Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 09.djvu/323

 . As a result of this, perhaps, divorce schemes were renewed. Charles's interest in Lord Ross's marriage bill (1670) was regarded as not wholly disinterested. An absurd story went round that the pope had agreed to the divorce (, p. 875). Yet about the same time Charles went with Catherine to Dover to meet the Duchess of Orleans and sign the famous treaty, of which, however, it is not known that she was cognisant. One result of the expedition was that Louise de Quérouaille was added to the number of her maids of honour. In 1671 Catherine accompanied Charles on a progress to the eastern counties. At Audley End she got involved in an extraordinary frolic, when she and some of her ladies went disguised as countrywomen to Saffron Walden fair and were found out and mobbed. Afterwards she and Charles were magnificently entertained at Norwich by Lord Henry Howard (, Narrative of Kino Charles's Visit to Norwich).

The development of anti-catholic feeling now became troublesome to Catherine. On 5 Feb. 1673 a committee of the lords was appointed to draw up a bill 'that no Romish priest do attend her majesty but such as are subjects of the king of Portugal' (Lords' Journals, xii. 627 b; cf. 618 b). The popish plot panic involved her in more serious dangers. Soon after the murder of Sir Edmundbury Godfrey (12 Oct. 1678) the informer Bedloe attributed the deed to her popish servants. On 8 Nov. 1678 Somerset House was searched for papists connected with the plot (ib. xiii. 48 α), and Titus Oates soon outstripped Bedloe by accusing the queen herself of a design to poison the king. He deposed before the council that he had accompanied some jesuits one day in August to Somerset House, and heard through a door left ajar the queen protesting that she would no longer suffer indignities to her bed, and was content with procuring the death of her husband and the propagation of the catholic faith (North, Examen of the Plot, pp. 182-3; cf., p. 955). Cross-examination and subsequent investigation showed clearly his entire ignorance of the internal arrangements of Somerset House and the impossibility of his having heard any such conversation. But Bedloe produced corroborative testimony of an interview he pretended to have witnessed between Catherine and some French priests in the gallery of her chapel at Somerset House, which he impudently asserted he had forgotten to mention when he gave in his depositions as to the murder of Godfrey. Wakeman, her physician, was to prepare the poison, Catherine was to deliver it herself; her last scruples had been overcome by the French jesuits.

On 28 Nov. Bedloe made his depositions at the bar of the House of Commons. Oates followed, and solemnly accused Catherine of high treason (see Debates, vi. 287-300). Next day they repeated their statements to the House of Lords (Lords' Journals, xiii. 388 α). On 12 Nov. the commons addressed the king begging him to tender oaths of supremacy to all the queen's English servants (Commons' Journals, ix. 539 b; cf. 548); and on 28 Nov. passed another address for the removal of Catherine, her family, and all papists from Whitehall (ib. ix. 549 b); which was, despite Shaftesbury's opposition, negatived by the Lords (Lords' Journals, xiii. 392 b). For some time Catherine was in imminent danger. Next year fresh depositions, among others from Monmouth's cook, were handed in against her, and on 24 June the council voted that she had better stand her trial. In these distresses her chief adviser was the exiled Count of Castelmelhor, and Dom Pedro, her brother, though not very speedily, despatched a special envoy to interpose in her behalf. But such foreign support would have availed her little against popular feeling. More important was Charles's steady adhesion to her. He said publicly to Burnet that he thought it would be a horrid thing to abandon her, and declared that, though men thought he had a mind to a new wife, he would not see an innocent woman wronged. He issued a public proclamation that he had never been married to any woman besides Catherine. In return for such acts of favour Catherine clung to the king with more affection than ever, declared she was only in safety where he was (Letters of H. Prideaux; p. 82, Camden Soc.), and went so far as to include the Duchess of Portsmouth in the nine popish ladies of her household that had been exempted from the test enforced on the rest. The acquittal of Sir George Wakeman and some jesuit priests on the charge of uniting with the queen to poison the king was a first check on the informers. 'The queen is now a mistress,' wrote Lady Sunderland, 'the passion her spouse has for her is so great.' At a dinner at Chiffinch's 'the queen drank a little wine to pledge the king's health and prosperity to his affairs, having drunk no wine this many years.' In August Bedloe died, protesting with his last breath that the queen was ignorant of any design against the king, and had only given money to help the introduction of catholicism. Yet on 17 Nov., after the failure of the Exclusion Bill, Shaftesbury moved in the House of Lords, 'as the