as well as he could with the information of Oates, which had been published; but tò render it the more acceptable, he added some circumstances of his own, still more tremendous, and still more absurd, than those of Oates. He said that ten thousand men were to be landed from Flanders in Burlington-bay, and were immediately to seize Hull. He affirmed that the lords Powis and Petre had undertaken to raise an army in Radnorshire; that fifty thousand men were ready to rise in London; that he himself had been tampered with to murder a man, and was to receive four thousand pounds for that service, beside the pope's blessing; that the king was to be assassinated, the protestants butchered, and the kingdom offered to One, if he would consent to hold it of the church; if not, the pope should continue to govern without him. He likewise accused the lords Carrington and Brudenel, who were committed to custody by order of parliament. But the most terrible part of all was, that Spain was to invade England with forty thousand men, who were ready at St. Iago in the character of pilgrims; though at this time Spain was actually unable to raise ten thousand men to supply her own garrisons in Flanders.

These narrations carry their own refutation; the infamy of the witnesses, the contradiction in their testimony, the improbability of it, the low vulgarity of the information, unlike what men trusted with great affairs would be apt to form, all these serve to raise our horror against these base villains, and our pity at the delusion of the times that could credit such reports. In order to give a confident air to the discovery, Bedloe published a pamphlet, with this title, "A Narrative and impartial Discovery of the horrid Popish Plot carried on for burning and destroying the Cities of London and Westminster with their Suburbs, &c. by Captain William Bedloe,

lately engaged in that horrid Design, and one of the Popish Committees for carrying an such Fires." The papists were thus become so obnoxious, that vote after vote passed against them in the house of commons. They were called idolaters; and such as did not concur in acknowledging the truth of the epithet were expelled the house without ceremony. Even the duke of York was permitted to keep his place in the house by a majority of only two. "I would not," said one of the lords, "have so much as a popish man or a popish woman to remain here, not so much as a popish dog or a popish bitch, not so much as a popish cat to mew or pur about our king." This was wretched eloquence; but it was admirably suited to the times.

Encouraged by the general voice in their favour, the witnesses, who all along had enlarged their narratives in proportion as they were greedily received, went a step farther, and ventured to accuse the queen. The commons, in an address to the king, gave countenance to this scandalous accusation; the lords rejected it with becoming disdain. The king received the news of it with his usual good-humour. They think," said he, "that I have a mind to a new wife; but I will not suffer an innocent woman to be abused." He immediately ordered Oates to be strictly confined, seized his papers, and dismissed his servants. But his favour with the parliament soon procured his release.

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Coleman was the first who was brought to trial, as being most obnoxious to those who pretended to fear the introduction of popery. His letters were produced against him. They plainly testified a violent zeal for the catholic cause; and that alone at present was sufficient to convict him. But Oates and Bedloe came in to make his condemnation sure. The former swore that he had sent fourscore guineas to a ruffian who

undertook to kill the king. The date of the transaction he fixed in the month of August, but would not fix the particular day. Coleman could have proved that he was in the country the greatest part of that month, and therefore the witness would not be particular. Bedloe swore that he had received a commission, signed by the superior of the Jesuits, appointing him a papal secretary of state, and that he had consented to the king's assassination. After this unfortunate man's sentence, thus procured by these vipers, many members of both houses offered to interpose in his behalf, if he would make an ample confession; but as he was, in reality, possessed of no treasonable secrets, he would not procure life by falsehood and imposture. He suffered with calmness and constancy, and to the last persisted in the strongest protestations of his innocence.

A. D.

The trial of Coleman was succeeded by those 1679. of Ireland, Pickering, and Grove. Ireland, a Jesuit, was accused by Oates and Bedloe, the only witnesses against him; and they swore that he was one of the fifty Jesuits who had signed the great resolve against the king. He affirmed, and proved that he was in Staffordshire all the month of August, a time when Oates asserted he was in London. The jury brought him in guilty, and the judge commended their verdict. It was in the same manner sworn that Pickering and Grove had bound themselves by an oath to assassinate the king, and had provided themselves with screwed pistols and silver bullets. Without regard to their own opposite declarations, they were found guilty. All these unhappy men went to execution protesting their innocence; a circumstance which made no impression on the spectators; their being Jesuits banished even pity from their sufferings.

The animosities of the people, however, seemed a

little appeased by the execution of these four; but a new train of evidence was now discovered, that kindled the flame once more. One Miles Prance, a goldsmith, and a professed Roman catholic, had been accused by Bedloe of being an accomplice in sir Edmondbury's murder; and, upon his denial, had been loaded with heavy irons, and thrown into the condemned hold, a place cold, dark, and noisome. There the poor wretch lay groaning, and exclaiming that he was not guilty; but being next day carried before lord Shaftesbury, and threatened with severe punishment in case of obstinacy, he demanded if a confession would procure his pardon. Being assured of that, he had no longer courage to resist, but confessed himself an accomplice in Godfrey's murder. He soon after, however, retracted his evidence before the king; but the same rigours being employed against him, he was induced to confirm his first information. The murder, he said, was committed in Somerset-house, by the contrivance of Gerard and Kelly, two Irish priests; that Laurence Hill, footman to the queen's treasurer, Robert Green, cushionkeeper to her chapel, and Henry Berry, porter of the palace, followed sir Edmondbury at a distance, from ten in the morning till seven in the evening; but that passing by Somerset-house, Green throwing a twisted handkerchief over his head, he was soon strangled, and the body carried to a high chamber in Somerset-house, whence it was removed to another apartment, where it was seen by Bedloe.

Hill, Green, and Berry, were tried upon this evidence: though Bedloe's narrative and Prance's information were totally irreconcileable, and though their testimony was invalidated by contrary evidence, all was in vain the prisoners were condemned and executed. They all denied their guilt at execution; and,

as Berry died a protestant, this circumstance was regarded as very considerable. But, instead of stopping the current of credulity, it only increased the people's animosity against a protestant, who could at once be guilty of a popish plot, of murder, and of denying it in his last moments.

This frightful persecution continued for some time; and the king, contrary to his own judgment, was obliged to give way to the popular fury. Whitebread, provincial of the Jesuits, Fenwick, Gavan, Turner, and Harcourt, all of them of the same order, were brought to their trial: Langhorne soon after. Besides Oates and Bedloe, Dugdale, a new witness, appeared against the prisoners. This man spread the alarm still farther, and even asserted that two hundred thousand papists in England were ready to take arms. The prisoners proved, by sixteen witnesses from St. Omer's, that Oates was in that seminary at the time he swore he was in London. But, as they were papists, their testimony could gain no manner of credit. All pleas availed them nothing; the Jesuits and Langhorne were condemned and executed, with their latest breath denying the crimes for which they died.

The informers had less success on the trial of sir George Wakeman, the queen's physician, who, though they swore with their usual animosity, was acquitted. His condemnation would have involved the queen in his guilt; and it is probable the judge and jury were afraid of venturing so far.

The viscount Stafford was the last man that fell a sacrifice to these bloody wretches: the witnesses produced against him were Oates, Dugdale, and Turberville. Oates swore that he saw Fenwick, the Jesuit, deliver to Stafford a commission from the general of the Jesuits, constituting him pay-master of the papal army.