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Show 346 ATROCIOUS JUDGES. [A. D. 1G88. on his return they hi~scd hitn and hooted him, and gave him a foretaste of the violence he was soon to experience from an English tnob. The forfeited and surrendered charter. 'vere likewise restored to the other corporationp in }~ngland. 'I'he e popular act', however, were generally ascribed to fear, ancl the coalition of all partie. , including the preachers of pa :ive obedience, to obtain a pennancnt redress of grievance by force cont.in ued re.~olute and unshaken. ' When 'Villiam landed, the frightful severities of Jeffreys in the we t had the effect of preventing the populace from :tJock-inrr to his tandard but h t · 1 · · o , e me Wit 1 no oppositiOn, and soon l) el''"'OllS of great cons1' d erah' on and I· n:fiuence sent in their ad-he ~ion to him. 1Vhen we read in hi tory of civil commotions and foreio-n • • b 111 va. IOn , we are apt to suppose that all the ordinary bu ine s of life wat; suspe d d B · · c n e · ut on Inqtnry, 've :find that it went 0 ~1 pretty 1nuch ns usual, unless where interrupte<l by actual vwl.ence. While the Prince of Orange was advancing to the cupltal, and James was n1arching out to give him battle, if his army would have stood true, the Court of Chancery sat reo-u- 1arly to hear " exce t' " d . . . o "' P Ions an "n1ot1on for time to plead;" and on the very day on wl1ich the Princess Anne fled to Not-tingham, and her unhappy father cxc1aiiued, in the extremity of his ao-ony " God I I 1 • o ' 1e p n1e. 1ny own cl11luren have forsaken me,'' the lord chancellor decided that "if an admjnistrator pay~ a debt due by bond before a debt due by a decree In equity, he is still liable to pay the debt due by the decree.* ,'If 24th ~ovember, 1688. 2 Vernon, 88, Sem·le v. Lane. By a reference to the mmute books ·n th . · , . . . 1 e 1cg1 trar s office, 1t appears that J cffreys sat a gam on Mnnday Nov 26 h h d . ' · ' w en c ec1ded Duval v. Edwards, a case on .A. D. 1Cf 8.] GEOHGE JEFFHEYS • :J47 Change of dynasty was not yet talked of, and the cry ·was for "a free Parlian1 ·nt." To meet thi~, the king resolved to call one in his o·wn nan1e ; and the la.t u e wbich Jefl'reys made of the great seal was by scaljng writs for the election of members of the IIouse of Con11nons, who were ordered. to meet on ihc 15th of January following. This n1ovemcnt only infu sed fro ·h vigor into the Prince of Orange, who no'v rcsol ved to bring nuttt ~rs to a cri i ~ ; anu James, finding him. elf aln1o t unjver ally cle"erted, as the most effectual way, in his juugtnent, of annoying his enemie--, very conveniently for th01n, detcnnined to leave the kingdom. l1reparatory to this, he had a parting interview with J cfl:rey~, to whom he dill not confide his ccrct; but he obtained fr01n him all the parlian1cntary writs which hnd not been is"'uc<l to the sheriffs amountino- to a con iderablc number, and th ."'c, ' b with his own hand., he threw into the fire, so that a la.wf'ul Parliament 1nio-ht not be as en1bl('cl when he was gone. To b increase the confu ion, he required .Jeffrey, to surrender the great seal to him,- having laid the plan of destroying it,in the belief that without it the government could not be conducted. All things being prepared, and Father Peter and the Earl of l\Ielfort havin o- be n informed of his intentions, which he b still concealed fr01n J cffreys, on the night of the 1Oth of De-cember, James, disg uised, left \Vhilehall, accompanied by Sir Edward I-Iales, w-hom he afterwards created Earl of Tenterden. London Bridge (which they dur t not eros') being ihc exceptions, nine in number, g iving a separate j udgment on each. lie did not sit on the 27th but he did on the 28th, which was the last day of term. So late as the 8th ~f December he sat and heard several petitions. In the evening of this day the great seal was taken from him. |
