Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 28.djvu/397

Rh estates (Diary and Correspondence, i. 200; ii. 180-2; cf., iii. 331, note; Ellis Correspondence, ii. 42-4). To relieve himself of pecuniary difficulties he engaged in speculations, ranging from the digging for coal in Windsor forest to the traffic of Scotch pedlars (Diary and Correspondence, i. 284). A pension of 2,000l. per annum conferred on him by James II about the beginning of 1688 was probably welcome, although Halifax thought it inadequate (ib. ii. 155). Macaulay (iii. 33) ignores it.

Clarendon more than ever identified his interests with those of the church. While in Ireland he had received a mark of confidence from Oxford by being named high steward of the university (5 Jan. 1686, ), and on leaving England he had done his best to keep the ecclesiastical appointments open for better days. He advised the bishops in the Tower concerning their bail (Diary and Correspondence, ii. 177), and was asked by Jeffreys to use his good offices with Sancroft (ib. p. 180). Accordingly the course of events soon made the queen, whose goodwill Clarendon had while in Ireland persistently wooed, and on whose council he had been placed in 1681, anxious in her turn for his countenance (ib.} On 24 Sept. 1688, the day after her friendly reception of him, Clarendon found the king himself, in view of the Dutch preparations for invasion, anxious to 'see what the Church of England men will do.' ' And your majesty will see that they will behave themselves like honest men, though they have been somewhat severely used of late' (ib. p. 189). By-and-by he became still more resolute, and on 22 Oct., at the council summoned by the king to hear his declaration concerning the birth of the Prince of Wales, declined to sit by the side of Father Petre, and asked to attend as a peer only (ib. ii. 195-6; cf. , iii. 57). On the other hand, he seems to have loyally used his influence with the Princess Anne (Diary and Correspondence, pp. 199, 201); so that the king may have been sincere in crediting (1 Nov.) his assurance that he had had no concern in the invitation to the Prince of Orange (ib. p.200). Unfortunately, nine days after the landing of the prince followed the desertion to him of Lord Cornbury (14 Nov.), which was afterwards, with some show of reason, thought to have ' begun the general defection' (, Life of James II, ii. 215). The anguish of Clarendon, who immediately (16 Nov.) threw himself at the feet of the king and queen, was probably genuine, though its motives may have been complex. His wife was not in the secret of the flight of the Princess of Denmark (ib. p.226), in which, according to the Duchess of Marlborough, he would have well liked to have had a chance of sharing (Conduct of the Duchess of Marlborough, p.18). In the council of peers called by the king on his return to discuss the question of summoning a free parliament (27 Nov.) Clarendon inveighed unsparingly against the royal policy (Diary and Correspondence, ii. 204-9; cf. , iii. 340, and Dartmouth's note); and on 1 Dec. he set out for Salisbury to make his peace with William. On 3 Dec. he had an interview with the prince at Berwick, near Hindon, and speedily made up his mind, with a view to the interests of the family as well as to the destinies of the country, to tender his support to the prince (Diary and Correspondence, ii. 213, 216-17). He was present at the Hungerford conference on 8 Dec., and followed the advance of the prince as far as Henley, where, on 13 Dec., he obtained leave of absence, wearily informing his friend the bishop of Ely that 'all was naught' (ib. p.225). By the prince's desire he waited on him again at Windsor on 16 Dec., and took heart to present to him his brother Rochester. It was at the conference held at Windsor that Clarendon was said to have suggested the confinement of King James to the Tower (Conduct of the Duchess of Marlborough, p.18; cf. Vindication of the Duchess, pp. 5-7); while, according to Burnet (iii. 355), improved by Macaulay (ii. 64), he proposed his relegation to Breda. He himself distinctly declares that, except at the Windsor meeting, he had never been present at any discourse concerning what should be done with King James, but that he was against the king being sent away (Diary and Correspondence, ii. 287). He was certainly now fully alive to the gravity of the crisis, though he may have doubted whether or not he ought to 'kick against the pricks' (cf. , Diary, iii. 429); but such efforts as he made to warn the unfortunate king against being hurried into an irretraceable step were frustrated by the flight of which he was informed by the prince himself (ib. p. 234).

Under the new régime Clarendon at first continued to bear himself as the representative of the protestant interest in Ireland, and early in 1689 had several interviews on its behalf with William (Diary and Correspondence, ii. 238, 243, 258). Indeed, Burnet (iii. 368-9) affirms that Clarendon's hopes were set on a return to Dublin, but that Tyrconnel's agents found means to frighten William into altogether declining to discuss Irish affairs with Clarendon, who hereupon took his revenge by `reconciling himself to King James.' He certainly both repudiated