William in the Netherlands-His Financial Embarrassments-Great Crisis of Commercial Difficulty-Revival of Credit -The New Currency established-Attainder of Sir John Fenwick-Negotiations for Peace-The Peace of Ryswick-Opening of St. Paul's Cathedral -Parliament-Reduction of the Army-Dangers of an insufficient Force-The East India Company-Statute against Socinians-Reformation of Manners-Societies for Promoting Christian Knowledge, and for the Propagation of the Gospel-Licentiousness of the Stage -Embassy to France-French Embassy to England-Czar of Muscovy in England. AFTER these harassing events had taken their course, William departed for the continent, to encounter dangers and difficulties far more oppressive than the risks of a battle-more insupportable to such a man than any dread of the assassin's knife. He left London in the very crisis of the monetary change, and was in Holland on the 7th of May. On the 22nd of May the king wrote to Shrewsbury from the Hague. He informed his Secretary of State that the French army had first taken the field; that the allied troops assemble as well as they can, but find it difficult to join, as the enemy had far advanced in great force. There was another reason, he said. The troops "in Flanders are so much in want of money, that they can scarcely move; and if the Treasury do not find prompt means to furnish supplies, I 194 FINANCIAL DIFFICULTIES OF THE CAMPAIGN. [169€ know not how I can possibly act."* On the 25th of May, Shrewsbury wrote to William in great alarm: "We discoursed this morning with several of the most eminent goldsmiths, and with some of the Bank, and had the dismallest accounts from them of the state of credit in this town, and of the effect it would soon have upon all the traders in money; none of them being able to propose a remedy, except letting the Parliament sit in June, and enacting the clipped money to go again,-the very hope of which locks up all the gold and good money, and would be to undo all that has been done."+ The Lords Justices, who had the charge of affairs in William's absence, were to a great extent helpless. They saw clearly what locked up all the gold and good money; but to retrace their steps would have been fatal. Their position was one of extreme difficulty. Public clamour was loud in its demand "that clipped money should be current again; that the standard should be advanced, and the price of guineas improved." Temporary aid which they expected had failed the government. An Act had been passed in the previous session for establishing a national Land Bank- -a bank which was to lend money on mortgages, and to lend also to the State. Land and Trade were two rival interests. Trade, or the moneyed interest, would not subscribe any portion of the two millions and a half that were required to establish the Land Bank; and Land was looking for aid to the new scheme, in the shape of loans, and had no cash to spare in the shape of subscriptions. The scheme utterly broke down; and, at the same time, through the difficulties connected with the re-coinage, the Bank of England could not pay its notes in specie. There was one universal panic throughout the land. There was a bold issue of small exchequer-bills, of which there was considerable distrust. The Bank of England endorsed their notes with a promise to pay in the new money when it came forth, and meanwhile to pay interest at the rate of 15 per cent. Merchants and smaller traders exchanged their promissory notes. But in spite of every expedient the nation was quickly coming to the condition of semi-civilization-barter. Of all the sufferers in this crisis it is impossible to conceive a man placed in a more distressing condition than the sovereign who was to fight the battles of his country at the head of a great European confederation. "In the name of God, determine quickly to find some credit for the troops here, or we are ruined,” he writes on June 4th. "We are here reduced to greater extremities than ever, for want of money; and if we do not soon receive some remittances the army will be disbanded," is his language on the 23rd of July. On the 30th, he says, "The letter from the Lords Justices has quite overcome me; and I know not where I am, since at present I see no resource which can prevent the army from mutiny or total desertion." The king then adds a most remarkable sentence: "If you cannot devise expedients to send contributions, or procure credit, all is lost, and I must go to the Indies." From such a man these words cannot be regarded as the mere impatience of disappointment. army, whose mutiny or total desertion was imminent, stood between Louis of France and the subjugation of Holland. If Holland became a province of France, England would soon be in the same condition, with a Stuart viceroy under the conquering Bourbon. What then remained? To found a great "Bhrewsbury Correspondence," p. 114. Ibid. p. 116. The 1696.] GREAT CRISIS OF COMMERCIAL DIFFICULTY. 195 maritime and commercial empire in the Dutch settlements-to call up the spirit of colonial freedom to balance the despotism of the old world. On the 31st the king sends Portland to England to arrange about assembling Parliament: "Rather than perish all must be risked." Shrewsbury wrote a desponding answer to Portland's communications; and then William in his reply expressed that noble sentiment which every Englishman ought to bear in mind in the day of public calamity and fear,-" May God relieve us from our present embarrassment, for I cannot suppose that it is His will to suffer a nation to perish which He has so often almost miraculously saved, though we have too well deserved it."* The heroic confidence of William had revived. "He was a man that knew how to meet adversity. His life had been one continued struggle with difficulties; but it had been the fixed rule of that life to encounter them with an unshaken fortitude, and a rigid adherence to what he considered to be right." He would not "go to the Indies." The nation that God had "so often almost miraculously saved" would be saved again, even in the dire extremity of this time. It has been said with great truth, "the vessel of our commonwealth has never been so close to shipwreck as in this period." ‡ On the 15th of August there was a great meeting of the General Court of the Bank of England to discuss an earnest appeal that had been made to them by the king's ministers, for an advance of two hundred thousand pounds. Very reluctantly had this application been made. Shrewsbury was in despair. He wrote to the king, "a loan from the city is much doubted, by the incapacity which has appeared in many to discharge the bills which have been drawn upon them from all parts. If the application to the Bank should not succeed, God knows what can be done." But he adds, "yet anything must be tried and ventured, rather than lie down and die." § The application to the Bank did succeed. Immediate relief to the necessities of William, however small, was obtained. But he was not in a condition to carry on the campaign with any vigour. His difficulties were set forth with considerable exaggeration by the French. The Jacobites were everywhere rejoicing. But time was working that change, from temporary financial distress to growing ease and eventual relief, which is almost certain when the resources of industry are not exhausted, and the great body of the people are not alienated from a government. The embarrassments of the English had induced the duke of Savoy to make a separate peace with France. Everywhere there were signs of a defection from the alliance of which William was the heart and soul. He came home at the beginning of October. He met the Parliament on the 20th of that month. In him the indomitable resolution with which he had encountered so many adverse contingencies spoke out, when he said, "It is fit for me to acquaint you that some overtures have been made, in order to the entering upon a negotiation for a general Peace; but I am sure we shall agree in opinion, that the only way of treating with France is with our swords in our hands; and that we can have no reason to expect a safe and honourable peace, but by showing ourselves prepared to make a vigorous and effectual war." This was not the language of a bankrupt * "Shrewsbury Correspondence," pp. 119, 127, 129, 130, 132. Hallam, chap. xv. 196 REVIVAL OF CREDIT-THE CURRENCY ESTABLISHED. [1696. king; it was not addressed to a bankrupt nation. There were evident symptoms that the great difficulty of the currency was in some degree passing away. Had the government evinced the slightest disposition to recede from the measure of re-coinage; to reduce the standard; to raise the denomination of the coin, the evil would never have been cured. The very first measure of the Commons was to pass this resolution-" That they would not alter the standard of the gold and silver, in fineness, weight, or denomination; and that they will make good all parliamentary funds since his majesty's accession to the Crown, that have been made credits for loans from the subject." The effect of this true statesmanship, for which the honour is mainly due to Montague, was instantaneous. The expectations of those who hoarded guineas in the belief that a guinea would pass for thirty shillings,of those who hoarded crowns in the belief that what was worth five shillings would exchange for commodities at the value of seven shillings and sixpence, -were at an end. The true money flowed into circulation. Trade revived. The financial and commercial crisis was past. The nation was solvent. A hundred and twenty-six years afterwards, one of the ablest of English statesmen, in resisting a motion against the Resumption of Cash Payments on the ground of agricultural distress, rested his most powerful arguments on the great historical precedent of 1696, and concluded his convincing speech, by moving, in the very words of Montague's resolution, "That this House will not alter the standard of gold and silver, in fineness, weight, or denomination." * England fought through the great currency change of 1822 as England had thrown off the far heavier weight, looking at the nation's comparative resources, of the change in 1696. The same spirit of the people was manifested at each crisis. A financier of the earlier period thus speaks of his contemporaries: "While our neighbouring nations. expected we should sink under this burden, and some were even prepared to receive us as a province, the strength of mind, constancy, and magnanimity of our people overcame it all." † The two houses of Parliament were occupied, during this session, with the extraordinary proceedings under a Bill of Attainder against sir John Fenwick. The historical narratives of this event are, for the most part, as lengthy as the parliamentary debates. A very slight summary is all that we can attempt to give of an affair which has far more to do with the history of party than with the history of the nation; and of which the only thing of any real importance, after an interval of more than a century and a half, is the constitutional question of procedure by attainder. In the deposition of Goodman, one of the witnesses for the Crown in the Assassination Plot, he implicated sir John Fenwick, as being, in conjunction with Friend, Parkyns, and others, in correspondence with James upon a projected invasion, and that Fenwick used to send over a list of the forces in England, and of their disposition. Porter, another of the conspirators, gave his testimony to a similar effect. Fenwick attempted to fly into France, under the assumed name of Thomas Ward; but in June he was apprehended at New Romney, in Kent. Fenwick was highly connected; he was a baronet Huskisson's "Speeches,' vol. ii. p. 166. "Wednesday Club," quoted in "Life of Paterson," p. 108. 1697.] ATTAINDER OF SIR JOHN FENWICK. 197 of an ancient family. A letter which he had addressed to his wife, upon his apprehension, was intercepted. He exhorted her to make all friends. "I know nothing," he said, " can save my life, but my lord Carlisle's going over to him, [king William], backed by the rest of the family of the Howards, to beg it." In another passage, he says, "I cannot think what else to say, but the great care must be the jury. If two or three could be got that would starve the rest, that, or nothing can save me." Fenwick, being ordered for trial, offered to give evidence of great importance; and was visited in prison by the duke of Devonshire, at the king's desire. In a written paper he implicated Shrewsbury and Godolphin, Marlborough and Russell, as having been in communication with James at various times. The paper was transmitted to William; who probably knew as much of these general treacheries as Fenwick could tell him. He transmitted the paper to Shrewsbury, saying, "You may judge of my astonishment at his effrontery in accusing you. . . . You will observe the sincerity of this honest man who only accuses those in my service, and not one of his own party."* William was desirous that Fenwick should be brought to trial before the public affairs demanded his own return to England. There was a difficulty. Goodman had been tampered with, and could nowhere be discovered. Fenwick, in his letter to his wife, had said, "Money, I know, would do it; but alas, that is not to be had." The indefatigable aunt of the earl of Carlisle did accomplish the means of preventing the evidence of Goodman before a jury. Two witnesses were required by law in cases of treason; one only was forthcoming. It was resolved to proceed against Fenwick by Bill of Attainder, in which the deficient legal evidence could be supplied by the previous deposition of Goodman before the Privy Council, and by the evidence of two grand jurymen as to what he had sworn when the Bill of Indictment was found by them. This proceeding was altogether irregular, although the crime of Fenwick was conclusively established. The most prolonged and violent discussions therefore ensued, both in the Lords and Commons, as to the passing of this Bill. In the Commons the majority for the Bill was only thirtythree; in the Lords only seven. "The debates," says Burnet, "were the hottest, and held the longest, of any that I ever knew." Fenwick, previous to the Bill being moved in the Commons, had been brought to the bar, and persisted in refusing to make any further confession. Lord Hardwicke, in a note on Burnet, says, "The king, before the session, had sir J. Fenwick brought to the Cabinet Council, where he was present himself. But sir John would not explain his paper."+ In another note he says: "My father was told by the duke of Newcastle, that his father, the first lord Pelham then a lord of the Treasury, and a staunch Whig, voted against the Bill, because he thought it hard to put a man to death, who, on compulsion, that is, to save his life, had told disagreeable truths. And the management of party was such, that sir J. Fenwick was prevented from speaking out, lest he should exasperate the great men on both sides, who knew he could tell tales. The consequence was, that he was afraid to affirm his own tale, and lost his life." He suffered death on the 28th of January. The proceeding by "Shrewsbury Correspondence," p. 145. Ibid. p. 324. + Oxford edit., vol, iv. p. 323. |