For Faith and Freedom

CHAPTER XX.

BENJAMIN'S WARNING

Since I have so much to tell, before long, of Benjamin's evil conduct, it must in justice be recorded of him that at this juncture he endeavoured, knowing more of the world than we of Somerset, to warn and dissuade his cousins from taking part in any attempt which should be made in the West. And this he did by means of a letter written to his father. I know not how far the letter might have succeeded, but, unfortunately, it arrived two or three days too late – when our boys had already joined the insurgents.

'Honoured Sir,' he wrote, 'I write this epistle, being much concerned in spirit lest my grandfather, whose opinions are well known, not only in his own county, but also at the Court, should be drawn into, or become cognisant of, some attempt to raise the West Country against their lawful King. It will not be news to you that the Earl of Argyle hath landed in Scotland, where he will meet with such a reception which will doubtless cause him to repent of his rashness. It is also currently reported, and everywhere believed, that the Duke of Monmouth intends immediately to embark and cross the sea, with the design of raising the country in rebellion. The Dissenters, who have been going about with sour looks for five-and-twenty years, venture now to smile and look pleased in anticipation of another civil war. This may follow, but its termination, I think, will not be what they expect.

'I have also heard that my cousin Humphrey, Dr. Eykin's favourite pupil, who hath never concealed his opinions, hath lately returned from Holland (where the exiles are gathered), and passed through London accompanied by Robin. I have further learned that while in London he visited (but alone, without Robin's knowledge) many of those who are known to be friends of the Duke and red-hot Protestants. Wherefore, I greatly fear that he hath been in correspondence with the exiles, and is cognisant of their designs, and may even be their messenger to announce the intentions of his Protestant champion. Certain I am that should any chance occur of striking a blow for freedom of worship, my cousin, though he is weak and of slender frame, will join the attempt. He will also endeavour to draw after him everyone in his power. Therefore, my dear father, use all your influence to withstand him, and, if he must for his own part plunge into ruin, persuade my grandfather and my cousin Robin to stay quiet at home.

'I hear it on the best authority that the temper of the country, and especially in your part of it, hath been carefully studied by the Government, and is perfectly well known. Those who would risk life and lands for the Duke of Monmouth are few indeed. He may, perhaps, draw a rabble after him, but no more. The fat tradesmen, who most long for the conventicle, will not fight, though they may pray for him. The country gentlemen may be Protestants, but they are mostly for Church and King. It is quite true that his Majesty is a Roman Catholic, nor hath he ever concealed or denied his religion, being one who scorns deception. It is also true that his profession of faith is a stumbling-block to many who find it hard to reconcile their teaching of Non-Resistance and Divine Right with the introduction of the Mass and the Romish Priest. But the country had not yet forgotten the sour rule of the Independent; and, rather than suffer him to return, the people will endure a vast deal of Royal Prerogative.

'It is absolutely certain – assure my grandfather on this point, whatever he may learn from Humphrey – that the better sort will never join Monmouth, whether he comes as another Cromwell to restore the Commonwealth, or whether he aspires to the Crown and dares to maintain – a thing which King Charles did always stoutly deny – that his mother was married. Is it credible that the ancient throne of these Kingdoms should be usurped by the base-born son of Lucy Waters?

'I had last night the honour of drinking a bottle of wine with that great lawyer, Sir George Jeffreys. The conversation turned upon this subject. We were assured by the Judge that the affections of the people are wholly with the King; that the liberty of worship which he demands for himself he will also willingly extend to the country, so that the last pretence of reason for disaffection shall be removed. Why should the people run after Monmouth, when, if he were successful, he could give no more than the King is ready to give? I was also privately warned by Sir George that my grandfather's name is unfavourably noted, and his actions and speeches will be watched. Therefore, Sir, I humbly beg that you will represent to him and to my cousins, and to Dr. Eykin himself, first the hopelessness of any such enterprise and the certainty of defeat; and next the punishment which will fall upon the rebels and upon those who lend them any countenance. Men of such a temper as Dr. Comfort Eykin will, doubtless, go to the scaffold willingly with their mouths full of the texts which they apply to themselves on all occasions. For such I have no pity, yet for the sake of his wife and daughter I would willingly, if I could, save him from the fate which will be his if Monmouth lands in the West. And as for my grandfather, 'tis terrible to think of his white hairs blown by the breeze while the hangman adjusts the knot; and I should shudder to see the blackened limbs of Robin stuck upon poles for all the world to see.

'It is my present intention, if my affairs permit, to follow my fortunes on the Western Circuit in the autumn, when I shall endeavour to ride from Taunton or Exeter to Bradford Orcas. My practice grows apace. Daily I am heard in the Courts. The Judges already know me and listen to me. The juries begin to feel the weight of my arguments. The attorneys besiege my chambers. For a junior I am in great demand. It is my prayer that you, Sir, may live to see your son Chancellor and a Peer of the realm. Less than Lord Chancellor will not content me. As for marriage, that might hinder my rise; I shall not marry yet. There is in your parish, Sir, one who knows my mind upon this matter. I shall be pleased to think that you will assure her – you know very well whom I mean – that my mind is unaltered, and that my way is now plain before me. So, I remain, with dutiful respect, your obedient son,

This letter arrived, I say, after the departure of Robin with his company of village lads.

When Mr. Boscorel had read it slowly and twice over, so as to lose no point of the contents, he sat and pondered awhile. Then he arose, and with troubled face he sought Sir Christopher, to whom he read it through. Then he waited for Sir Christopher to speak.

'The boy writes,' said his Honour, after a while, 'according to his lights. He repeats the things he hears said by his boon companions. Nay, more, he believes them. Why, it is easy for them to swear loyalty and to declare in their cups where the affections of the people are placed.'

'Sir Christopher, what is done cannot be undone. The boys are gone – alas! – but you still remain. Take heed for a space what you say as well as what you do.'

'How should they know the temper of the country?' Sir Christopher went on, regardless. 'What doth the foul-mouthed profligate Sir George Jeffreys know concerning sober and godly people? These are not noisy Templars; they are not profligates of the Court; they are not haunters of tavern and pot-house; they are not those who frequent the play-house. Judge Jeffreys knows none such. They are lovers of the Word of God; they wish to worship after their fashion; they hate the Pope and all his works. Let us hear what these men say upon the matter.'

'Nay,' said Mr. Boscorel; 'I care not greatly what they say. But would to God the boys were safe returned.'

'Benjamin means well,' Sir Christopher went on. 'I take this warning kindly; he means well. It pleases me that in the midst of the work and the feasting, which he loves, he thinks upon us. Tell him, son-in-law, that I thank him for his letter. It shows that he hath preserved a good heart.'

'As for his good heart' – Mr. Boscorel stroked his nose with his forefinger – 'so long as Benjamin gets what he wants – which is Benjamin's mess, and five times the mess of any other – there is no doubt of his good heart.'

'Worse things than these,' said Sir Christopher, 'were said of us when the civil wars began. The King's troops would ride us down; the country would not join us; those of us who were not shot or cut down in the field would be afterwards hanged, drawn, and quartered. Yet we drove the King from his throne.'

'And then another King came back again. So we go up, and so we go down. But about this expedition and about these boys my mind misgives me.'

'Son-in-law,' Sir Christopher said solemnly, 'I am now old, and the eyes of my mind are dim, so that I no longer discern the signs of the times, or follow the current of the stream; moreover, we hear but little news, so that I cannot even see any of those signs. Yet to men in old age, before they pass away to the rest provided by the Lord, there cometh sometimes a vision by which they are enabled to see clearly when younger men are still groping their way in a kind of twilight. Monmouth hath landed; my boys are with him; they are rebels; should the rising fail, their lives are forfeit; and that of my dear friend Dr. Comfort Eykin's – yea, and my life as well belike, because I have been a consenting party. Ruin and death will in that event fall upon all of us. Whether it will so happen I know not, nor do I weigh the chance of that event against the voice of conscience, duty, and honour. My boys have obeyed that voice; they have gone forth to conquer or to die. My vision doth not tell me what will happen to them. But it shows me the priest flying from the country, the King flying from the throne, and that fair angel, whom we call Freedom of Conscience, returning to bless the land. To know that the laws of God will triumph – ought not that to reconcile a man, already seventy-five years of age, to death, even a death upon the gallows? What matter for this earthly body so that it be spent until the end in the service of the Lord?'

CHAPTER XXI.

WE WAIT FOR THE END

I have said that my father from the beginning unto the end of this business was as one beside himself, being in an ecstasy or rapture of mind insomuch that he heeded nothing. The letters he sent out to his friends, the Nonconformists, either brought no answer or else they heaped loads of trouble, being intercepted and read, upon those to whom they were addressed. But he was not moved. The defection of his friends and of the gentry caused him no uneasiness. Nay, he even closed his eyes and ears to the drinking, the profane oaths, and the riotous living in the camp. Others there were, like-minded with himself, who saw the hand of the Lord in this enterprise, and thought that it would succeed by a miracle. The desertions of the men, which afterwards followed, and the defection of those who should have joined – these things were but the weeding of the host, which should be still further weeded – as in a well-known chapter in the Book of Judges – until none but the righteous should be left behind. These things he preached daily, and with mighty fervour, to all who would listen; but these were few in number.

As regards his wife and daughter he took no thought for them at all, being wholly enwrapped in his work; he did not so much as ask if we had money – to be sure, for five-and-twenty years he had never asked that question – or if we were safely bestowed; or if we were well. Never have I seen any man so careless of all earthly affections when he considered the work of the Lord. But when the time came for the army to march, what were we to do? Where should we be bestowed?

'As to following the army,' said Robin, 'that is absurd. We know not whither we may march or what the course of events may order. You cannot go home without an armed escort, for the country is up; the clubmen are out everywhere to protect their cattle and horses, a rough and rude folk they would be to meet; and the gipsies are robbing and plundering. Can you stay here until we come back, or until the country hath settled down again?'

Miss Blake generously promised that we should stay with her as long as we chose, adding many kind things about myself, out of friendship and a good heart; and so it was resolved that we should remain in Taunton, where no harm could befall us, while my father still accompanied the army to exhort the soldiers.

'I will take care of him,' said Barnaby. 'He shall not preach of a morning till he hath taken breakfast, nor shall he go to bed until he hath had his supper. So long as the provisions last out he shall have his ration. After that I cannot say. Maybe we shall all go on short commons, as hath happened to me already; and, truth to tell, I love it not. All these things belong to the voyage, and are part of our luck. Farewell, therefore, mother. Heart up! – all will go well! Kiss me, Sis; we shall all come back again. Never fear. King Monmouth shall be crowned in Westminster. Dad shall be Archbishop of Canterbury, and I shall be Captain of a King's ship. All our fortunes shall be made, and you, Sis, shall have a great estate, and shall marry whom you please – Robin or another. As for the gentry who have not come forward, hang 'em, we'll divide their estates between us and so change places, and they will be so astonished at not being shot for cowardice that they will rejoice and be glad to clean our boots. Thus shall we all be happy.'

So they marched away, Monmouth being now at the head of an army seven thousand strong, and all in such spirits that you would have thought nothing could withstand them. And when I consider, and remember how that army marched away, with the cheers of the men and the laughter and jokes of the young recruits, the tears run down my cheeks for thinking how their joy was turned to mourning, and life was exchanged for death. The last I saw of Robin was that he was turning in his saddle to wave his hand, his face full of confidence and joy. The only gloomy face in the whole army that morning was the face of Humphrey. Afterwards I learned that almost from the beginning he foresaw certain disaster. In the first place, none of those on whom the exiles of Holland had relied came into camp. These were the backbone of the Protestant party – the sturdy blood that had been freely shed against Charles I. This was a bitter disappointment. Next, he saw in the army nothing but a rabble of country lads, with such officers as Captain Hucker, the Serge-maker, instead of the country gentlemen, with their troops, as had been expected; and from the beginning he distrusted the leaders – even the Duke himself. So he hung his head and laughed not with the rest. But his doubts he kept locked up in his own heart. Robin knew none of them.

It was a pretty sight to see the Taunton maids walking out for a mile and more with their lovers who had joined Monmouth. They walked hand-in-hand with the men; they wore the Monmouth favours; they had no more doubt or fear of the event than their sweethearts. Those who visit Taunton now may see these women (now grown old) creeping about the streets lonely and sorrowful, mindful still of that Sunday morning when they saw their lovers for the last time.

When I consider the history of this expedition I am amazed that it did not succeed. It was, surely, by a special judgment of God that the victory was withheld from Monmouth and reserved for William. I say not (presumptuously) that the judgment was pronounced against the Duke on account of his sinful life, but I think it was the will of Heaven that the country should endure for three years the presence of a Prince who was continually seeking to advance the Catholic religion. The people were not yet ripe, perhaps, for that universal disgust which caused them without bloodshed (in this island at least) to pull down King James from his throne. When, I say, I consider the temper and the courage of that great army which left Taunton, greater than any which the King could bring against it; when I consider the multitudes who flocked to the standard at Bridgwater, I am lost in wonder at the event.

From Sunday, the 21st, when the army marched out of Taunton, till the news came of their rout on Sedgemoor, we heard nothing certain about them. On Tuesday the Duke of Albemarle, hearing that the army had gone, occupied Taunton with the Militia, and there were some who expected severities on account of the welcome given to the Duke and the recruits whom he obtained here. But there were no acts of revenge that I heard of – and, indeed, he did not stay long in the town. As for us, we remained under the shelter of Miss Blake's roof, and daily expected news of some great and signal victory. But none came, save one letter. Every day we looked for this news, and every day we planned and laid down the victorious march for our army.

'They will first occupy Bristol,' said Miss Blake. 'That is certain, because there are many stout Protestants in Bristol, and the place is important. Once master of that great city, our King will get possession of ships, and so will have a fleet. There are, no doubt, plenty of arms in the town, with which he will be able to equip an army ten times greater than that which he now has. Then with – say, thirty thousand men – he will march on London. The Militia will, of course, lay down their arms or desert at the approach of this great and resolute army. The King's regiments will prove, I expect, to be Protestants, every man. Oxford will open her gates, London will send out her train-bands to welcome the Deliverer, and so our King will enter in triumph and be crowned at Westminster Abbey, one King James succeeding another. Then there shall be restored to this distracted country' – being a schoolmistress, Miss Blake could use language worthy of the dignity of history – 'the blessings of religious freedom; and the pure Word of God, stripped of superstitious additions made by man, shall be preached through the length and breadth of the land.'

'What shall be done,' I asked, 'with the Bishops?'

'They shall be suffered to remain,' she said, speaking with a voice of authority, 'for those congregations which desire a prelacy, but stripped of their titles and of their vast revenues. We will not persecute, but we will never suffer one Church to lord it over another. Oh! when will the news come? Where is the army now?'

The letter of which I have spoken was from Robin.

'Sweetheart,' he said, 'all goes well so far. At Bridgwater we have received a welcome only second to that of Taunton. The Mayor and Aldermen proclaimed our King at the High Cross, and the people have sent to the camp great store of provisions and arms of all kinds. We are now six regiments of foot with a thousand cavalry, besides the King's own body-guard. We have many good friends at Bridgwater, especially one, Mr. Roger Hoar, who is a rich merchant of the place, and is very zealous in the Cause. Your father preached on Sunday evening from the text (Deuteronomy vii. 5), "Ye shall destroy their altars, and break down their images, and cut down their groves, and burn their graven images with fire." It was a most moving discourse, which fired the hearts of all who heard it.

'They say that our chief is downhearted because the nobility and gentry have not come in. They only wait for the first victory, after which they will come in by hundreds. But some of our men look forward to depriving them of their estates, and dividing them among themselves; and already the Colonels and Majors are beginning to reckon up the great rewards which await them. As for me, there is but one reward for which I pray – namely, to return unto Bradford Orcas and to the arms of my sweet saint. Lord Churchill is reported to be at Chard; there has been a brush in the Forest of Neroche between the scouts, and it is said that all the roads are guarded so that recruits shall be arrested or at least driven back. Perhaps this is the reason why the gentry sit down. Barnaby says that so far there have been provisions enough and to spare; and he hopes the present plenty may continue. No ship's crew can fight, he says, on half rations. Our march will be on Bristol. I hope and believe that when we have gotten that great town our end is sure. Humphrey continueth glum.'

Many women there were who passed that time in prayer, continually offering up supplications on behalf of husband, brother, lover or son. But at Taunton the Vicar, one Walter Harte, a zealous High Churchman, came forth from hiding, and, with the magistrates, said prayers daily for King James II.

To tell what follows is to renew a time of agony unspeakable. Yet must it be told. Farewell, happy days of hope and confidence! Farewell, the sweet exchange of dreams! Farewell to our lovely hero, the gracious Duke! All the troubles that man's mind can conceive were permitted to be rained upon our heads – defeat, wounds, death, prison – nay, for me such a thing as no one could have expected or even feared – such a fate as never entered the mind of man to invent.