CHAPTER THE THIRD. CHARLES THE SECOND (CONTINUED).
THE Duke of York, the king's brother, being an acknowledged Papist, the people began to look out for a Protestant successor, and turned their eyes upon young Monmouth, a natural son of Charles, who was almost a natural in more respects than one, for his mental capacity was more—or less—than dubious. He was, indeed, a good-looking idiot, and nothing more; but, coming after such a king as Charles, the nation might have been satisfied with him; and, to oblige York, the fellow was formally declared illegitimate. The prosecution of the Catholics was carried on with unabated animosity; and several, among whom was the aged Lord Stafford, were put to death, under the pretence of advancing the cause of "peace and goodness."
The particulars of the sacrifice of Stafford afford such a faithful sample of the mode in which justice was administered in the reign of Charles the Second, that, converting ourselves into "our own reporter," we give a brief sketch of the trial. The defendant in the action, which was in the nature of an impeachment, was accused of high treason, and the three witnesses against him were Oates, Dug-dale, and Turberville, three scamps who made a regular business—and a very profitable one—of giving false evidence. Oates swore he had seen somebody deliver a document signed by somebody else, appointing Stafford paymaster to some army, which at some time or other was going to be got together somehow, somewhere, for the purpose of doing something against the Government, and in favour of the Catholics. Dugdale swore that the accused had engaged him, Dugdale, to murder the king at so much a week, with the offer of a saintdom in the next year's almanack. Turberville swore ditto to Dugdale, and though Stafford was able to disprove their evidence in many very important points, the trio of perjurers had gone so boldly to work that there was a large balance of accusation remaining over that could not be upset, in consequence of the unfortunate impossibility of proving a negative.
Stafford succeeded in damaging the credit of the witnesses, but as they came forward professedly in the character of hard swearers, who, so as they got the prisoners executed, were indifferent about being believed, the attack on their reputations affected them very little. The unhappy prisoner was so taken aback by the effrontery of his accusers, that he hardly gave himself a fair chance in his defence, which consisted chiefly of ejaculations expressive of wonder at the excessive impudence and audacity of the witnesses. Such exclamations as "Well, I'm sure! what next?" though natural enough under the circumstances, did not make up, when all put together, a very eloquent speech for the defence, and after a trial of six days' duration, the Peers, by a majority of twenty-four, found poor Stafford guilty.
Sentence of death was passed upon him, but the more ignominious portion of the punishment having been remitted by the king's order, the two sheriffs were seized with a most sanguinary fit of system, and objected to the omission of hanging and quartering, because, as they said, the leaving out of these barbarities would be altogether irregular. In order to satisfy the scruples of these very punctilious gentlemen, the Peers pronounced them "over nice," and the Commons passed a resolution of indemnity, by which the sheriffs were made aware that they would not be considered to have "scamped" their work, if they merely cut off Stafford's head without proceeding to the more artistical details of butchery.
Stafford died nobly, and the fickle populace, who had howled for his condemnation, began sighing and grieving at his fate; but as all this sympathy was almost in the nature of a post obit, it was of little or no value to the nobleman on whose behalf it was contributed. The executioner himself turned tender-hearted at the last moment, and twice raised the fatal axe, but a coarse brute near him on the scaffold—perhaps one of the thwarted sheriffs—desired the headsman not to make two bites at a cherry, and the blow was forthwith administered.
These excesses of the Parliament caused even the dissolute Charles to try, the effect of dissolution; but there was no going on for any length of time without a House of Commons to vote the supplies; and the king, thinking to withdraw the legislature from the influence of London mobs, appointed the next to be held at Oxford. This a arrangement gave great dissatisfaction to the opposition, and both parties came as if prepared for a battle, the speakers on each side being, no doubt, abundantly supplied with the leaden ammunition that is customarily used for debating purposes. It was during the party bickerings prevailing about this time, that the definitions, since so famous—and sometimes so infamous—of Whig and Tory, were first hit upon. The former was given to the popular party, merely because it had been given to some other popular party, in some other place, at some previous time, and the latter was given to the courtiers, because some Popish banditti in Ireland had been once called Tories; * but why they had been, or why, if they had been, the courtiers of Charles the Second's time need have been, are points that the reader's ingenuity must serve him to elucidate.
* Somebody, who was of course a nobody, says the word Tory
is derived from Torrco, to roost, because the Tories were
always clever at roasting their antagonists.
The king had usually been civil enough to his Parliaments, but on the occasion of the assembly at Oxford he determined to speak his mind, and his speech, being a reflection of his mind, was of course very rambling and irregular. He complained of the last Parliament having been refractory, and expressed a hope that the "present company" would know how to behave themselves. He disavowed all idea of acting in an arbitrary manner himself, but he was thoroughly determined not to be "put upon" by any one else; and so now they knew what he meant, and he trusted that no misunderstanding would arise to mar their efforts for the public benefit. The Commons listened to all this with a few mental "Oh, indeed's!" "Dear me's!" "No! 'Pon your honour's!" and "You don't say so's!" but they were not in the least over-awed, and they set to work exactly in the old way to choose the same Speaker and adopt the same measures as the last Parliament, of which many of them had been members.