of many Dissenters: but the acts of the government, and especially the severity with which Magdalene College had been treated, had done more than even the pen of Halifax to alarm and to unite all classes of Protestants. Most of those sec- V taries who had been induced to express gratitude for the Indulgence were now ashamed of their error, and were desirous of making atonement by casting in their lot with the great body of their countrymen.

CHAP.

'VIII.

tions.

In consequence of this change in the feeling of the Noncon- Regulation formists, the government found almost as great difficulty in of corporathe towns as in the counties. When the regulators began their work, they had taken it for granted that every Dissenter who had availed himself of the Indulgence would be favourable to the King's policy. They were therefore confident that they should be able to fill all the municipal offices in the kingdom with staunch friends. In the new charters a power had been reserved to the crown of dismissing magistrates at pleasure. This power was now exercised without limit. It was by no means equally clear that James had the power of appointing magistrates: but, whether it belonged to him or not, he determined to assume it. Everywhere, from the Tweed to the Land's End, Tory functionaries were ejected; and the vacant places were filled with Presbyterians, Independents, and Baptists. In the new charter of the City of London the crown had reserved the power of displacing the Masters, Wardens, and Assistants of all the companies. Accordingly more than eight hundred citizens of the first consideration, all of them members of that party which had opposed the Exclusion Bill, were turned out of office by a single edict. In a short time appeared a supplement to this long list.* But scarcely had the new officebearers been sworn in when it was discovered that they were as unmanageable as their predecessors. At Newcastle on Tyne the regulators appointed a Roman Catholic Mayor and Puritan Aldermen. No doubt was entertained that the municipal body, thus remodelled, would vote an address promising to support the King's measures. The address, however, was negatived. The Mayor went up to London in a fury, and told the King that the Dissenters were all knaves and rebels, and that in the whole corporation the government could not reckon on more than four votes.† At Reading

* Privy Council Book, Sept. 25. 1687; Feb. 21. 1687.

+ Records of the Corporation, quoted

in Brand's History of Newcastle; John-
stone, Feb. 21. 1687.

CHAP.

VIII.

twenty-four Tory Aldermen were dismissed.

Twenty-four new Aldermen were appointed. Twenty-three of these immediately declared against the Indulgence, and were dismissed in their turn.* In the course of a few days the borough of Yarmouth was governed by three different sets of magistrates, all equally hostile to the Court.† These are mere examples of what was passing all over the kingdom, The Dutch Ambassador informed the States that in many towns the public functionaries had, within one month, been changed twice, and even thrice, and yet changed in vain. From the records of the Privy Council it appears that the number of regulations, as they were called, exceeded two hundred.§ The regulators. indeed found that, in not a few places, the change had been for the worse. The discontented Tories, even while murmuring against the King's policy, had constantly expressed respect for his person and his office, and had disclaimed all thought of resistance. Very different was the language of some of the new members of corporations. It was said that old soldiers of the Commonwealth, who, to their own astonishment and that of the public, had been made Aldermen, gave the agents of the Court very distinctly to understand that blood should flow before Popery and arbitrary power were established in England.||

The regulators found that little or nothing had been gained by what had as yet been done. There was one way, and one way only, in which they could hope to effect their object. The charters of the boroughs must be resumed; and other charters must be granted confining the elective franchise to very small constituent bodies appointed by the sovereign.¶

But how was this plan to be carried into effect? In a few of the new charters, indeed, a right of revocation had been reserved to the crown: but the rest James could get into his hands only by voluntary surrender on the part of corporations, or by judgment of a court of law. Few corporations were now disposed to surrender their charters voluntarily; and such judgments as would suit the purposes of the government were hardly to be expected even from such a slave as Wright. The writs of Quo Warranto which had been brought a few years before for the purpose of crushing the Whig party had been

* Johnstone, Feb. 21. 1687.
+ Van Citters, Feb. 14. 1688.

Ibid. May. 1688.

§ In the margin of the Privy Council Book may be observed the words "Se

cond Regulation," and "Third Regula-
tion," when a corporation had been
remodelled more than once.

Johnstone, May 23. 1688.
Ibid. Feb. 21. 1688.

Yet those writs had at

CHAP.

VIII.

condemned by every impartial man.
least the semblance of justice; for they were brought against
ancient municipal bodies, and there were few ancient munici-
pal bodies in which some abuse, sufficient to afford a pretext
for a penal proceeding, had not grown up in the course of ages.
But the corporations now to be attacked were still in the inno-
cence of infancy. The oldest among them had not completed
its fifth year. It was impossible that many of them should
have committed offences meriting disfranchisement. The
Judges themselves were uneasy. They represented that what
they were required to do was in direct opposition to the plain-
est principles of law and justice: but all remonstrance was vain.
The boroughs were commanded to surrender their charters.
Few complied; and the course which the King took with those
few did not encourage others to trust him. In several towns
the right of voting was taken away from the commonalty, and
given to a very small number of persons, who were required to
bind themselves by oath to support the candidates recom-
mended by the government. At Tewkesbury, for example, the
franchise was confined to thirteen persons. Yet even this num-
ber was too large. Hatred and fear had spread so widely
through the community that it was scarcely possible to bring
together in any town, by any process of packing, thirteen men
on whom the Court could absolutely depend. It was rumoured
that the majority of the new constituent body of Tewkesbury
was animated by the same sentiment which was general
throughout the nation, and would, when the decisive day should
arrive, send true Protestants to Parliament. The regulators
in great wrath threatened to reduce the number of electors to
three. Meanwhile the great majority of the boroughs firmly
refused to give up their privileges. Barnstaple, Winchester,
and Buckingham, distinguished themselves by the boldness of
their opposition. At Oxford the motion that the city should
resign its franchises to the King was negatived by eighty
votes to two.† The Temple and Westminster Hall were in a
ferment with the sudden rush of business from all corners of
the kingdom. Every lawyer in high practice was overwhelmed
with the briefs from corporations. Ordinary litigants com-
plained that their business was neglected. It was evident that
a considerable time must elapse before judgment could be given
in so great a number of important cases. Tyranny could ill

* Johnstone, Feb, 21. 1688.
Van Citters, March 8. 1688.

Van Citters, May 1688.

CHAP.

VIII.

Inquisition in all the

brook this delay. Nothing was omitted which could terrify the refractory boroughs into submission. At Buckingham some of the municipal officers had spoken of Jeffreys in language which was not laudatory. They were prosecuted, and were given to understand that no mercy should be shown to them unless they would ransom themselves by surrendering their charter.* At Winchester still more violent measures were adopted. A large body of troops was marched into the town for the sole purpose of burdening and harassing the inhabitants. The town continued resolute; and the public voice loudly accused the King of imitating the worst crimes of his brother of France. The dragonades, it was said, had begun. There was indeed reason for alarm. It had occurred to James that he could not more effectually break the spirit of an obstinate town than by quartering soldiers on the inhabitants. He must have known that this practice had sixty years before excited formidable discontents, and had been solemnly pronounced illegal by the Petition of Right, a statute scarcely less venerated by Englishmen than the Great Charter. But he hoped to obtain from the courts of law a declaration that even the Petition of Right could not control the prerogative. He actually consulted the Chief Justice of the King's Bench on this subject: but the result of the consultation remained secret; and in a very few weeks the aspect of affairs became such that a fear stronger than the fear of the royal displeasure began to impose some restraint even on the most servile magistrates.

While the Lords Lieutenants were questioning the Justices public de- of the Peace, while the regulators were remodelling the partments boroughs, all the public departments were subjected to a strict inquisition. The palace was first purified. Every battered old Cavalier, who, in return for blood and lands lost in the royal cause, had obtained some small place under the Keeper of the Wardrobe or the Master of the Harriers, was called upon to choose between the King and the Church. The Commissioners of Customs and Excise were ordered to attend His Majesty at the Treasury. There he demanded from them a promise to support his policy, and directed them to require a similar promise from all their subordinates.§ One Customhouse officer notified his submission to the royal will in a way

May 22.
June 1.

* Van Citters,
+ Ibid. May. 1688.
Ibid. May. 1688.

1688.

§ Van Citters, April 1688; Treasury Letter Book, March 14. 1687; Ron quillo, April.

which excited both merriment and compassion. "I have," he said, "fourteen reasons for obeying His Majesty's commands, a wife and thirteen young children."* Such reasons were indeed cogent; yet there were not a few instances in which, even against such reasons, religious and patriotic feelings prevailed.

There is ground to believe that the government at this time seriously meditated a blow which would have reduced many thousands of families to beggary, and would have disturbed the whole social system of every part of the country. No wine, beer, or coffee could be sold without a license. It was rumoured that every person holding such a license would shortly be required to enter into the same engagements which had been imposed on public functionaries, or to relinquish his trade. It seems certain that, if such a step had been taken, the houses of entertainment and of public resort all over the kingdom would have been at once shut up by hundreds. What effect such an interference with the comfort of all ranks would have produced must be left to conjecture. The resentment excited by grievances is not always proportioned to their dignity; and it is by no means improbable that the resumption of licenses might have done what the resumption of charters had failed to do. Men of fashion would have missed the chocolate house in Saint James's Street, and men of business the coffee pot, round which they were accustomed to smoke and talk politics, in Change Alley. Half the clubs would have been wandering in search of shelter. The traveller at nightfall would have found the inn where he had expected to sup and lodge deserted. The clown would have regretted the hedge alehouse, where he had been accustomed to take his pot on the bench before the door in summer, and at the chimney corner in winter. The nation might, perhaps, on such provocation, have risen in general rebellion without waiting for the help of foreign allies.

CHAP.

VIII.

It was not to be expected that a prince who required all the Dismission of Sawyer. humblest servants of the government to support his policy on pain of dismission would continue to employ an Attorney General whose aversion to that policy was no secret. Sawyer had been suffered to retain his situation more than a year and a half after he had declared against the dispensing power. This extraordinary indulgence he owed to the extreme difficulty which the government found in supplying his place. It + Ibid. May 18. 1688.

* Van Citters, May. 1688.