attending to their own safety, instead of ambitiously attempting to invade their neighbours.(2) Thus were all the hopes of James and his adherents blasted, by what the French termed his MALIGNANT STAR. Covered with shame and confusion, and overwhelmed with disappointment and despair, he returned to St. Germains; where, laying aside all thoughts of an earthly crown, he turned his views solely towards heaven. Lewis XIV., who was an accomplished gentleman as well as a magnificent king, treated the dethroned monarch, on every occasion, with much tenderness and respect. But some of the French courtiers were less polite than their sovereign. "There," said one of them, in the hearing of James, "is a simpleton, who has lost three kingdoms for a mass !"(3)

We shall see, in the course of events, Lewis himself obliged to abandon the cause of this royal refugee, and to acknowledge the right of William to his dominions.

LETTER XVIII.

The military Transactions on the Continent, from the Beginning of the War that followed the League of Augsburg, to the Peace of Ryswick, in 1697, and of Carlowitz, in 1699.

I HAVE already had occasion to observe, that Lewis XIV., threatened by the powerful confederacy formed in consequence of the league of Augsburg, made himself master of Philipsburg, and other places, in 1688, as a prelude to more vigorous exertions; and that the alliance against him was completed, by the accession of England, in 1689. I have also had occasion to notice, that the emperor Leopold, the supposed head of this alliance, having subdued the malecontents in Hungary, had got his son, Joseph, proclaimed king of that country, and the Hungarian crown declared hereditary in the house of Austria.

That revolution was not accomplished without the shedding of much blood,

(1) Burnet, book v. Duke of Berwick's Mem. vol. i. James II., 1696. Amid all these conspiracies against his person and government, William discovered a cool courage, which does great honour to his memory. On some occasions he displayed even a generous magnanimity that claims admiration. He not only pardoned but continued in employment some of his principal servants, after making them sensible that he was acquainted with their intrigues! And he was rewarded with that fidelity which such heroie confidence deserved.

(2) Burnet, book v. Duke of Berwick's Mem, vol. 1. James II., 1696

(3) Voltaire, Siècle, chap. xiv.