Complete Works of Rudyard Kipling (Illustrated) (1114 page)

James from the succession and to set up a bastard son of Charles in his place; in 16801681 it looked almost like a civil war between
Tories and Whigs. But all moderate men dreaded this, and the King played his game so cleverly that, when he died in 1685, his brother
James succeeded him without trouble. Charles had taken sharp vengeance on some of the
Whig plotters, and their families did not forget the fact.

James II, however, was not merely the
Catholic King of a strongly Protestant people,
but he was also the most obstinate man in
England. If not, like Edward II, a crowned ass, he was at least a crowned mule. In three years he had wrecked his own throne, and very nearly pulled down the ancient monarchy of
England on the top of himself. His Parliament was quite loyal and quite prepared to shut its eyes to his Catholic faith, if he would not flaunt it in every one’s face. But, from the very first, he set himself not only to do this,
but to make the Catholics supreme in the
State. He wished to give them all posts in
Army, Navy and Civil Service, and even in the
Church of England. He thought that by promising to abolish all laws against the Protestant
Dissenters he might get them to help him to abolish the laws against the Catholics also.

But the Dissenters, who certainly had never loved the Church of England, feared a Catholic king much more, and altogether refused to listen to James; they threw in their lot with those very churchmen and bishops who had bullied them. In Ireland, James appealed to the wildest passions of the Irish against the
Protestant colonies of Englishmen which had been planted there by Elizabeth, by James I
and by Cromwell, and who had been confirmed in their lands by Charles II. To the one person who
could
perhaps have helped him to put down England by the sword — namely, King
Louis of France — this crowned mule turned a deaf ear, and professed that he wanted no such help. In short, he listened to nobody but a few
Catholic priests in his own household.

Until 1688 his heir had been his eldest daughter, the good and beloved Princess Mary,
who had been married in 1677 to her Dutch cousin, Prince William of Orange, who was now the leader of Protestant Europe against the
King of France. Most Englishmen were content to wait till James should die; then this darling Protestant girl would be their queen.
But in June, 1688, James had a son born to him, who would, of course, be brought up as a Papist. The whole nation shivered at the prospect; its leaders, Whig and moderate

Tory alike, would wait no longer, and a secret message was at once despatched to Prince William begging him to come over to England,
either to turn out King James or to teach him by force (for nothing but force would ever convince such a character) to govern better.

Prince William of Orange was the son of
Charles I’s daughter Mary. He was a frail little creature, nearly always ill, with an enormous hook-nose and cold gray eyes, which only lighted up in battle. His manners were also cold and unkind; but underneath all he had a soul of fire. He cared for but one thing on earth, to smash King Louis of France. He saw that rich England had been, since Cromwell’s time, too much the ally of France, too much the enemy of Holland. He thought she had played false to Protestantism. If he came to England to deliver it from King James, he meant afterward to throw the whole weight and wealth of England into the alliances which he was forever knitting together against his hated enemy, France. For English “politics” and the English Constitution, for the squabble of Whigs and Tories in the English
Parliament, he cared nothing at all. But he was the husband of the heiress of England, and here was his chance of power.

Men went about saying that the child justborn to King James was not his son at all,
was no true Prince of Wales, “he had been smuggled into the Palace in a warming pan” —
and much other nonsense of that sort. It suited William to believe this, or to pretend to believe it. James was well warned of what was coming, but he shut his ears, and so was quite unready to meet William and his Dutch fleet, which had a lot of English and Scottish soldiers and exiles on board it. William landed in Devonshire and moved slowly toward London. James had an army, many of whose regiments would have fought faithfully for him if he would only have led them; but he turned tail and fled to France; and just before Christmas, 1688, William entered London.

What was to be done? Was James still
King? Had Mary become Queen? Who was to call a Parliament ? (Only a King can do this,
and it seemed as if there was no King.) William, however, called a “Convention” (which was a Parliament in all but name), and, after some debate, this body decided that James was no longer King, but that William and Mary were joint King and Queen of England and Ireland.
A Scottish Convention declared the same thing for Scotland. A document was drawn up called the “Bill of Rights” which is a sort of second edition of Magna Charta. It fully expressesthe idea that thg Sovereign of England is a
“limited monarch” and that there are a great many things he may not do.

This “Revolution of 1688” was mainly the work of the Whigs, and William has often been called the “Whig Deliverer.” Revolutions are bad things, but it is difficult to see how this one could have been avoided. James was a real tyrant, almost as impossible a King for Englishmen as John or “Bloody” Mary I had been;
and, since Mary II refused to reign without her husband, and the baby Prince of Wales had fled with his father, the question was perhaps settled in the only satisfactory manner. But
England was by no means united by the settlement; William was a foreigner and a foreigner he remained till his death.

CHAPTER X

WILLIAM III TO GEORGE II 1688-1760; THE GROWTH OF EMPIRE

“Brown Bess.”

In the days of lace-ruffles, perukes and brocade
Brown Bess was a partner whom none could despise —

An out-spoken, flinty-lipped, brazen-faced jade
With a habit of looking men straight in the

eyes —

At Blenheim and Ramillies fops would confess

They were pierced to the heart by the charms of Brown Bess.

Though her sight was not long and her weight was not small,
Yet her actions were winning, her language was clear;

And every one bowed as she opened the ball
On the arm of some high-gaitered, grim grenadier.

Half Europe admitted the striking success

Of the dances and routs that were given by
Brown Bess.

When ruffles were turned into stiff leather stocks,

And people wore pigtails instead of perukes,

Brown Bess never altered her iron-gray locks;

She knew she was valued for more than her looks.

‘‘Oh, powder and patches was always my dress.

And I think I am killing enough,” said Brown
Bess.

So she followed her red-coats, whatever they did,

From the heights of Quebec to the plains of

Assaye,

From Gibraltar to Acre, Cape Town and
Madrid,

And nothing about her was changed on the way;

(But most of the Empire which now we possess,

Was won through those years by old-fashioned
Brown Bess).

In stubborn retreat or in stately advance,

From the Portugal coast to the cork-woods of Spain,

She had puzzled some excellent Marshals of
France

Till none of them wanted to meet her again:

But later, near Brussels, Napoleon, no less,

Arranged for a Waterloo ball with Brown
Bess.

She had danced till the dawn of that terrible day —

She danced on till dusk of more terrible night,

And before her linked squares his battalions

gave way

And her long fierce quadrilles put his lancers to flight.

And when his gilt carriage drove off in the press,
“I have danced my last dance for the world!”
said Brown Bess.

If you go to Museums — there’s one in Whitehall —

Where old weapons are shown with their names writ beneath,
You will find her, upstanding, her back to the wall,

As stiff as a ramrod, the flint in her teeth.
And if ever we English have reason to bless
Any arm save our mothers’, that arm is Brown
Bess!

The Bill of Rights had said that “to keep an
Army in time of peace was against Law.”
Only the fact that England was at war for very long periods during the next hundred years saved the Army from being abolished; and at every interval of peace it was reduced far too much for the safety of the country. In 1689
war with France was certain, for, as I told you,
William had come to England mainly to in-duce England to help Kolland and other countries whom France was threatening. Also the
French King at once took up the cause of James.

James went to Ireland and called on the
Catholic Irish to help him; French troops and money were sent after him. Ireland had now some real wrongs to avenge, for Cromwell’s conquest had been cruel, and many old Irish families had lost their lands, to make room for
English settlers; these Catholics, therefore,
gave James a good army, with which, early in
1689, he advanced to try and subdue the most
Protestant of the Irish Provinces, Ulster.
But he failed to take the city of Londonderry,
which held out against a most awful siege for three months and more. It was not till a year after this that William was able to muster enough English and Dutch troops to begin the reconquest of Ireland. He smashed James to pieces at the Battle of the Boyne, and drove him once more into exile in 1690; a year later the war ended with the surrender of
Limerick, which the Catholics had defended as bravely as the Protestants had defended
Londonderry. Ireland was at last completely conquered.

William wanted to give, and promised to give, the defeated Irish Catholics peace and protection; but the English Parliament in-tended that those who provoked the war should pay the expenses of the war. A vast number of estates were therefore again taken from the Catholics and given to the Protestants,
and a fresh set of grievances began for Ireland.
Harsh laws were also passed in this and the next reign, both in the English and Irish Parliaments, with the intention of stamping out the Catholic religion altogether. They were hardly ever put in force, for the whole Irish people, Catholic and Protestant alike, hated them; and men, after what they had gone through, only wished to live at peace with their neighbours. Harsh laws were also passed and had been passed since 1660 in the English
Parliament against Irish trade; for the jealous
English merchants feared that Irishmen would make woollen goods, or grow fat bacon, beef,
or butter cheaper than England could do.
These laws were put in force; and their result in the long run was to make Ireland ripe for rebellion.

The same jealousy was displayed toward
Scotland, which was just beginning to have a few small manufactures of its own, and which certainly grew excellent and cheap beef and mutton. Then, too, there was a large party which had clung to King James or was ready to rise for him, especially in the wild Highlands

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north of the Forth and Clyde. The south and east of Scotland had accepted the Revolution of 1688, and the Presbyterian Church had again been established. The risings for
King James were put down, though not without tough fighting. But when Scotland asked to be allowed a share in the trade with our colonies, the English Parliament answered with a contemptuous “no”; and the result was that Scotland growled and growled more and more throughout the reign of William. But in the next reign, after long and fierce debates,
the old Scottish Parliament was induced to vote for union with the English (1708); and henceforward there was one united Parliament of Great Britain, and trade was perfectly free between the two nations. Then began the great commercial prosperity of Modern Scotland. Within fifty years Glasgow had got an enormous share of the trade with the British
Colonies and India, and one of the most interesting tales of town history is the story how the grave merchants of Glasgow got together and set to work to deepen the river Clyde so as to make it carry the trade which they knew would come. The first Glasgow ship for tobacco sailed to America ten years after the union, and began what is still one of Glasgow’s greatest industries.