Sidebilder
PDF
ePub

not shrink from this duty. The former concluded his speech by saying, that no man had more respect and affection for the House of Hanover, or would do more to serve them than himself; but that they must excuse him if he would not venture damnation for them. The latter moved as an amendment, "That the reward should be for apprehending and bringing the Pretender to justice, in case he should land or attempt to land." Many of the Whig peers concurred with the amendment; all the Whig bishops had withdrawn from the debate; and the House of Lords, to their honour, rejected Lord Wharton's proposal.

The House of Lords, on the same day, passed two resolutions: 1. That no person, not included in the Articles of Limerick, and who had borne arms in France or Spain, should be capable of any employment, civil or military. 2. That no person, who is a natural born subject of her Majesty, should be capable of sustaining the character of public minister from any foreign potentate.-These resolutions were levelled entirely at Sir Patrick Lawless, an Irishman, who was then in London as agent from the Court of Spain in the treaty of commerce. He had been an adherent of James the Second, had intrigued in the cause of his son, was in frequent and close communication with Bolingbroke, and held the Roman Catholic faith. All these might be just grounds of jealousy; but, as mere truth and reason have seldom sufficient weight with the vulgar, some of the leading Whigs did not scruple to add several absurd and groundless allegations. Walpole had even gone so far as to allude to him, in the House of Commons, as a man "strongly suspected of having imbrued his hands in the blood of the late Duke of Medina Celi and Marquis of Leganez:"* an utter calumny. The Ministers, however, wisely yielded to the popular prejudice; and sent to Lawless a friendly suggestion to withdraw into Holland.

In the midst of these parliamentary proceedings, the Ministers were thrown into the greatest confusion by an unexpected diplomatic demand. The Hanoverian envoy, Baron Schutz, had, instead of any precise instructions from his Court, received an order to consult and be guided by Somers, Halifax, Cowper, and other undoubted friends of the Protestant succession. All of them were, at this period, unanimous in thinking that their great object could not be better secured than by the presence of one of the Hanover family in England. So long as they had indulged any hope of regaining the Queen's favour, they had been unwilling to urge, or even to allow, a measure which they knew to be peculiarly distasteful to her Majesty; but seeing her now thoroughly wedded to Tory counsels, they looked much more to the safety of her legal successor than to her own satisfaction. They saw, besides, that the active intrigues of the Jacobites could only be withstood by equal activity and vigour on the other side; and their plan was that the Electoral Prince, having been created a peer by the title of Duke of Cambridge, should come

Coxe's Life, vol. i. p. 45.

over and take his seat. With such views, and under the guidance of these statesmen, Schutz, on the 12th of April, suddenly waited upon Lord Chancellor Harcourt, and told him that he had orders. from the Electress Sophia to ask for the writ of the Prince as Duke of Cambridge. The Chancellor, much discomposed, changed colour and looked down;* and, after a long pause, answered that he would speak of it to the Queen. On Schutz's taking his leave, the Chancellor followed him to the door, and begged him to observe that he had not refused the writ, but only wished, in the first place, to take her Majesty's orders. A cabinet council was immediately summoned. At its conclusion, Harcourt wrote dryly to the envoy, stating that the Queen, not having received the least information of that demand from him, or in any other manner whatsoever from the Court of Hanover, could hardly persuade herself that he acted by direction from thence; but that the writ of the Duke of Cambridge had been sealed at the same time with all the others, and lay ready to be delivered to the envoy whenever he called for it. It soon appeared how great was the resentment of the Queen, and the perplexity of Ministers. Three days after Schutz had an interview with the Lord Treasurer. "He told me," says the envoy in his despatches, "that he never saw the Queen in a greater passion.

. He said I ought to have addressed myself to the Secretary of State, or to him, who would not have failed to advise very properly in the affair: protesting that he had no service more at heart, after the Queen's, than that of the Electoral family; and that he was vexed at what had happened, the Queen taking it as the greatest mark of contempt that could be given her. He added, that had it not been for this incident, her Majesty would have invited the Electoral Prince to pay her a visit next summer, forgetting that he had told me, but a moment before, that she was too much afraid to see any of the Electoral family here, and that, this alone excepted, she would willingly grant everything else that could be demanded of her. He heaped together several very unintelligible things in this discourse."†

It also appears that Oxford, in this conversation, advised Schutz, as a friend, to appear no more at Court. Finding that Schutz was not disposed to take this hint, it was followed two days after by a positive and formal injunction from the Secretary of State; and he was informed, at the same time, that the Queen considered his conduct as a grievous insult, and had directed her minister to solicit his immediate recall from the Elector. Alarmed at this, and having acted without special orders, Schutz set out himself for Hanover, to convey the writ and justify his conduct in demanding it.

At first sight this transaction appears, no doubt, honourable to the zeal and sincerity of the Whigs. But a close and impartial

See an account of this conversation in the despatch of Schutz to Robethon, April 13, 1714. Macpherson's Papers, vol. ii. p. 590. [See also Lord Campbell's Lives of the Lord Chancellors, vol. iv. p. 474, ch. cxix., Life of Lord Harcourt.]

† See Macpherson's Papers, vol. ii. p. 399.

examination tends, on the contrary, in some degree to disparage the course which they pursued on this occasion. It was generally known that the Queen had always entertained a rooted and unconquerable aversion to the presence of any of the Electoral family in England. Besides that weak minds often shrink from the sight of an heir, as reminding them of death, she might justly fear the cabals and intrigues which would gather round the Court of her intended successor: and might remember how much she herself, in that very situation, had been able to thwart and embarrass the Government of William. She might remember the jealousy and apprehension which Queen Elizabeth, from the very first period of her reign, had manifested against acknowledging the claim, or receiving the visit, of Mary of Scots.* In short, it was positively certain that her Majesty would never willingly allow any of the Hanover family to reside in England, and that no minister of hers could venture to propose it. Such had been the state of things so early as 1705. In that year the Whigs were in place and the Tories in opposition. The ground of the two parties was opposite to what it became nine years afterwards, and their conduct was opposite also. In 1705 the Tories wishing, on the one hand, to harass the Government, and, on the other hand, to manifest their own attachment to the Protestant succession, brought forward motions in both Houses to invite the Princess Sophia, as presumptive heir, to come over to England. The Whigs, being then in office, and compelled to take the orders of the Queen, withstood, with all their might, this plausible proposal, and argued that, in a matter of that delicate and domestic nature, the inclinations of her Majesty were not to be coldly overlooked, still less openly opposed.† The proposal was, however, so entirely in accordance with the general principles of the Whigs, that several amongst them in both Houses, with the Archbishop of Canterbury at their head, refused to take part against it, and joined with the Tories on that question. Such men might, with perfect propriety and consistency, pursue, in 1714, the same object they had already urged in 1705. But, with regard to the main body of the Whigs, I must own, notwithstanding my approval and admiration of their general policy at this time, that I think it very difficult to excuse their conduct in these two instances: that they may be charged

See Buchanan's History of Scotland, 17th book. "I will be Queen of England as long as I live," says Elizabeth. "What! do you think I am willing to have my graveclothes always before my eyes? Kings have this peculiarity, that they have some kind of sentiments against their own children, who are born lawful heirs to succeed them. How then is it likely I should stand affected towards my kinswoman, if she be once declared my heir? Just as Charles the Seventh was toward Louis the Eleventh. Besides, and that which weighs most with me, I know the inconstancy of this people; I know how they loathe the present state of things; I know how intent their eyes are upon a successor. It is natural for all men, as the proverb is, to worship the rising rather than the setting sun. I have learnt that from my own times, to omit other examples: when my sister Mary sat at helm, how eagerly did some men desire to see me placed on the throne!" &c., English Version, vol. ii. p. 158, ed. 1690.

+See Somerville's Queen Anne, p. 111; and Coxe's Marlborough, vol. ii. p. 240.

with too little patriotism at the first period, or with too much party spirit at the latter.

The application of Schutz, and the consequent indignation of the Queen, made her ministers determine on strong remonstrances with the Court of Hanover. They appointed as ambassador, first Lord Paget, and almost immediately afterwards the Earl of Clarendon, depending, perhaps, on his illustrious name; for of talents or of judgment he was certainly utterly destitute. We find it stated of him in a grave despatch, that when he was appointed governor of Pennsylvania, and told that he should represent her Majesty, he fancied that it was necessary to dress himself as a woman, and actually did so!* The Queen wrote to the Elector, and to Princess Sophia, with her own hand, on the 19th of May, deprecating, in the strongest terms, the proposed visit of the Prince, and holding out threats as to the consequences if he came. On the other hand, the Whig chiefs, and more especially the Duke of Marlborough, con

Bothmar's despatch to Robethon, June 16, 1714. Macpherson's Papers. This Lord Clarendon was Edward, the third Earl of the first creation; he died in 1723.1

1

[He was the Lord Cornbury, of odious memory in American Colonial history-one of those incompetent and unprincipled governors, whose maladministration indirectly prepared the way for American independence, by giving practical proof of the inability of the mother country to govern wisely and happily her distant colonies. "He had," as is remarked by Mr. Bancroft in his History of the United States, "every vice of character necessary to discipline a colony into self-reliance and resistance."-Vol. iii. p. 60. It is proper to warn the American reader that it was not Pennsylvania of which he was ap pointed governor. This slight inaccuracy in the text has been introduced from Macpherson's Papers, the compiler of that work having, in attempting to correct one error, interpolated another. The passage in Bothmar's despatch is given as follows:-“I am sorry that you are to have the Earl of Clarendon, because he is a selfish and presumptuous fool, and a fool to such a degree, that, being appointed governor by the queen in the Indies, (he was governor of Pennsylvania,) he thought that it was necessary for him, in order to represent her majesty, to dress himself as a woman, which he actually did.”Vol. ii. p. 625. It was the government of New York and New Jersey that this degene rate grandson of the great Clarendon was commissioned to administer, and he was in America from 1702 till 1709. A different version of the story of the female costume may be found instead of the incredible folly to which Bothmar attributed it. William Smith, the early historian of the province of New York, says of him:

"As Lord Cornbury came to this province in very indigent circumstances, hunted out of England by a host of hungry creditors, he was bent upon getting as much money as he could squeeze out of the purses of an impoverished people. His excessive avarice, his embezzlement of the public money, and his sordid refusal to pay his private debts, bore so heavily upon his reputation, that it was impossible for his adherents either to support him or themselves against the general opposition. As soon as he was superseded, his creditors threw him into the custody of the sheriff of New York; and he remained there till the death of his father, when, succeeding to the earldom of Clarendon, he returned to England. We never had a governor so universally detested, nor any one who so richly deserved the public abhorrence. In spite of his noble descent, his behaviour was trifling, mean, and extravagant. It was not uncommon for him to dress himself in a woman's habit, and thus to patrol the fort in which he resided. Such freaks of low humor exposed him to the universal contempt of the people; but their indignation was kindled by his despotic rule, savage bigotry, insatiable avarice, and injustice, not only to the public, but even to his private creditors."-Hist. of Province of New York, Part III.

In Pennsylvania apprehensions were entertained of a scheme to extend Lord Cornbury's powers over that province also, in violation of the rights of William Penn as the proprietary: but this did not take place.]

tinued in their letters to be no less vehement in urging the necessity of his Highness's immediate arrival!*

It is difficult to say to what decision these opposite exhortations would have led, had not an unexpected incident postponed it. This was the sudden death, if, indeed, at eighty-three any death should be termed sudden, of the good old Princess Sophia. She had been much affected at reading the peremptory letters from the Queen; and on the next day after their. receipt, the 28th of May, whilst walking in the gardens of Herrenhausen, she was seized with an apoplectic fit, and fell dead into the arms of the Electoral Princess, afterwards Queen Caroline. She was a woman of most amiable temper and no mean acquirements, being perfect mistress of the Dutch, German, English, French, and Italian languages; and during her long life she had never belied the character that becomes an English and a Royal birth. She used to say that she should die happy if she could only live to have "Here lies Sophia, Queen of England," engraved upon her coffin; and it is remarkable within how very few weeks her wish would have been fulfilled.'

The death of the Princess enabled the Elector, now become immediate heir to the English crown, to steer his course without disobliging either the Sovereign or his friends. After pausing for nearly three weeks, he answered the Queen's letter in most civil and submissive, but very vague terms; and despatched orders to Baron Bothmar, his envoy at the Hague, to proceed to London, and to consult with the Whig leaders, whether, after all the unavoidable delay that had occurred, any idea of sending over the Electoral Prince had not better be postponed till next Session.

Meanwhile the English Ministers were not inactive. Oxford, who had constantly endeavoured to keep well with the Court of Hanover, who perhaps really intended its interests, who had early in the year sent thither his cousin Mr. Harley with warm expressions of duty and attachment, saw, with despair, that the late events had confirmed the distrust and aversion in that quarter, whilst he had failed to push his negotiations with the other. His influence with the Queen was also daily declining, or, rather, had already ceased. In spite of all his whispers and manoeuvres, Bolingbroke, in conjunction with Atterbury, perceiving how necessary it was to their ultimate designs still further to discourage, nay, even to crush the Dissenters, drew up in Council, and brought into Parliament, as a Government measure, the celebrated Schism Act. This Act enjoins, That no person in Great Britain shall keep any public or

"By this remedy," writes the Duke to Robethon, on the 5th of May, "the succession will be secured without risk, without expense and without war; and likewise it is very probable that France, seeing herself prevented in that manner, will abandon her design of assisting the Pretender. In my humble opinion, it would be proper to use despatch, and that the Prince should set out before Lord Paget arrives." Cadogan wrote still more pressingly from London on the 7th.

1

[See the correspondence between the Electors and Sir Thomas Hanmer, within two months before her death.-Memoir of Hanmer, pp. 161, etc.]

« ForrigeFortsett »