Since his coronation in April last, nay, since his first assuming the government a year ago, everything had gone wrong, and he had been blamed for it; nothing could exaggerate the difficulties of his position. He had partially expected them, for he was not naturally sanguine, but his worst imaginings had fallen short of the actual happenings.
Affairs had now reached a crisis. In England, Scotland, and Ireland was a deadlock, on the Continent imminent peril, and the King, for the first time in his life, doubted his own capacity to deal with such huge obstacles as those which confronted and threatened to overwhelm him.
Sitting utterly still, he mentally faced the task before him.
He believed that to fail utterly was impossible, since that would be to deny the teaching of his own soul, and so, God; but he might fail partially, and he might, even in winning a small measure of success, forfeit tremendous stakes.
The loss of personal ease, of his popularity in England, a complete misunderstanding of his motives, the rancorous, malicious hate of his enemies—these things he had, from the moment of his coronation, been prepared for; but it might be that he would be called upon to make vaster sacrifices—the friendship of many former supporters, even their long-cherished love and loyalty, the trust and confidence of the allies, the admiration of the dissenting churches throughout Europe, even his own peace of soul. Everything in brief, that he valued, save the love of Mary and the friendship of William Bentinck, must be pledged, and might be lost in this forthcoming conflict.
He had honestly and justly tried to satisfy the English, but had met with utter failure. They reproached—reviled him, complained, and loudly voiced their dissatisfaction; he had not pleased one of those who had placed him on the throne. The chaotic state of the Government might, to a superficial observer, appear to give some warrant for their discontent; but, as the King cynically observed to himself, they were incapable of even suggesting a remedy for the ills they so decried; he did everything, and Whig and Tory alike agreed in putting all burdens on his shoulders, then in blaming his administration.
In the crisis of '88 their action had been oblique. They had shifted the almost intolerable confusion of affairs into his hands, then stood back to watch and criticise, while he, who had already the business of half Europe on his mind, made what order he could out of jarring chaos. His health had broken under the strain; even his friends noticed a new languor in him, which the English were quick to dub sloth. Deprived of his one recreation of hunting—for which he had no time—hardly able to endure the stenches and smoke of London, his reserved temper taxed almost beyond bearing by the incessant, unreasonable, shortsighted quarrelling by which he was surrounded, he felt his strength slipping like water through his hands.
His popularity had gone as he had predicted it would. The Jacobites were already a tremendously strong party, and his own ministers were half of them already beginning to traffic with the exiled King—who was now in Ireland with French troops, and of whom it had been said that, would he but change his religion, he could not be kept out of England six weeks.
William, reviewing his position, smiled at the shallow taunts that accused him of having thirsted for a crown.
He was working like a galley-slave for England—working with insufficient money, false servants, unfriendly onlookers, and an apathetic nation ready to seize on frivolous pretexts to dub him unpopular—and his reward for labours, that perhaps not one of his subjects had any conception of, was the nominal dignity of kingship and the long-fought-for alliance of England with the States.