Page:Public School History of England and Canada (1892).djvu/122

 who was a Protestant, would become Queen of England. Nevertheless, Charles continued to intrigue with Louis, and made the marriage a means of getting a larger grant from the French king. He even persuaded Danby to write to Louis a letter asking for money, and promising to prevent his Parliament from going to war with France.

10. The “Popish Plot,” 1678.—Although these intrigues were kept secret, the people became uneasy and felt they were betrayed. While they were in this humour, a low scoundrel, called Titus Oates, who had been a Jesuit but had left that body, came forward with a strange tale. He said there was a plot to kill Charles and make the Duke of York king. Oates told his story to Sir Edmund Bury Godfrey, a London magistrate, and soon afterwards Godfrey was found dead in a ditch. How he came to his death no one ever knew; but people said that he was killed by the Roman Catholics to prevent the “Popish Plot” from coming out. This caused great excitement, which was increased by the discovery of some papers belonging to Coleman, the secretary of the Duchess of York, in which references were made to some hope of the Roman Catholics. Parliament, in its alarm, passed an act preventing Roman Catholics from becoming members; and Oates, Bedloe, and other perjured witnesses swore away the lives of many innocent victims. Judges and juries believed the most ridiculous tales of plots, and condemned the accused on the most trivial and contradictory evidence. The most illustrious victim was Lord Stafford, who perished in 1681. Charles did not believe these tales, but laughed at the whole matter, and allowed the popular frenzy to spend itself in putting to death men of his own creed. Shaftesbury helped the plot along for his own ends, and when, in 1679, Danby's letter to Louis XIV., asking for a pension for Charles, was laid on the table of the House of Commons, he had his revenge. Danby was impeached and driven from office, Parliament was dissolved for the first time in seventeen years, and Shaftesbury became chief minister.

11. Exclusion Bill.—Amidst this excitement a new Parliament was elected in 1679. Under Shaftesbury's leadership it brought in a bill to exclude James, Duke of York, from the throne. But Charles, to save James, dissolved Parliament, not, however, before