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 opened, but the anglican churches were left unmolested (Life, ii. 79), except that Benedictines were settled in St. James's Chapel. The court in October was said to be deserted by all not called thither on actual service (, iii. 261). On 5 Jan. 1687 Rochester, whom the king had in vain attempted to convert, succumbed to the cabal [see ].

In Scotland a proclamation, issued 18 Feb. 1687, granted the right of public worship to all nonconformists, though with reservations burdensome to the presbyterians, and suspended all penal law against the catholics. In London a preliminary attempt was made to secure by royal ‘closetings’ as many distinguished recruits as possible for Rome (, pp. 268–70; cf. Ellis Correspondence, i. 265); while in the country the judges on assize were instructed to feel the pulse of members of parliament (, p. 370). At court Penn was frequently admitted to the presence (Ellis Correspondence, i. 269), and on 4 April the fateful Declaration of Indulgence appeared (see ib. ii. 285;, iii. 39). On 3 July James publicly received at Windsor the papal nuncio (Count Ferdinand d'Adda). To the deep annoyance of the king (Les derniers Stuarts, ii. 148), the pope left Father Petre unpromoted, but conferred a cardinalate upon Mary of Modena's brother Rinaldo, and named him protector of the English nation at Rome. Father Petre, appointed to the privy council, in November 1687, the convert Sir Nicholas Butler, and Sunderland now formed the triumvirate in control of affairs.

On the day after the nuncio's reception the dissolution of parliament was proclaimed (4 July 1687). James II tried to secure a more subservient body by a manipulation of the surrendered municipal charters (, iii. 191), and by managing the counties with the aid of a renovated lord-lieutenancy. The universities were likewise attacked. On the deprivation of the vice-chancellor of Cambridge (May) followed the expulsion of the fellows of Magdalen College, Oxford (December), and its conversion into a catholic seminary. In the Magdalen case James intervened personally (Diary of Bishop Cartwright of Chester, pp. 83, 86–93 et al.; cf., pp. 284 seqq.).

The determination of the king stiffened as his manœuvres failed, and on 27 April 1688 he put forth his second Declaration of Indulgence, which, while reiterating his religious policy, announced his intention of assembling parliament in November at the latest. This declaration was (4 May) ordered to be read in church on two specified successive Sundays, after being previously distributed by the bishops in their dioceses. When seven bishops petitioned him (18 May) against the declaration, James told them that they had raised the standard of rebellion. A fortnight afterwards they were consigned to the Tower (, iii. 189–90; Clarendon Correspondence, pp. 177, 179–80). The acquittal of the bishops (30 June 1688) naturally disturbed the king, though he appears to have preserved his self-control when the news reached him in the camp at Hounslow Heath (, p. 397; Ellis Correspondence, ii. 24–5; cf. Life, ii. 165).

The confidence shown by James was partly due to the birth of a prince of Wales (10 June); for the doubtfulness of the succession had been an element of weakness in his position. The significance of the birth of an heir was soon apprehended, and little art was needed to prompt and develope the suggestion that the child was supposititious. Although James was only in his fifty-fifth year, while the queen had already given birth to four children (who died young), the story found willing listeners in the Princesses Mary and Anne and among the public at large [see ].

III. From the summer to the autumn of 1688 the relations between James II and the Prince of Orange had been uneasy. The fear that James would renew Charles's offensive alliance with France easily became a belief that such an alliance had been actually concluded (, iii. 275–6), and that a league, more or less resembling the treaty of Dover, had been concluded between James and Louis. The literature on the subject is enormous (by way of example see ‘An Account of a Private League,’ &c., in Harleian Miscellany, i. 37 seqq.). The officiousness of Skelton, the English envoy, had personally irritated William against James, who in his turn was annoyed by the favourable reception given at the Hague to Burnet (, iii. 137–9), though by James's desire he ceased to be received at court. In January 1687 James sent to the Hague in Skelton's place Albeville, a catholic Irishman in the pay of France. William hereupon sent Dykvelt to England, who, besides warning the king against the repeal of the Test Act, communicated with all the statesmen, by whom William was afterwards invited to England. During the summer of 1687 the irritation between the English and Dutch governments increased. James, who about this time declined to oblige the emperor by coming forward on behalf of the peace of Europe, was more isolated than ever in his foreign relations. After the dissolution of parliament Zuylesteen was sent to