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have retired, first for three weeks, to the country, and then for five weeks, to Bath, on the eve of an insurrection breaking out. But according to the evidence of that noble person, on the trial of Lord Russell, the conspirators waited for the return of the messenger they had sent to Scotland. It is therefore proper to follow him there, and see what was done. I will take the account from Murray, of Philiphaugh, the witness for the Crown, who exaggerated matters so much, as to excite frequently the astonishment of Jerviswood, and draw a reproof from his dying lips. The witness deposed that, at the meeting held upon the arrival of the messenger, amongst other discourse, it was said that the surprising rulers was a thing not to be thought of amongst Protestants, as it could not be effected without bloodshed. * He proceeded to make the following statement:

"All the company seemed to agree, that they should undertake nothing, or move in that affair, till they had a full and certain account what England proposed, what methods they resolved to follow there, who were to be their heads; and that, if they designed any attempt on the King's person, or overturning monarchy, they would not be forward or clear to join. And

* State Trials, vol. x. p. 677.

it being here insinuated, that the most they could do, at least for which there could be any plausible pretence, was to draw together; and, without any act of hostility, send addresses to His Majesty for redress of the present abuses of the government, and for obtaining sufficient security against the hazard they apprehended to their religion and liberties; it was said by Polwart, that he was apt to think that was their very design; for he had heard it was generally believed by that party in England, that if once they were in a body, the King would be prevailed with to quite (leave?) the Duke to be tried for Popery, correspondence with France, and accession to the Popish plot; and then, if the King were once free from the influence of the Duke's counsels, they were confident he might be moved to reform their abuses, and secure their religion and liberties for the future to their contentment."

This deposition fully corroborates a letter of Carstairs, which is reported to have been written by him to his friends. The substance of it was as follows:

"He testifies his abhorrence of any design against the King or Duke's life; that all his countrymen with whom he spake, were free from any design against the King or government; and that he frequently told the lords

who came to him, this whole affair upon which he was questioned, amounted to no more than talk, without so much as any formed design, and even talking was much broke off, before the discovery of the plot. He showed them how unwilling he was to bring any man to trouble; and that it could not but be very grievous to him to be forced to speak of any who had trusted him as a friend, especially when the business never came to any bearing, or to that height as to be any way prejudicial to the government.”

If, however, the reader estimates the character of Lord Russell as one in which falsehood found no place, he will agree with me that the words spoken by him to Bishop Burnet, with the confidence of friendship, and in the expectation of being summoned, within a few hours, before his Creator, are the best of all evidence. He then declared that all that had been done amounted to loose discourse, or at most, embryos, that never came to any thing. * And, in the paper delivered to the sheriffs, he says,

"And now, to

sum up all, as I never had any design against the King's life, so I never was in any contrivance of altering the government." Dalrymple considers this denial as a proof that Burnet wrote the paper; because it is difficult to reconcile it with

* Burnet's Journal.

Lord Russell's sincerity; as if there were not as much guilt in affixing his name to a falsehood, as in writing it himself. But Dalrymple has, in fact, no other foundation for his opinion than a mistaken notion of his own, that †, on the trial, Lord Russell did not either avow or deny the intended insurrection. Had he looked to the printed trial, he would have seen that Lord Russell is made to say that he looked on a rebellion as wicked and impracticable, and that he never wished to redress any grievance but in a legal and parliamentary way. In the report here given from his own hand, he says, "As for going about to make or raise a rebellion, that likewise is a thing so wicked, and withal so impracticable, that it never entered into my thoughts." His language, on his trial, to his friend, and in his last speech, is thus firm and consistent, though, as might be expected, his language is stronger to the judges before conviction than to the world and his friend afterwards. Dalrymple says, there is a letter in the Paper-office of Lord Russell to the King, in which he only denies the assassination. The petition to the King before given, in which he merely allows the meetings to be unlawful, must be the letter here alluded to. I have looked at

* Dal. p. 93.

+ Ibid. p. 91.

the

papers in the Paper-office, and there is only one other petition, or letter, of Lord Russell to the King, which is quite unimportant. Such is the faithful description of Dalrymple, and that too in a note, in which he complains of the inaccuracy of Burnet.

;"

The judgment expressed by Lady Russell, many years afterwards, probably contains the truth on this subject. She was persuaded the Rye-House plot was no more than "talk;' "and 'tis possible," she adds, "that talk going so far as to consider, if a remedy to supposed evils might be sought, how it could be formed."*

* The whole of the passage is worth insertion. It is on the occasion of Monmouth's invasion, in a letter to Dr. Fitzwilliam :

"And now, Doctor, I take this late wild attempt to be a new project, not depending on, or being linked in the least to any former design, if there was then any real one, which I am satisfied was not, no more than (my own lord confessed) talk. And it is possible that talk going so far as to consider if a remedy to supposed evils might be sought, how it could be formed? But, as I was saying, if all this late attempt was entirely new, yet the suspicion my lord must have lain under would have been great; and some other circumstances, I must confess, would have made his part an hard one. So that, from the deceitfulness of the heart, or want of true sight in the directive faculty, what would have followed, God only knows. From the frailty of the will I should have feared but little evil; for he had so just a soul, so firm, so good, he could not warp from such principles that were so, unless misguided by his understanding, and that his own, not

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