It was doubtless the duty of the Princess to remain, to have received and consoled her father. However others might judge or counsel, she was still his child; and the heart which could be cold towards a parent in such an extremity as that in which the degraded and unhappy monarch now found himself, must have been deficient in all that is high and generous, even if it could boast some amiable dispositions in the sunshine of life.
It was soon ascertained with whom, and where, Anne had fled; and the public, commonly right in matters of feeling, could not readily forgive her whom they fixed upon as the prime adviser of the Princess.
Upon learning that the Prince of Denmark had deserted the King, and that James was returning to London, the Princess, as Lady Churchill in her own Vindication declared, was “put into a great fright. She sent for me,” continues the same writer, “told me her distress, and declared that rather than see her father she would jump out of the window. This was her very expression.”[[113]]
Such was Anne’s first outbreak of emotion, not for her father, but for herself; it was probable she was more afraid of her quick-tempered stepmother than of her subdued and unhappy father. A rumour had indeed prevailed that the Queen had treated the Princess ill, and had even gone so far as to strike her.[[114]] Be that as it might, Anne addressed a letter to her stepmother, announcing that having heard of her husband’s desertion of James, she felt too much afraid of the King’s displeasure to remain, and to risk an interview. She stated her intention not to remove far away, in order that she might return in case of a happy reconciliation. She declared herself in a distressing condition, divided between duty to a husband, and affection to a father; and, after commenting upon the state of public affairs, she ended her epistle in these terms:—“God grant a happy end to all these troubles, that the King’s reign may be prosperous, and that I may shortly meet you again in peace and safety. Till then, let me beg of you to continue the same favourable opinion that you hitherto had of
“Yours, &c.
“Anne.”
The following account of the caution with which Anne concerted her flight, and the mode in which she put it into execution, is given by her who acted so conspicuous a part in the tragicomic transaction.
“A little before,[[115]] a note had been left with me, to tell me where I might find the Bishop of London, (who in that critical time absconded,) if her Royal Highness should have occasion for a friend. The Princess, on this alarm, sent me immediately for the Bishop. I acquainted him with her resolution to leave the court, and to put herself under his care. It was hereupon agreed that, when he had advised with his friends in the city, he should come about midnight in a hackney coach to the neighbourhood of the Cockpit, in order to convey the Princess to some place where she might be private and safe.
“The Princess went to bed at the usual time, to avoid suspicion. I came to her soon after; and by the back-stairs which went down from her closet, her Royal Highness, my Lady Fitzharding, and I, with one servant, walked to the coach, where we found the Bishop and the Earl of Dorset. They conducted us that night to the Bishop’s house in the city, and the next day to my Lord Dorset’s, at Copt Hall. From thence we went to the Earl of Northampton’s, and from thence to Nottingham, where the country gathered round the Princess; nor did she think herself safe until she saw herself surrounded by the Prince of Orange’s friends.”[[116]]
Inoffensive, and even popular from her strict adherence to Protestantism, Anne immediately met with defenders. A small body of volunteers mustered round her, and formed a guard, commanded by no less a person than Dr. Compton, Bishop of London, the resolute prelate who had opposed the court on various occasions, and especially in his refusal to suspend a Protestant clergyman for exposing papistical errors.[[117]] This zealous man, who had been a cornet of dragoons in his youth, now rode before the Princess and her suite, including Lady Churchill, carrying a drawn sword in his hand, and pistols on his saddle-bow.[[118]] In this chivalric guise the fugitive party reached Northampton, and travelled on to Nottingham; where the gallant Earl of Devonshire, the friend of Russell, had raised a band of volunteers to assist the cause of the revolution.