An Island Story, H. E. Marshall [learn to read books txt] 📗
- Author: H. E. Marshall
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As he rode along an old woman pushed her way through the crowd, and afraid neither of the prancing horses nor the drawn swords of the soldiers, darted to the side of the Prince. She seized his hand, and, looking up into his face with eyes full of tears, cried, “I am happy now, I am happy now.” And the grave and stern William smiled gently as he looked down upon her. The Deliverer had come.
James II., his Queen, and their little boy fled to France. No one wanted James, no one regretted him. To go to France was the best thing he could do, and the King there received him kindly and treated him as an honored guest.
At Westminster a Parliament was called, which arranged that William and Mary should be King and Queen together. For although Mary had the better right to the throne she did not wish to reign without her husband, nor did he wish to accept a lower rank than that of his wife.
So ended the “Glorious Revolution.” It had been brought about with hardly any fighting at all, and the war between the King and Parliament was at an end, for William and Mary received the throne by the will of Parliament.
WILLIAM III. AND MARY II.—THE STORY OF BRAVE LONDONDERRY
ALTHOUGH most of the people received William and Mary joyfully, some, chiefly in Ireland and Scotland, still looked upon James as the rightful King.
In Ireland especially there were many Roman Catholics, who would not acknowledge a Protestant King. The King of France hated William, so he helped James with money and ships, which enabled him to set out for Ireland to win his kingdom again.
James landed at a town called Kinsale and the Irish people welcomed him with great joy. But he felt disheartened almost at once for there had already been much fighting, and the country through which he had to pass was desolate and deserted, and at times he and his men could find hardly enough food to keep them from starving. Most of the Protestants had fled from the land or had shut themselves up in the two towns of Enniskillen and Londonderry. The soldiers of James besieged both these towns, but it was round Londonderry that the greatest fight took place.
Londonderry is on a river called the Foyle, and the enemy not only surrounded the town on the land side, but they built a bar across the river so that no ships could come to the town with food or help.
The walls were weak and the cannon few, and the Irish thought that the town could not hold out for long. The Governor, too, was a cowardly man, and did his best to dishearten the people, until it was suspected that he was a traitor. Indeed, he would have given in, but a brave old clergyman, called Walker, marched into his pulpit one morning with a sword in one hand and a Bible in the other, and preached such a rousing sermon that the people took heart and never lost it again through all the long weeks of hunger and suffering which they had to endure.
It was a dreadful time. The people had hardly anything to eat, but they held bravely on, hoping against hope that help would come to them from England. But day after day passed and no help came. Rats, mice, dogs, and horses, all were eaten, only tallow and skins remained. Still they held on. The soldiers were so weak at last from want of food that they could hardly stand, far less fight. They resolved to hold out for two days longer. Then the end must come.
But just as the sun was setting on the 28th of July, the day before they were going to give in, the eager watchers on the walls saw the gleam of sails far down the river. Help! Help at last! How their hearts beat, how they shouted with all the little strength they had, as nearer and nearer sailed the ships.
There were three of them. On they came with all sail set. But how could they pass the dreadful bar which lay across the river? On they came. One ship called the Mountjoy took the lead and, sailing with all its force, it crashed against the boom, as the bar was called.
With a tremendous noise the boom shivered and cracked, but the Mountjoy was not strong enough to break it through. The shock was so fierce that the ship was thrown backward and stuck in the mud, for the river was shallow.
A groan rose from the people on the walls, and their hearts grew sick with disappointment and fear, while the Irish soldiers on the bank cheered with triumph. But as the Mountjoy was thrown back, the second ship followed and dashed at the spot which the Mountjoy had hit. The boom, which was already cracked, gave way and, amid the noise of joyful cheers and of tearing, splintering wood, she sailed gayly over. Londonderry was saved.
That same night, eager hands unloaded the ships and, for the first time for three months, the people had enough to eat. A day or two later the army of James burned the tents and cabins in which they had lived while besieging the town, and went away.
But the struggle was not over. It lasted until the following year, when William himself came to Ireland. Then there was a great battle between the soldiers of James and the soldiers of William. It was called the Battle of the Boyne, because it was fought near a river of that name. James was beaten, and fled again to France, and William, with the crown upon his head, entered Dublin, the acknowledged King of Ireland.
WILLIAM III. AND MARY II.—THE STORY OF A SAD DAY IN A HIGHLAND GLEN
THE friends of James were called Jacobites, from Jacobus which is Latin for James. There were many Jacobites in the north of Scotland. They rose under Claverhouse, the man who had treated the Covenanters so badly, and a battle was fought at Killiecrankie Pass. The Jacobites won the day, but their leader was killed, so, although many of the clans continued to be discontented, they were without a leader and could do little.
The discontent and rebellion went on for a year or two, and at last William determined to put an end to it. He proclaimed that he would forgive all those who had rebelled, if they would take an oath, before 1st January 1692 A.D., acknowledging him as King, and promising to live quietly and peacefully under his rule. Those who did not take the oath would be punished.
All the Highland chieftains, except the chief of the Macdonalds of Glencoe, took the oath. This chief was very unwilling to own William as King, and he could not bring himself to do so until the very last day. Then he started off from his lonely glen and went to the nearest town, where he expected to find one of the King’s officers to whom he could swear the oath. But to his dismay he found that he had come to the wrong town, and that there was no one there who could receive his oath.
He started off again, as quickly as he could, to go to the right town. But it was deep winter, and traveling was very slow in those days, and he was six days late when he arrived. However, his oath was accepted, and he went home feeling safe and happy.
But a man called the Master of Stair, who was governing Scotland for William and Mary, hated all Highlanders, and the Campbells, another clan, hated the Macdonalds. So the Campbells and the Master of Stair decided that, as the chief had been a few days late in swearing to obey William, they had a good excuse for killing all the Macdonalds.
William was not told that Macdonald had sworn. He was made to believe that he had not done so, and that the whole clan was a set of robbers, and he signed an order for them to be destroyed. Although it is said that William did not know what he was doing when he signed this order, he ought to have known, and the Massacre of Glencoe, as it is called, is the darkest spot on his reign.
The Master of Stair had the King’s order, but he did not do his work openly. He sent Campbell and his men to live in Glencoe for nearly a fortnight, so that Macdonald should suspect nothing. The old chief received the men kindly, and treated as his guests those who were ready to betray and murder him.
At five o’clock one dark winter’s morning, the Campbells crept silently out of the houses and along the snow-covered paths to the scattered cottages. A few minutes later the glen was awake with the sounds of shots and screams. Campbell and his soldiers were at their work. Without mercy men were killed almost in their sleep. Those, who were able, fled through the darkness and the snow with their wives and children, many of them only to die of cold and hunger among the lonely mountains and glens. The soldiers murdered all they could, then they set fire to the empty houses and marched away, driving before them the cattle and horses belonging to the Macdonalds. And when the sun rose high over the valley of Glencoe, it shone only on bloodstained snow and blackened, smoking ruins, where peaceful homes had been but a few hours before.
For some time Britain and France had been at war, for the French King hated William, and would not acknowledge him as King of Britain. William spent a part of every year abroad directing this war and ruling Holland. While he was gone, Mary ruled in England. She governed so well, and was so sweet and gentle, that the people loved her dearly. They loved her far more than they loved William, who was so quiet and stern as to seem almost sullen.
But in 1694 A.D., Mary became ill of a very dreadful disease called smallpox, and died in a few days. William had loved her very much, and he was very sad when she died. “I was the happiest man on earth,” he said to one of his friends, “now I am the most miserable. She had no fault, none; you knew her well, but you could not know, nobody but myself could know, her goodness.” And if the King sorrowed, the whole country sorrowed with him.
After the death of Mary, William ruled alone.
At last the King of France made peace with William, perhaps because he was tired of fighting, perhaps because he was a little tired of helping James, who was really very dull and stupid. By this peace the French King consented to acknowledge William as the rightful King of Britain, and to give back the lands he had wrongfully taken from Germany and the other countries he had been fighting against.
A few years later James died, and Louis XIV., the French King, forgot the promise he had made to William. He proclaimed the son of James to be King of Britain under the title of James III. This made the British very angry, although it really did not matter much. A French King might call James King of Britain, but that could not make him so truly. However, William wanted to go to war with France again for another reason, and this act of the French King decided the people to do so. This other reason was that the King of Spain had died, and Louis wanted to make his own grandson King of Spain, so that
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