Well then, to return to my present tale, it was Old Dare whom we encountered in the street to-day; and when my uncle asked what the coil was all about, he shook his head and answered,—

"I cannot say with knowledge; but a messenger rode post-haste to the house of the Mayor but now, and it was plain, by the stains of travel on him and his horse, that they had been hard pushed to reach the place. It is something of note, I take it, and something of evil, I fear." He lowered his voice and said in my uncle's ear (yet I heard every word, being very keen of hearing), "I fear me it will prove to be some plot to ruin the Duke and his Council of Six. It may be that they have been something rash and forward. I fear me we shall hear bad news ere the day is out."

I knew well what was meant by the Council of Six. The Duke of Monmouth had some faithful friends, lovers of liberty and constitutional rule—my Lord of Russell and Mr. Algernon Sydney being of the number—who met together often to discuss what might be done for a country beginning once again to groan beneath the yoke of an arbitrary exercise of the power of the Crown. Representations had been made to the King, it was said, to summon Parliament, and give to the people their lawful voice in the government; but this having proved of none avail, it had been whispered that these men had spoken of another Great Revolution, such as had cost the King's father his head; and of course such talk was accounted rank treason in those days, and was like to cost many a man his life.

Now we of the West Country in general, and of Taunton Town in particular, knew very well that if any rising or tumult took place, it would be like enough to be in our neighbourhood; and that, even if we kept ourselves tranquil, we might get the credit of being turbulent, and have our rights infringed, even if our charter were not taken from us, as it had been early in the King's reign, although restored seventeen years later. Also, we all of us pinned our chiefest hopes of constitutional government and the Protestant religion on the hoped-for succession of the Duke of Monmouth; and if he were to be implicated in a plot which should cost him liberty or life, our hopes would receive a crushing blow, and nothing lie before us but the succession of a bigoted Papist and a man of known cruelty and tyranny.

Small wonder was it, therefore, that our faces were grave, and that we all looked anxiously at our minister, Mr. Vincent, as he mounted the pulpit a little after the usual time, and looked seriously upon our upturned faces. He made no attempt at a regular sermon that day, but after giving thanks for the merciful preservation of his gracious Majesty the King from a recent and great danger, he proceeded to tell us that a plot had been laid against the King's life and that of the Duke of York, and how it was currently rumoured that the Duke of Monmouth and his friends were concerned in the matter. Arrests had been made of certain persons, and the Duke had fled and hidden himself.

Mr. Vincent also told us, with great seriousness, that rumour had already been forward to declare that an insurrection had commenced, with Taunton as its centre; and counselled us, as we valued the peace of the realm and our own safety, to avoid any cause of offence, and to remain perfectly quiet and tranquil. The time might come in the future when it would be a righteous thing to rise up and strike a blow for the liberty and the faith of the country, but certainly that day had not yet come. The King upon the throne was the rightful one; his rule was on the whole fair and just. There was no quarrel with him. Nothing would so injure the righteous cause as a revolt against law and order; nothing would so greatly hurt the cause of the young Duke of Monmouth. We must show discretion and wisdom at this time, that none might have cause to look with suspicion upon us.

This wise counsel from one who was a pillar of strength amongst us was not without due effect. We looked at one another and resolved to abide by Mr. Vincent's counsel. We knew that our Mayor was a bitter enemy to all dissenters, and would fasten upon us an indictment of disaffection if we gave the smallest ground. Indeed he took instant action upon hearing of the plot, and called some bands of the militia into the town; and I verily believe that it was with his consent, if not at his instigation, that a deed was done in the town which made us who called ourselves dissenters tingle with rage and feel almost ready to raise the very tumult of which we were altogether innocent in fact.

Now the thing of which I speak was nothing less than the demolishing of the great chapel called Paul's Meeting, of which I have spoken, and in which hundreds of citizens met to worship Sunday by Sunday. And this thing was done, to the great shame of those concerned in it, just when the excitement which I have mentioned prevailed, notwithstanding that Mr. Vincent and Mr. Burgess, both of whom preached to us there, were godly men, and taught us submission to lawful rulers, and spoke no evil of dignitaries.

The first I knew of this was one evening just before our house generally closed for the night—it was summer then, and not dark till ten of the clock—when Will Wiseman came rushing into the yard, all bursting with excitement, and crying out to me in panting gasps,—

"Dicon, Dicon, come and see! come and see! They are pulling our meeting-house to pieces, and say they will make such a bonfire of our pews and pulpit as shall light to bed every dissenter in the county! Come and see! come and see! I would not go myself till I had told thee!"