Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 18.djvu/174

160 Page (the one the author, the other the disperser) lost each their right hand. And, to show that men in those days had both a sense of their duty and their guilt; when Stubs had his right hand cut off, he immediately uncovered his head with the other, and cryed, "God save the queen!" I never read that, during the time of the execution, they were protected by a mob of chimneysweepers hired by their partisans.

What cause shall we then assign of this tumultuous and excessive joy of the party: their industry to spread, and their eagerness to believe, what they so much wished? Were all the glories and blessings of queen Anne's reign so soon to be forgotten? Were their protestations of loyalty and affection nothing else but petitions for preferment? or did they proceed only from the fear of Newgate and Tyburn? Might not all her cares and labours that (in her circumstances) could have no other end but the welfare of her people, have deserved one pitying tear? Could not even (allowing their own supposition) her mistaken zeal for restoring the peace and commerce of her subjects, her tenderness to their exhausted purses, and her care to transmit their liberties safe to posterity, plead for one relenting thought? Might not some regard have been paid to her personal virtues, and to the rare example she has left behind her, of the constant practice of all christian duties amid the grandeur and temptations of a court? No! All these things, it seems, were to be the subject of mirth, ridicule