The History of England, from the Accession of James the Second - Volume 1, Thomas Babington Macaulay [ebook pc reader txt] 📗

to oppose the insurgents.

On the thirteenth of June the red regiment of Dorsetshire militia

came pouring into that town. The Somersetshire, or yellow

regiment, of which Sir William Portman, a Tory gentleman of great

note, was Colonel, was expected to arrive on the following

day.364 The Duke determined to strike an immediate blow. A

detachment of his troops was preparing to march to Bridport when

a disastrous event threw the whole camp into confusion.


Fletcher of Saltoun had been appointed to command the cavalry

under Grey. Fletcher was ill mounted; and indeed there were few

chargers in the camp which had not been taken from the plough.

When he was ordered to Bridport, he thought that the exigency of

the case warranted him in borrowing, without asking permission, a

fine horse belonging to Dare. Dare resented this liberty, and

assailed Fletcher with gross abuse. Fletcher kept his temper

better than any one who knew him expected. At last Dare,

presuming on the patience with which his insolence had been

endured, ventured to shake a switch at the high born and high

spirited Scot Fletcher's blood boiled. He drew a pistol and shot

Dare dead. Such sudden and violent revenge would not have been

thought strange in Scotland, where the law had always been weak,

where he who did not right himself by the strong hand was not

likely to be righted at all, and where, consequently, human life

was held almost as cheap as in the worst governed provinces of

Italy. But the people of the southern part of the island were not

accustomed to see deadly weapons used and blood spilled on

account of a rude word or gesture, except in duel between

gentlemen with equal arms. There was a general cry for vengeance

on the foreigner who had murdered an Englishman. Monmouth could

not resist the clamour. Fletcher, who, when his first burst of

rage had spent itself, was overwhelmed with remorse and sorrow,

took refuge on board of the Helderenbergh, escaped to the

Continent, and repaired to Hungary, where he fought bravely

against the common enemy of Christendom.365


Situated as the insurgents were, the loss of a man of parts and

energy was not easily to be repaired. Early on the morning of the

following day, the fourteenth of June, Grey, accompanied by Wade,

marched with about five hundred men to attack Bridport. A

confused and indecisive action took place, such as was to be

expected when two bands of ploughmen, officered by country

gentlemen and barristers, were opposed to each other. For a time

Monmouth's men drove the militia before them. Then the militia

made a stand, and Monmouth's men retreated in some confusion.

Grey and his cavalry never stopped till they were safe at Lyme

again: but Wade rallied the infantry and brought them off in good

order.366


There was a violent outcry against Grey; and some of the

adventurers pressed Monmouth to take a severe course. Monmouth,

however, would not listen to this advice. His lenity has been

attributed by some writers to his good nature, which undoubtedly

often amounted to weakness. Others have supposed that he was

unwilling to deal harshly with the only peer who served in his

army. It is probable, however, that the Duke, who, though not a

general of the highest order, understood war very much better

than the preachers and lawyers who were always obtruding their

advice on him, made allowances which people altogether inexpert

in military affairs never thought of making. In justice to a man

who has had few defenders, it must be observed that the task,

which, throughout this campaign, was assigned to Grey, was one

which, if he had been the boldest and most skilful of soldiers,

he would scarcely have performed in such a manner as to gain

credit. He was at the head of the cavalry. It is notorious that a

horse soldier requires a longer training than a foot soldier, and

that the war horse requires a longer training than his rider.

Something may be done with a raw infantry which has enthusiasm

and animal courage: but nothing can be more helpless than a raw

cavalry, consisting of yeomen and tradesmen mounted on cart

horses and post horses; and such was the cavalry which Grey

commanded. The wonder is, not that his men did not stand fire

with resolution, not that they did not use their weapons with

vigour, but that they were able to keep their seats.


Still recruits came in by hundreds. Arming and drilling went on

all day. Meantime the news of the insurrection had spread fast

and wide. On the evening on which the Duke landed, Gregory

Alford, Mayor of Lyme, a zealous Tory, and a bitter persecutor of

Nonconformists, sent off his servants to give the alarm to the

gentry of Somersetshire and Dorsetshire, and himself took horse

for the West. Late at night he stopped at Honiton, and thence

despatched a few hurried lines to London with the ill tidings.367

He then pushed on to Exeter, where he found Christopher Monk,

Duke of Albemarle. This nobleman, the son and heir of George

Monk, the restorer of the Stuarts, was Lord Lieutenant of

Devonshire, and was then holding a muster of militia. Four

thousand men of the trainbands were actually assembled under his

command. He seems to have thought that, with this force, he

should be able at once to crush the rebellion. He therefore

marched towards Lyme.


But when, on the afternoon of Monday the fifteenth of June, he

reached Axminster, he found the insurgents drawn up there to

encounter him. They presented a resolute front. Four field pieces

were pointed against the royal troops. The thick hedges, which on

each side overhung the narrow lanes, were lined with musketeers.

Albemarle, however, was less alarmed by the preparations of the

enemy than by the spirit which appeared in his own ranks. Such

was Monmouth's popularity among the common people of Devonshire

that, if once the trainbands had caught sight of his well known

face and figure, they would have probably gone over to him in a

body.


Albemarle, therefore, though he had a great superiority of force,

thought it advisable to retreat. The retreat soon became a rout.

The whole country was strewn with the arms and uniforms which the

fugitives had thrown away; and, had Monmouth urged the pursuit

with vigour, he would probably have taken Exeter without a blow.

But he was satisfied with the advantage which he had gained, and

thought it desirable that his recruits should be better trained

before they were employed in any hazardous service. He therefore

marched towards Taunton, where he arrived on the eighteenth of

June, exactly a week after his landing.368


The Court and the Parliament had been greatly moved by the news

from the West. At five in the morning of Saturday the thirteenth

of June, the King had received the letter which the Mayor of Lyme

had despatched from Honiton. The Privy Council was instantly

called together. Orders were given that the strength of every

company of infantry and of every troop of cavalry should be

increased. Commissions were issued for the levying of new

regiments. Alford's communication was laid before the Lords; and

its substance was communicated to the Commons by a message. The

Commons examined the couriers who had arrived from the West, and

instantly ordered a bill to be brought in for attainting Monmouth

of high treason. Addresses were voted assuring the King that both

his peers and his people were determined to stand by him with

life and fortune against all his enemies. At the next meeting of

the Houses they ordered the Declaration of the rebels to be

burned by the hangman, and passed the bill of attainder through

all its stages. That bill received the royal assent on the same

day; and a reward of five thousand pounds was promised for the

apprehension of Monmouth.369


The fact that Monmouth was in arms against the government was so

notorious that the bill of attainder became a law with only a

faint show of opposition from one or two peers, and has seldom

been severely censured even by Whig historians. Yet, when we

consider how important it is that legislative and judicial

functions should be kept distinct, how important it is that

common fame, however strong and general, should not be received

as a legal proof of guilt, how important it is to maintain the

rule that no man shall be condemned to death without an

opportunity of defending himself, and how easily and speedily

breaches in great principles, when once made, are widened, we

shall probably be disposed to think that the course taken by the

Parliament was open to some objection. Neither House had before

it anything which even so corrupt a judge as Jeffreys could have

directed a jury to consider as proof of Monmouth's crime. The

messengers examined by the Commons were not on oath, and might

therefore have related mere fictions without incurring the

penalties of perjury. The Lords, who might have administered an

oath, appeared not to have examined any witness, and to have had

no evidence before them except the letter of the Mayor of Lyme,

which, in the eye of the law, was no evidence at all. Extreme

danger, it is true, justifies extreme remedies. But the Act of

Attainder was a remedy which could not operate till all danger

was over, and which would become superfluous at the very moment

at which it ceased to be null. While Monmouth was in arms it was

impossible to execute him. If he should be vanquished and taken,

there would be no hazard and no difficulty in trying him. It was

afterwards remembered as a curious circumstance that, among

zealous Tories who went up with the bill from the House of

Commons to the bar of the Lords, was Sir John Fenwick, member for

Northumberland. This gentleman, a few years later, had occasion

to reconsider the whole subject, and then came to the conclusion

that acts of attainder are altogether unjustifiable.370


The Parliament gave other proofs of loyalty in this hour of

peril. The Commons authorised the King to raise an extraordinary

sum of four hundred thousand pounds for his present necessities,

and that he might have no difficulty in finding the money,

proceeded to devise new imposts. The scheme of taxing houses

lately built in the capital was revived and strenuously supported

by the country gentlemen. It was resolved not only that such

houses should be taxed, but that a bill should be brought in

prohibiting the laying of any new foundations within the bills of

mortality. The resolution, however, was not carried into effect.

Powerful men who had land in the suburbs and who hoped to see new

streets and squares rise on their estates, exerted all their

influence against