of undisciplined over disciplined troops. When he had fired his volley, the Highlander threw away his firelock, and was ready in an instant to rush forward with his broadsword. The bayonet at that time in use was so constructed that, when fixed, it filled up the mouth of the barrel. It took some minutes to arrange the clumsy contrivance which turned the musket into a pike. While the regulars were still fumbling with their weapons, the Highlanders were upon them.[1] Mackay brought off such troops as were left with rare coolness, and the death of Dundee neutralized the effects of the defeat. The Highland army passed under the command of General Cannon, who had brought over the Irish auxiliaries, a man of no particular ability. Mackay succeeded in Mackay concludes the war. rapidly re-establishing his army. He destroyed the prestige of the Highlanders by defeating a detachment at St. Johnstone's, near Perth; and when a newly raised regiment of Cameronian recruits beat off the mountaineers at Dunkeld, no longer held together by a leader of ability, they broke up and retired to their own glens, and the war was practically over.
Though William's measures had thus been tolerably successful, although the Revolution was acknowledged in two portions of the Empire, Factions of the English Parliament. and likely soon to become so in the third, his position in London was most difficult and trying. Success had dissolved the union between the Whigs and Tories, and the triumphant Whigs had time to remember their sufferings in the last reign and to form plans of vengeance. The King desired above all things the cessation of faction and the union of parties, but on every question which arose the Commons displayed a most passionate temper. A certain number of attainders were reversed, and this was well enough; but when a Bill of Indemnity Bill of Indemnity dropped. was brought in, so many exceptions were made to it, that it became in fact rather a Bill of vengeance than a Bill of oblivion. The discussion of these exceptions lasted so long that the Bill had to be dropped for that session. But the intemperate Whig leaders, such men as Howe, Sacheverell, and the younger Hampden, were not contented to be thus balked of their revenge. Fierce attacks were brought against the Lord Attack on Halifax. President Caermarthen, and Halifax, the Privy Seal. The position of Caermarthen was so strong that his enemies were afraid to divide the House against him. Halifax had made more enemies, and was not so firmly supported by the King's influence. The practical mind of William found little to like in the subtle and questioning intellect of Halifax; and as the affairs in Ireland had been virtually entirely in that nobleman's control, the wretched condition of the Protestants, the lengthened misery of Londonderry, and the temporary success of James and Tyrconnel, were all laid to his charge. It was said that he even purposely neglected Ireland in order to render a new Government indispensable. However, he contrived to escape impeachment by a narrow majority of sixteen; and the relief of Londonderry, and the immediate despatch of Schomberg at the head of a considerable body of troops to support the Protestant interest, tended to check the vehemence of the popular anger which was directed against him.
Late in August, the Parliament broke up till October, and all eyes were turned towards the fate of Schomberg's expedition. His troops consisted for the most part of raw recruits, scarcely able to discharge their firelocks. He could not venture to fight with such an army, but displayed great skill and determination in the manner in Misery of the English army in Ireland. which he overcame overwhelming difficulties; for, while encamped in the neighbourhood of Dundalk, treason was discovered in the camp of some French Protestant refugees, some regiments of which accompanied him. The refugees themselves were trustworthy, but a certain number of other foreigners had found their way into their regiments, and opened correspondence with the Irish. Sharp vengeance fell upon the chief conspirators. But a more terrible enemy than treason attacked the English troops. A deadly pestilence arose and carried them off by hundreds: their misery was unspeakable; the ties of morality and decorum were relaxed, the men got drunk sitting on the corpses of their dead comrades, and the horror of the time is well shown by the fact, that several ships lay in Carrickfergus Bay filled with carcases, and not a live man on board. The blame of the wretched condition of the army was traceable to the general maladministration which existed in the Government. The Chief Commissary was a man named Shales, who supplied the army with quite uneatable food, drew money largely for supplies which never reached the troops, and let out the troop horses, when collected, to English farmers. But it was not only in the army that this maladministration was visible. Admiral Herbert, now Lord Torrington, sunk in debauchery, allowed the same offences to be perpetrated in the navy. It would be unfair to lay this to the charge of William. The deeprooted mismanagement of the last twenty years rendered it almost impossible for him to introduce reforms with any rapidity, nor, with all the weight of foreign affairs on his hands, could he personally supervise every department. His own department was well and successfully managed, and the English troops abroad won some honour in a skirmish against the French at Walcourt.
Parliament meets. Oct. 19, 1689.
Still it was not to be expected that Parliament, on its reassembling, should be in a better temper than when it separated. It again renewed its violent courses. The necessary supplies were indeed voted; The Bill of Rights, by which the Declaration of Right was to be formed into a statute, and which in the last session had been thrown aside because the Lords wished to introduce the name of the Electress Sophia in the succession to the throne, was passed without that amendment; but besides this scarcely any other work was done. On the other hand, the Whig majority proceeded on their course of vengeance. The violence of the Whigs. The Earls of Salisbury and Peterborough, Sir Edward Hales and Obadiah Walker were impeached; a Committee to inquire into the death of Russell and Sidney, known as the Murder Committee, was appointed, and the attack upon Halifax renewed. At length the Whigs, conscious that the King was not well pleased with their vindictive temper, attempted to secure their own permanent supremacy in Parliament. They introduced a Corporation Bill, for restoring all the charters which had been forfeited in the reign of James; and to this, at the suggestion of Sacheverell and Howard, were appended two clauses, the one providing that all who had taken part in the surrender of the charters should be incapable of holding office for seven years, the other adding that all who, in spite of being thus incapacitated, presumed to hold office should be fined £500, and be debarred for life from public employment. These clauses, which would have in fact disfranchized the Tory party in every borough, they attempted to pass through the House by a surprise, when the greater part of the Tory party had returned home for The Tories throw out the Corporation Act. Christmas. But so violent and factious a measure called out all the energies of the Opposition. The country gentlemen came crowding back to town, and, after a violent debate, the Whigs were defeated by a small majority. The Tories thought to improve their triumph by reintroducing the Bill of Indemnity without the exceptions, but they quite overrated their strength. Their attempt was defeated by an enormous majority, and a Bill of Pains and Penalties incorporated with the Indemnity Act, which rendered it a mere measure of proscription. But this violent measure was not destined to pass the House. The fierce struggle of parties was so repugnant to the King, any attempt at firm national government appeared to him so hopeless, that, having William threatens to leave England. secretly arranged means of retiring to Holland, he sent for his ministers, and told them it was his intention to withdraw from England, leaving the Queen upon the throne. The threat stupefied the Whigs. To whatever excesses their passion may have led them, they felt that their safety was bound up with the prudent chief they had elected. A passionate scene ensued, in which the Tory Nottingham and the Whig Dissolves Parliament, Jan. 27, 1690, and undertakes Irish war. Shrewsbury vied with each other in intreating William to forego his plan. At length he yielded, but determined that he would escape from the atmosphere of faction which surrounded him, and himself go to carry on the war in Ireland. Having stated that such was his unalterable intention, he prorogued and dissolved the factious Parliament which he had been unable to bring to reason.
The dissolution brought with it a reaction. The Tories in the New Tory reaction in new Parliament. Parliament were as strong as the Whigs had lately been. Even London returned four opponents to the obnoxious clauses of the Corporation Act. As yet the theory of a ministry not having been established, there was no great change, yet the balance among the ministers was somewhat altered. Halifax withdrew from the Government; the Board of Treasury and the Board of Admiralty were both reconstituted, with a larger proportion of Tories, and Caermarthen attained such an amount of power as to make him virtually Prime Minister. Sir John Lowther Venality of Parliament. was put at the head of the