CHAPTER X.

THE poor Queen was now very ill, the physicians and surgeons summoned, and a privy council called; to which the Dukes of Somerset and Argyle went uninvited, they claiming their privilege as privy councillors; others followed their example in quick succession; Bolingbroke and Mrs. Masham were outmarched by their opponents: the Queen was dead; and the council was seized by a strong majority of adherents of the house of Hanover; and from this moment-down went the prospects of the Pretender.

Immediate steps were at once taken for the security of the cities of London and Westminster, even two days before the Queen's death; and orders were given to the heralds at arms, and the Life Guards (for the Queen might die at any moment), to be in readiness to mount at the first warning, in order to proclaim the Elector of Hanover, King of Great Britain; and as Portsmouth had been left in a defenceless state (perhaps on purpose), six hundred men, out-pensioners of Chelsea Hospital, were marched there under Colonel Pocock, and such half-pay officers as were at hand; Brigadier Whetham was ordered off to Scotland; and the same day the fleet was placed under the command of the Earl of Berkeley.

Her Majesty expired on the 1st of August, in the fiftieth year of her age; a good woman as wife, mother, and queen; but-yet not a woman of a strong mind-No! she was a weak-minded woman, the prey of bad, designing men. While all this was going on at court, Dr. Jonathan Swift was skulking off to Reading, in Berkshire, till the Queen should die, and be buried; when he further skulked to Ireland, to his deanery of St. Patrick's, the proceeds of his iniquity; where he remained for the remainder of his life.

De Foe, in his Appeal to Honour and Justice, affirms, "that no sooner was the Queen dead, and the King, as right required, pro

claimed, but the rage of men increased upon me to that degree, that the threats and insults I received were such as I am not able to express. If I offered to say a word in favour of the present settlement, it was called fawning and twining round again. On the other hand, though I have meddled neither one way or other, nor written one book since the Queen's death, yet a great many things are called by my name; and I bear every day the reproaches which all the answerers of those books cast, as well upon the subject as the authors. I have not seen nor spoken to my Lord of Oxford but once since the King's landing, nor received the least message, order, or writing, from his lordship, or any other way corresponded with him; yet he bears the reproach of my writing in his defence; and I the rage of men for doing it. I cannot say it is no affliction to me to be thus used, though my being entirely clear of the fact, is a true support to me."

From the above quotation it would appear that the public believed De Foe to be connected with the ministry when he wrote the three pamphlets on the Pretender's coming; and also that they believed him to be in favour of the Pretender when he wrote those pamphlets.

On the appearing shortly afterwards of the Secret History of the White Staff, the public were only confirmed in their previous opinion of that connection subsisting between the late ministry and De Foe; on which Oldmixon, in his History of England, vol. iii. p. 537, observes:-"One cannot doubt but the Secret History of the White Staff, a pamphlet Foe wrote soon after King George's accession to the throne, was by the Earl of Oxford's directions; and that the most natural hints for it came from him, because the whole treatise is calculated for his vindication; and Foe depended upon him too much to dare to publish any such thing without his participation and consent."

As the tide of popular feeling had fully set in against De Foe after the writing (as was supposed) in favour of the Pretender; and also his writing a vindication of Harley in his administration of public affairs; he, poor fellow, was fairly hooted from the ground of politics; that ground on which he had done more than any living man on behalf of civil and religious liberty; and he had done it for

the detraction of all parties, and without the thanks of any mortal man. He lived isolated for thirty years as a politician; neglected by Whigs and abhorred by Tories. Howe would not pray with him when in Newgate, in 1703; and Jonathan Swift did not know the fellow's name!

De Foe now wrote "An Appeal to Honour and Justice, though it be of his worst Enemies. By Daniel De Foe. Being a true Account of his Conduct in Public Affairs. Jer. xvii. 18. London, printed for J. Baker, 1715. 8vo, pp. 58:" in which he commences by hoping "the time is come at last, when the voice of moderate principles may be heard. Hitherto the noise has been so great, and the prejudices and passions of men so strong, that it had been but in vain to offer any argument, or for any man to talk of giving a reason for his actions; and this alone has been the cause why, when other men, who, I think, have less to say in their own defence, are appealing to the public, and struggling to defend themselves, I alone have been silent under the infinite clamours and reproaches, causeless curses, unusual threatenings, and the most unjust and injurious treatment in the world.

and are

"I hear much of people calling out to punish the guilty; but very few are concerned to clear the innocent. I hope some will be inclined to judge impartially, and have yet reserved so much of the Christian as to believe, and at least to hope, that a rational creature cannot abandon himself so as to act without some reason, willing not only to have me defend myself, but to be able to answer for me; when they hear me causelessly insulted by others, and, therefore, are willing to have such arguments put into their mouths as the cause will bear.

"1. I think I have been long enough made fabula vulgi, and borne the weight of general slander; and I should be wanting to truth, to my family, and to myself, if I did not give a fair and true state of my conduct, for impartial men to judge of, when I am no more in being to answer for myself.-2. By the hint of mortality, and by the infirmities of a life of sorrow and fatigue, I have reason to think I am not a great way from, if not very near to, the great ocean of eternity, and the time may not be long ere I embark on

the last voyage. Wherefore, I think I should have even accounts with this world before I go, that no actions (slanders) may lie against my heirs, executors, administrators, and assigns, to disturb them in the peaceable possession of their father's (character) inheritance.-3. I fear-God grant I have not a second sight in itthat this lucid interval of temper and moderation, which shines, though dimly too, upon us at this time, will be but of short continuance, and that some men, who know not how to use the advantage God has put into their hands with moderation, will push, in spite of the best prince in the world, at such extravagant things, and act with such an intemperate forwardness, as will revive the heats and animosities which wise and good men were in hopes should be allayed by the happy accession of the King to the throne."

"I come next to the general clamour of the ministry being for the Pretender. I must speak my sentiments solemnly and plainly, as I always did in that matter, viz., that if it was so, I did not see it, nor did I ever see reason to believe it; this I am sure of, that if it was so, I never took one step in that kind of service; nor did I ever hear one word spoken by any one of the ministry, that I had the honour to know or converse with, that favoured the Pretender; but have had the honour to hear them all protest, that there was no design to oppose the succession of Hanover in the least. It may be objected to me, that they might be in the interest of the Pretender for all that; it is true they might; but that is nothing to me. I am not vindicating their conduct, but my own; as I never was employed in anything that way, so I do still protest, I do not believe it was ever in their design; and I have many reasons to confirm my thoughts, which are not material to the present case. But, be that as it will, it is enough to me that I acted nothing in any such interest, neither did I ever sin against the Protestant succession of Hanover in thought, word, or deed; and if the ministry did, I did not see it, or so much as suspect them of it. It was a disaster to the ministry, to be driven to the necessity of taking that set of men by the hand, who, nobody can deny, were in that interest; but as the former ministry answered, when they were charged with a design to overthrow the church, because they were favoured, joined

with, and were united to the dissenters; I say they answered, that they made use of the dissenters, but granted them nothing (which, by the way, was too true); so those gentlemen answer, that it is true they made use of the Jacobites, but did nothing for them. But this by the bye. Necessity is pleaded by both parties for doing things which neither side can justify. I wish both sides would for ever avoid the necessity of doing evil; for certainly it is the worst plea in the world, and generally made use of for the worst things.

"I have often lamented the disaster which employing Jacobites was to the ministry; and certainly it gave the greatest handle to their enemies. But there was no medium. The Whigs refused to show them a safe retreat, or to give them the least opportunity to take any other measures, but at the risk of their own destruction; and they ventured upon that course in hopes of being able to stand alone at last, without help of either the one or the other; in which, no doubt, they were mistaken. However, in this part, as I was always assured, and have good reason to believe, that her Majesty was steady in the interest of the house of Hanover; so, as nothing was ever offered to me, or required of me, to the prejudice of that interest, on what ground can I be reproached with the secret reserved designs of any, if they had such designs, as I verily believe they had not?"

Poor De Foe!-his unfortunate connection with the late ministry, and the odium that connection threw upon him, preyed so upon his spirits, as to bring on an attack of apoplexy; which endangered his life for a long period, and laid him up altogether from literary pursuits for many months; the attack leaving him in a very precarious and shattered condition of health for a long time.

In the early part of the year 1715, "The Family Instructor; in three Parts; with a Recommendatory Letter by the Rev. S. Wright. London, sold by Emanuel Matthews, at the Bible in Paternoster Row," appeared; the work being divided into three portions :· 1: To Father and Children. 2: To Masters and Servants. 3: To Husbands and Wives. This work had a great run for many years, and passed through twenty editions or more; and especially in years