The History of England from the Accession of James II, Vol. 5

T >> Thomas Babington Macaulay >> The History of England from the Accession of James II, Vol. 5

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But on the first of March humours of menacing appearance showed
themselves in the King's knee. On the fourth of March he was
attacked by fever; on the fifth his strength failed greatly; and
on the sixth he was scarcely kept alive by cordials. The
Abjuration Bill and a money bill were awaiting his assent. That
assent he felt that he should not be able to give in person. He
therefore ordered a commission to be prepared for his signature.
His hand was now too weak to form the letters of his name, and it
was suggested that a stamp should be prepared. On the seventh of
March the stamp was ready. The Lord Keeper and the clerks of the
parliament came, according to usage, to witness the signing of
the commission. But they were detained some hours in the
antechamber while he was in one of the paroxysms of his malady.
Meanwhile the Houses were sitting. It was Saturday, the seventh,
the day on which the Commons had resolved to take into
consideration the question of the union with Scotland. But that
subject was not mentioned. It was known that the King had but a
few hours to live; and the members asked each other anxiously
whether it was likely that the Abjuration and money bills would
be passed before he died. After sitting long in the expectation
of a message, the Commons adjourned till six in the afternoon. By
that time William had recovered himself sufficiently to put the
stamp on the parchment which authorised his commissioners to act
for him. In the evening, when the Houses had assembled, Black Rod
knocked. The Commons were summoned to the bar of the Lords; the
commission was read, the Abjuration Bill and the Malt Bill became
laws, and both Houses adjourned till nine o'clock in the morning
of the following day. The following day was Sunday. But there was
little chance that William would live through the night. It was
of the highest importance that, within the shortest possible time
after his decease, the successor designated by the Bill of Rights
and the Act of Succession should receive the homage of the
Estates of the Realm, and be publicly proclaimed in the Council:
and the most rigid Pharisee in the Society for the Reformation of
Manners could hardly deny that it was lawful to save the state,
even on the Sabbath.

The King meanwhile was sinking fast. Albemarle had arrived at
Kensington from the Hague, exhausted by rapid travelling. His
master kindly bade him go to rest for some hours, and then
summoned him to make his report. That report was in all respects
satisfactory. The States General were in the best temper; the
troops, the provisions and the magazines were in the best order.
Every thing was in readiness for an early campaign. William
received the intelligence with the calmness of a man whose work
was done. He was under no illusion as to his danger. "I am fast
drawing," he said, "to my end." His end was worthy of his life.
His intellect was not for a moment clouded. His fortitude was the
more admirable because he was not willing to die. He had very
lately said to one of those whom he most loved: "You know that I
never feared death; there have been times when I should have
wished it; but, now that this great new prospect is opening
before me, I do wish to stay here a little longer." Yet no
weakness, no querulousness, disgraced the noble close of that
noble career. To the physicians the King returned his thanks
graciously and gently. "I know that you have done all that skill
and learning could do for me; but the case is beyond your art;
and I submit." From the words which escaped him he seemed to be
frequently engaged in mental prayer. Burnet and Tenison remained
many hours in the sick room. He professed to them his firm belief
in the truth of the Christian religion, and received the
sacrament from their hands with great seriousness. The
antechambers were crowded all night with lords and privy
councillors. He ordered several of them to be called in, and
exerted himself to take leave of them with a few kind and
cheerful words. Among the English who were admitted to his
bedside were Devonshire and Ormond. But there were in the crowd
those who felt as no Englishman could feel, friends of his youth
who had been true to him, and to whom he had been true, through
all vicissitudes of fortune; who had served him with unalterable
fidelity when his Secretaries of State, his Treasury and his
Admiralty had betrayed him; who had never on any field of battle,
or in an atmosphere tainted with loathsome and deadly disease,
shrunk from placing their own lives in jeopardy to save his, and
whose truth he had at the cost of his own popularity rewarded
with bounteous munificence. He strained his feeble voice to thank
Auverquerque for the affectionate and loyal services of thirty
years. To Albemarle he gave the keys of his closet, and of his
private drawers. "You know," he said, "what to do with them." By
this tune he could scarcely respire. "Can this," he said to the
physicians, "last long?" He was told that the end was
approaching. He swallowed a cordial, and asked for Bentinck.
Those were his last articulate words. Bentinck instantly came to
the bedside, bent down, and placed his ear close to the King's
mouth. The lips of the dying man moved; but nothing could be
heard. The King took the hand of his earliest friend, and pressed
it tenderly to his heart. In that moment, no doubt, all that had
cast a slight passing cloud over their long and pure friendship
was forgotten. It was now between seven and eight in the morning.
He closed his eyes, and gasped for breath. The bishops knelt down
and read the commendatory prayer. When it ended William was no
more.

When his remains were laid out, it was found that he wore next to
his skin a small piece of black silk riband. The lords in waiting
ordered it to be taken off. It contained a gold ring and a lock
of the hair of Mary.

FN 1 Evelyn saw the Mentz edition of the Offices among Lord
Spencer's books in April 1699. Markland in his preface to the
Sylvae of Statius acknowledges his obligations to the very rare
Parmesan edition in Lord Spencer's collection. As to the Virgil
of Zarottus, which his Lordship bought for 46L, see the extracts
from Warley's Diary, in Nichols's Literary Anecdotes, i. 90.

FN 2 The more minutely we examine the history of the decline and
fall of Lacedaemon, the more reason we shall find to admire the
sagacity of Somers. The first great humiliation which befel the
Lacedaemonians was the affair of Sphacteria. It is remarkable
that on this occasion they were vanquished by men who made a
trade of war. The force which Cleon carried out with him from
Athens to the Bay of Pyles, and to which the event of the
conflict is to be chiefly ascribed, consisted entirely of
mercenaries, archers from Scythia and light infantry from Thrace.
The victory gained by the Lacedaemonians over a great confederate
army at Tegea retrieved that military reputation which the
disaster of Sphacteria had impaired. Yet even at Tegea it was
signally proved that the Lacedaemonians, though far superior to
occasional soldiers, were not equal to professional soldiers. On
every point but one the allies were put to rout; but on one point
the Lacedaemonians gave way; and that was the point where they
were opposed to a brigade of a thousand Argives, picked men, whom
the state to which they belonged had during many years trained to
war at the public charge, and who were, in fact a standing army.
After the battle of Tegea, many years elapsed before the
Lacedaemonians sustained a defeat. At length a calamity befel
them which astonished all their neighbours. A division of the
army of Agesilaus was cut off and destroyed almost to a man; and
this exploit, which seemed almost portentous to the Greeks of
that age, was achieved by Iphicrates, at the head of a body of
mercenary light infantry. But it was from the day of Leuctya that
the fall of Spate became rapid and violent. Some time before that
day the Thebans had resolved to follow the example set many years
before by the Argives. Some hundreds of athletic youths,
carefully selected, were set apart, under the names of the City
Band and the Sacred Band, to form a standing army. Their business
was war. They encamped in the citadel; they were supported at the
expense of the community; and they became, under assiduous
training, the first soldiers in Greece. They were constantly
victorious till they were opposed to Philip's admirably
disciplined phalanx at Charonea; and even at Chaeronea they were
not defeated but slain in their ranks, fighting to the last. It
was this band, directed by the skill of great captains, which
gave the decisive blow to the Lacedaemonian power. It is to be
observed that there was no degeneracy among the Lacedaemonians.
Even down to the time of Pyrrhus they seem to have been in all
military qualities equal to their ancestors who conquered at
Plataea. But their ancestors at Plataea had not such enemies to
encounter.

FN 3 L'Hermitage, Dec. 3/13 7/17, 1697.

FN 4 Commons' Journals, Dec. 3. 1697. L'Hermitage, Dec 7/17.

FN 5 L'Hermitage, Dec. 15/24., Dec. 14/24., Journals.

FN 6 The first act of Farquhar's Trip to the Jubilee, the
passions which about his time agitated society are exhibited with
much spirit. Alderman Smuggler sees Colonel Standard and
exclaims, "There's another plague of the nation a red coat and
feather." "I'm disbanded," says the Colonel. "This very morning,
in Hyde Park, my brave regiment, a thousand men that looked like
lions yesterday, were scattered and looked as poor and simple as
the herd of deer that grazed beside them." "Fal al deral!" cries
the Alderman: "I'll have a bonfire this night, as high as the
monument." "A bonfire!" answered the soldier; "then dry,
withered, ill nature! had not those brave fellows' swords'
defended you, your house had been a bonfire ere this about your
ears."

FN 7 L'Hermitage, January 11/21

FN 8 That a portion at least of the native population of Ireland
looked to the Parliament at Westminster for protection against
the tyranny of the Parliament at Dublin appears from a paper
entitled The Case of the Roman Catholic Nation of Ireland. This
paper, written in 1711 by one of the oppressed race and religion,
is in a MS. belonging to Lord Fingall. The Parliament of Ireland
is accused of treating the Irish worse than the Turks treat the
Christians, worse than the Egyptians treated the Israelites.
"Therefore," says the writer, "they (the Irish) apply themselves
to the present Parliament of Great Britain as a Parliament of
nice honour and stanch justice. . . Their request then is that
this great Parliament may make good the Treaty of Limerick in all
the Civil Articles." In order to propitiate those to whom he
makes this appeal, he accuses the Irish Parliament of encroaching
on the supreme authority of the English Parliament, and charges
the colonists generally with ingratitude to the mother country to
which they owe so much.

FN 9 London Gazette, Jan 6. 1697/8; Postman of the same date; Van
Cleverskirke, Jan. 7/17; L'Hermitage, Jan. 4/14/, 7/17; Evelyn's
Diary; Ward's London Spy; William to Heinsius, Jan. 7/17. "The
loss," the King writes, "is less to me than it would be to
another person, for I cannot live there. Yet it is serious." So
late as 1758 Johnson described a furious Jacobite as firmly
convinced that William burned down Whitehall in order to steal
the furniture. Idler, No. 10. Pope, in Windsor Forest, a poem
which has a stronger tinge of Toryism than anything else that he
ever wrote, predicts the speedy restoration of the fallen palace.

"I see, I see, where two fair cities bend
their ample bow, a new Whitehall ascend."

See Ralph's bitter remarks on the fate of Whitehall.

FN 10 As to the Czar: London Gazette; Van Citters, 1698; Jan.
11/21. 14/24 Mar 11/21, Mar 29/April 8; L'Hermitage 11/21, 18/28,
Jan 25/Feb 4, Feb 1/11 8/18, 11/21 Feb 22/Mar 4; Feb 25/Mar 7,
Mar 1/4, Mar 29/April 8/ April 22/ May 2 See also Evelyn's Diary;
Burnet Postman, Jan. 13. 15., Feb. 10 12, 24.; Mar. 24. 26. 31.
As to Russia, see Hakluyt, Purchas, Voltaire, St. Simon. Estat de
Russie par Margeret, Paris, 1607. State of Russia, London, 1671.
La Relation des Trois Ambassades de M. Le Comte de Carlisle,
Amsterdam, 1672. (There is an English translation from this
French original.) North's Life of Dudley North. Seymour's History
of London, ii. 426. Pepys and Evelyn on the Russian Embassies;
Milton's account of Muscovy. On the personal habits of the Czar
see the Memoirs of the Margravine of Bayreuth.

FN 11 It is worth while to transcribe the words of the engagement
which Lewis, a chivalrous and a devout prince, violated without
the smallest scruple. "Nous, Louis, par la grace de Dieu, Roi
tres Chretien de France et de Navarre, promettons pour notre
honneur, en foi et parole de Roi, jurons sue la croix, les saints
Evangiles, et les canons de la Messe, que nous avons touches, que
nous observerons et accomplirons entierement de bonne foi tous et
chacun des points et articles contenus au traite de paix,
renonciation, et amitie."

FN 12 George Psalmanazar's account of the state of the south of
France at this tune is curious. On the high road near Lyons he
frequently passed corpses fastened to posts. "These," he says,
"were the bodies of highwaymen, or rather of soldiers, sailors,
mariners and even galley slaves, disbanded after the peace of
Reswick, who, having neither home nor occupation, used to infest
the roads in troops, plunder towns and villages, and, when taken,
were hanged at the county town by dozens, or even scores
sometimes, after which their bodies were thus exposed along the
highway in terrorem."

FN 13 "Il est de bonne foi dans tout ce qu'il fait. Son procede
est droit et sincere." Tallard to Lewis, July 3. 1698.

FN 14 "Le Roi d'Angleterre, Sire, va tres sincerement jusqu'a
present; et j'ose dire que s'il entre une fois en traite avec
Votre Majeste, il le tiendra de bonne foi."--"Si je l'ose dire a
V. M., il est tres penetrant, et a l'esprit juste. Il s'apercevra
bientôt qu'on barguigne si les choses trainent trop de long."
July 8.

FN 15 I will quote from the despatches of Lewis to Tallard three
or four passages which show that the value of the kingdom of the
Two Sicilies was quite justly appreciated at Versailles. "A
l'egard du royaume de Naples et de Sicile le roi d'Angleterre
objectera que les places de ces etats entre mes mains me rendront
maitre du commerce de la Mediteranee. Vous pourrez en ce cas
laissez entendre, comme de vous meme, qu'il serait si difficile
de conserver ces royaumes unis a ma couronne, que les depenses
necessaires pour y envoyer des secours seraient si grands, et
qu'autrefois il a tant coute a la France pour les maintenir dans
son obeissance, que vraisemblablement j'etablirois un roi pour
les gouverner, et que peut-etre ce serait le partage d'un de mes
petits-fils qui voudroit regner independamment." April 7/17 1698.
"Les royaumes de Naples et de Sicile ne peuvent se regarder comme
un partage dont mon fils puisse se contenter pour lui tenir lieu
de tous ses droits. Les exemples du passe n'ont que trop appris
combien ces etats content a la France le peu d'utilite dont ils
sont pour elle, et la difficulte de les conserver." May 16. 1698.
"Je considere la cession de ces royaumes comme une source
continuelle de depenses et d'embarras. Il n'en a que trop coute a
la France pour les conserver; et l'experience a fait voir la
necessite indispensable d'y entretenir toujours des troupes, et
d'y envoyer incessamment des vaisseaux, et combien toutes ces
peines ont ete inutiles." May 29. 1698. It would be easy to cite
other passages of the same kind. But these are sufficient to
vindicate what I have said in the text.

FN 16 Dec. 20/30 1698.

FN 17 Commons' Journals, February 24. 27.; March 9. 1698/9 In the
Vernon Correspondence a letter about the East India question
which belongs to the year 1699/1700 is put under the date of Feb.
10 1698. The truth is that this most valuable correspondence
cannot be used to good purpose by any writer who does not do for
himself all that the editor ought to have done.

FN 18 I doubt whether there be extant a sentence of worse English
than that on which the House divided. It is not merely inelegant
and ungrammatical but is evidently the work of a man of puzzled
understanding, probably of Harley. "It is Sir, to your loyal
Commons an unspeakable grief, that any thing should be asked by
Your Majesty's message to which they cannot consent, without
doing violence to that constitution Your Majesty came over to
restore and preserve; and did, at that time, in your gracious
declaration promise, that all those foreign forces which came
over with you should be sent back."

FN 19 It is curious that all Cowper's biographers with whom I am
acquainted, Hayley, Southey, Grimshawe Chalmers, mention the
judge, the common ancestor of the poet, of his first love
Theodora Cowper, and of Lady Hesketh; but that none of those
biographers makes the faintest allusion to the Hertford trial,
the most remarkable event in the history of the family; nor do I
believe that any allusion to that trial can be found in any of
the poet's numerous letters.

FN 20 I give an example of Trenchard's mode of showing his
profound respect for an excellent Sovereign. He speaks thus of
the commencement of the reign of Henry the Third. "The kingdom
was recently delivered from a bitter tyrant, King John, and had
likewise got rid of their perfidious deliverer, the Dauphin of
France, who after the English had accepted him for their King,
had secretly vowed their extirpation."

FN 21 Life of James; St. Simon; Dangeau.

FN 22 Poussin to Torcy April 28/May 8 1701 "Le roi d'Angleterre
tousse plus qu'il n'a jamais fait, et ses jambes sont fort
enfles. Je le vis hier sortir du preche de Saint James. Je le
trouve fort casse, les yeux eteints, et il eut beaucoup de peine
a monter en carrosse."

FN 23 Memoire sur la proposition de reconnoitre au prince des
Galles le titre du Roi de la Grande Bretagne, Sept. 9/19, 1701.

FN 24 By the most trustworthy accounts I mean those of St. Simon
and Dangeau. The reader may compare their narratives with the
Life of James.

FN 25 Lettres Historiques Mois de Novembre 1701.

FN 26 Last letter to Heinsius.

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