XV. CHAP. Before the negotiations for the peace of Utrecht the sympathy of the British government had been repeatedly invoked on behalf of suffering French protestants condemned to the galleys for their faith. Both in England and Holland their representatives had pleaded that no treaty should be concluded without a provision for their release. Queen Anne herself had expressed an interest in them and had received assurances from Louis XIV. But Bolingbroke had no sympathy with religious convictions and had not been disposed either to hazard his favour at the court of Versailles or to retard a peace by insisting upon a condition distasteful to Louis and Madame de Maintenon. The French protestants were sacrificed to bigotry and indifference. It was a timely and gracious concession on the part of the regent to redeem the promises that had been given by ordering them to be set at liberty. The British government was now resolved to insist on the removal of the pretender from Lorraine, whither, after a short stay at St. Germain's, he had once more repaired. The duke, nervous lest the regent should exert pressure, met James at Commercy (March 10-14), and explained his inability to remain his host. No practicable resource remained but the papal territory of Avignon, which he reached about April 1. Pope Clement XI. wrote him a letter of welcome and assigned him a pension. The whigs remained unappeased. They were determined to discredit him by driving him to Rome. A memorial handed in by Stair to the regent declared that his government would not be satisfied till the pretender was beyond the Alps. Despite occasional disturbances, of which Jacobite correspondence made the most, the population as a whole shewed no sympathy with the rising. The evacuation of Perth by the pretender was acclaimed with cheers in the London theatres. While the dissenters were especially zealous for the government—a dissenting congregation headed by its preacher taking arms to assist the troops at Preston-thirteen of the prelates of the Church of England published a declaration of "abhorrence of the present rebellion". In Ireland the parliament voted £50,000 for the apprehension of the pretender and £10,000 for that of the Duke of Ormonde, in the event of their landing. The speech with which King George opened 1 James III. to Cardinal Imperiali, May 12, 1716, Stuart Papers, ii., 147. 1716 THE REBEL PRISONERS. 265 XV. the session on January 9, 1716, expressed the confidence of CHAP. the ministry in the future, since it conveyed an indirect warning to France against " endeavouring to support this desperate undertaking". When reports came to hand that numbers of Irish and Scottish officers were ready to embark from France, 10,000 additional troops were promptly voted for England and 6,000 for Ireland. "Had they" (the king's servants), wrote Stanhope to Stair on January 23, "encouraged the temper which appeared, I do verily believe a war would have been voted before the rising of the house." This was not the attitude of an administration in difficulties, and the news of the pretender's flight a fortnight later completed the effect on the regent's mind. No event, as Prince Eugene declared, could have contributed to the stability of the new dynasty so effectually as the Scottish rebellion. In the infliction of penalties the government, as compared with the Stewart sovereigns, acted with moderation and lenity. By the rigour of the law all the prisoners were liable to death. But there was no "bloody assize". From among the hundreds of undistinguished prisoners taken at Preston, one in every twenty was selected by lot to take his trial; the rest were respited.1 Less than a hundred of those taken in Scotland were, under a power given by statute,2 sent for trial to Carlisle, despite the execrations of the Jacobites and the disapproval of Scottish lawyers. Though most of them pleaded guilty, not one was executed. A number escaped, so large as to suggest the complicity of jailers. Among them were Forster and Brigadier MacIntosh, who in April broke out of Newgate and, notwithstanding the offer of £1,000 for Forster, made their way safely to Avignon. Only twenty-two prisoners were hanged in Lancashire and four in London. Some hundreds were transported for terms to the American colonies. In the 1R. O., MS., State Papers, Dom., G. I., bundle 2, no. 95, Dec. 13, 1715. 21 G. I., st. 2, c. 33. 3 Duncan Forbes, then depute-advocate, to Walpole, in August, 1716, Cullo den Papers, p. 61. 4 Eighteen from Edinburgh Castle, "about as many from Stirling". Stuart Papers, ii., 432, September 12, 1716; cf. ibid., p. 432. 'See R. O., MS., Board of Trade, Carolina (Proprietary), vol. v., n. 97. They had pleaded guilty, as is acknowledged by the young Lord Wharton in his attack upon the proceedings of the government, October 10, 1716, Stuart Papers, iii., 547. . of the rebel lords it was determined that an uid be made. With a view to diverting unpoputhe court, the procedure adopted was not that of out of impeachment by the house of commons of on. On January 11, 1716, resolutions passed for **tment of Lords Derwentwater, Widdrington, Nithscoun, Carnwath, Kenmure, and Nairne. Brought up e house of lords on the 19th, all of them pleaded and threw themselves on the king's mercy, with the on of the Earl of Wintoun, who asked for further time epare his defence. Sentence upon the other six was 、ou with solemn ceremony in Westminster Hall by Lord cor Cowper, sitting as lord high steward. The execu.. vere fixed to take place on February 24. Among the numerous friends of the condemned there ively hopes of obtaining a remission of the sentences. sonal appeals to the king proving inefficacious, the friends The culprits sought to stir public sentiment and, in par , that of the two houses of parliament. The advocates Gemency, currently called "the mercy men,"1 were in a arul dilemma. If the leaders of the rebellion were spared, er followers ought not to have been executed. On the er hand, the suppression of the rebellion and the flight of aeretender seemed to render further bloodshed needless. They also found themselves confronted with a constitutional hculty. By a section of the act of settlement it was proviced that no pardon under the great seal of England be Readable to an impeachment by the commons in parliament ”. The house of lords, however, agreed that the prerogative of don after conviction was not abolished and, on February 2, under the influence of Nottingham who seceded from his colleagues, carried an address for mercy, though by five votes only. After a vehement discussion in council, it was decided that three of the six convicted lords should be reprieved. The three most guilty, Nithsdale, Derwentwater, and Kenmure. were left for execution. Derwentwater and Kenmure were cheaded upon Tower Hill on the 24th, both professing to The last their adherence to the pretender. The escape of 1 Stuart Papers, ii., 10. 1716 DISMISSAL OF NOTTINGHAM. 267 XV. Nithsdale from prison in a woman's clothes by the contrivance CHAP. of his countess on the evening before is one of the dramatic episodes of history. All England applauded her heroism and, though her act was treason, the government was generous enough to let her go free. The trial of the Earl of Wintoun began on March 15. There was some doubt as to his sanity, but his part in the rebellion was clearly proved. Like the other prisoners he pretended that he had surrendered on the promise of mercy. As this plea reflected upon the king, the government took this, the first opportunity they had had, of rebutting it by the testimony of Generals Carpenter and Wills. Being unanimously found guilty he was sentenced to death on March 19, a sentence commuted for imprisonment for life in the Tower, whence on August 4 he effected his escape to the continent. The opposition offered by Nottingham to the executions brought to the surface the latent differences between him and the rest of the ministry. While his vote in the house of lords in opposition to his colleagues had abundant justification in precedent, public opinion was rapidly maturing in favour of party government. Four days after the executions, Nottingham, his son Lord Finch, his brother Lord Aylesford, and his nephew Lord Guernsey, were all dismissed from their posts. Henceforth the government was purely whig. In the days of their domination the tories had conceived the idea of conserving their power from the vicissitudes of popular election by a repeal of the triennial act of 1694. But the end had come with unexpected suddenness and the opportunity was now transferred to the hands of their opponents. A continuance of the existing parliament for six years longer would probably make in favour of the peaceable establishment of the dynasty. The question was, indeed, raised1 and yet remains one of the controversies of constitutional law, whether a parliament summoned for three years was competent to extend its existence to seven without a reference to the electorate from whom it derived its powers. But time had disclosed practical objections to the continuance of the triennial act which were incontestable. They were admirably sketched by Steele in his speech for the bill in the commons, and may 1 See the Marquis of Wharton's circular letter to the freeholders, October 10, 1716, Stuart Papers, iii., 547. XV. CHAP. be summarised by saying that election petitions, business and electioneering manœuvres successively engrossed the three years of a parliament's life. Outside parliament it was said that triennial elections had increased bribery. Constituencies and agents preyed upon their representatives. Party passions were heightened, domestic peace was disturbed. In foreign affairs an absence of continuity had made itself felt in English policy and the government of the day had been regarded abroad as an ephemeral power. The triennial act had made, said the old Earl of Sunderland, “a triennial king, a triennial ministry, and a triennial alliance". Upon these considerations the government determined to repeal the act and substitute a term of seven years as the limit of a parliament's duration. Yet so many interests were involved in the maintenance of the existing system, that doubts were entertained of the reception a septennial bill would meet with in the house of commons. It was determined, therefore, following the precedent of the triennial act, to introduce the bill in the first place into the house of lords. In the debate on the second reading, Nottingham and his friends ranged themselves with the opposition. Bishop Atterbury "complimented, bantered, and lashed the ministry. . . with an infinite deal of wit. An essential part of it (the speech) was to admire the happiness of this free nation that was now to be governed by a standing parliament and a standing army." 1 Shrewsbury, like Atterbury in correspondence with the pretender, caustically observed that, "as to the saving of money, he could not see that, for he believed everybody knew that an annuity of seven years costs dearer than an annuity of three ". The division was not wholly upon party lines. The Duke of Somerset, at the head of a group of whigs, voted against the bill; a group of tory peers in its favour. "A new strange jumble," commented an onlooker. The second reading was carried on April 16 by seventy-seven to forty-three votes, thirty peers subsequently recording a protest against it. In the house of commons, although there was the same conflict of feeling, the government were more sure of a majority. Whigs who had inveighed against the intentions of the tories in the last par 1 Stuart Papers, ii., 131, April 19, 1716. 3 Ibid., p. 122, April 16, 1716. |