Page:Cassell's Illustrated History of England vol 4.djvu/30

16 James, and he served his master with cunning and zeal. James brought with him arms for ten thousand men, and abundance of ammunition, and a military chest of about a hundred and twenty thousand pounds sterling. Before quitting St. Germains Louis XIV. himself had paid James a parting visit, displayed towards him the most marked friendship, embraced him at parting, and told him the greatest good that he could desire for him was that they might never meet again. He also presented him with his own cuirass, which had not many dents in it from his own wars—Louis allowing Luxembourg and Turenne to do the fighting, himself only being occasionally in the camp to receive the honours; nor was it likely to receive many more bruises on the back of James.

Along with him came a troop of exiles, English and Irish swelling his train with the French on his landing to a body of about two thousand five hundred men. Amongst the leading exiles were his own son, the duke of Berwick, Cartwright, bishop of Chester, and the popish lords Powis, Dover, and Melfort—the last of them a man almost equally detested by all parties, and by those of both religions, for he was an apostate and a turncoat, and encouraged James in the most base and impolitic designs and sentiments. He was, in fact, a man after James's own heart, for he could love nothing that was honourable and upright.

James landed on the 12th of March, and two days after was in Cork. The Irish received him with enthusiastic acclamations as a saviour; but the effects of his anticipated arrival, and the measures concerted by himself and carried out by the brutal Tyrconnel, met him on the instant. He was anxious to push on to Dublin; but the whole country was a desert, and horses could not be procured in sufficient numbers to convey his baggage, nor food to sustain them on the way. During the detention consequent on this, Tyrconnel arrived to welcome his majesty to Ireland. Spite of the untoward aspect of things, of the stripped and desolated country, this hollow monster assured him that all was flourishing, that only Enniskillen and Londonderry afforded their last refuge to the protestants, and that Hamilton was on his way to exterminate them. It was a strange kind of prosperity, for when they at length could set out towards Dublin, the French beheld with astonishment the track they had to pass through. Instead of well-cultivated fields, thriving villages, and busy towns, the whole was stripped, vast districts without an inhabitant, and what was naturally fair and fertile, swarming only with ragged and wild-looking peasants, armed with rude pikes, stakes, and long skeans. It was a hideous spectacle, made the more hideous by the strange cries and caperings of the uncouth mob, which crowded the highway side to welcome the royal champion of their faith.

On the 24th of March he entered Dublin amid the hurrahs and the festive demonstrations of flowers, garlands of evergreens, of tapestry and carpets hung from the windows, of processions of young girls in white, and friars and priests with their crosses, and with the host itself. At sight of that, James alighted, and, falling on his knees in the mud, bared his head in humble devotion. A grand cavalcade of carriages, containing the judges, the lord mayor and aldermen, and many other officers and noblemen, conducted him to the castle, the way being lined on each hand by troops of soldiery. There was much playing of pipes and harps, and shouting amongst the people, and in the royal chapel Te Deum was performed in celebration of the arrival of the national deliverer.

The next morning James proceeded to form his privy council. This was composed of the duke of Berwick, his son; the duke of Powis; the earls of Abercorn, Melfort, Dover, Carlingford, and Clanricarde; the lords Thomas Howard, Kilmallack, Merrion, Kinmore; lord chief justice Herbert, the bishop of Chester, general Sarsfield, colonel Dorrington, and, strangely enough, D'Avaux, who should have retained the independent position of ambassador; the marquis D'Abbeville, and two other foreigners. The protestant bishop of Meath, at the head of his clergy, appeared before him, imploring his protection, and permission to lay before him the account of the injuries they and their flocks had received. James affected to declare that he was just as much as ever desirous to afford full liberty of conscience, and to protect all his subjects in their rights and opinions; but he said it was impossible to alter what had already taken place, and he gave an immediate proof of the impartiality which protestants were likely to receive at his hands by dismissing Keating, chief justice of the common pleas, the only protestant judge still remaining on the bench.

Then came the catholic bishops and priests to pay their homage, and they were received with all the warmth of royal sunshine. These were the men, together with the priests all over the island, who from their pulpits called in God's name on the infuriated populace to be up, and cut the throats and make spoil of the heretic Englishry. To make his intentions the clearer, he issued a proclamation, thanking the Irish for having so readily appeared in arms at the call of the lord-lieutenant; for having, in fact, committed all the atrocities and spoliations on his protestant subjects, whom he was hypocritically declaring he would defend and deal equal justice to. He ordered all the protestants who had fled out of the island, to save their lives and some remnant of their property, to return under the same assurances of protection, whilst Hamilton, with his full knowledge and approbation, was at the very moment engaged in endeavouring to extinguish the last sparks of Irish protestantism at Londonderry and Enniskillen. And, finally, he summoned a parliament to meet at Dublin on the 7th of May.

These measures dispatched, it became the question whether, in the interval before the meeting of parliament, James should continue in Dublin, or should proceed to the army besieging Londonderry, and encourage it by his presence. This called forth the conflicting views and interests of his adherents, and his whole court became rent by struggling factions. The English exiles warmly urged the king to proceed to Ulster. They cared little for the fate of Ireland, their views and wishes were fixed on England. In the north, as soon as Londonderry was put down, it was easy for James to put across to Scotland, there to commence the campaign for the recovery of the English crown. But this was the very thing which his Irish partisans dreaded. They felt very certain that if James recovered the English throne, they should be left to contend with the colonists of