ot,
after a trial by drum-head court-martial. Some of the prisoners of
higher rank were brought into London in a manner like that of captives
dragged along in an old Roman triumph, or like that of actual convicts
taken to Tyburn. They were marched in procession from Highgate through
London, each man sitting on a horse, having his arms tied with cords
behind his back, the horses led by soldiers, with a military escort
drumming and fifing a march of triumph. The men of noble rank were
confined in the Tower; others, many of them men of position, such as Mr.
Thomas Forster, a Northumberland gentleman, and member for his county,
were thrust into Newgate, whose horrors have been so well described in
Scott's "Rob Roy." The Rev. Robert Patten, who had been a conspicuous
Jacobite, played a Titus Oates part in betraying his companions, and his
name figures for King's evidence incessantly in the political trials.
When he tired of treachery he retired to the obscurity of his parish of
Allendale, in Northumberland, and gave the world his history of the
rebellion in which he had played so base a part.

Among the chief prisoners were Lord Widdrington, the Earl of Nithisdale,
the Earl of Wintoun, the Earl of Carnwath, the Earl of Derwentwater,
Viscount Kenmure, and Lord Nairn. These noblemen were impeached before
the House of Lords, and all, except Lord Wintoun, pleaded guilty, and
prayed for the mercy of the King. Every effort was made to obtain a
pardon for some of the condemned noblemen. Women of rank and beauty
implored the King's mercy. Audacious attempts were made to bribe the
ministers. Some eminent members of the Whig party in the House of
Commons spoke up manfully and courageously in favor of a policy of mercy.
It is something pleasant to recollect that Sir Richard Steele, who had
got into Parliament again, was conspicuous among these. In the House of
Lords the friends of the condemned men succeeded in carrying, despite the
strong {138} resistance of the Government, a motion for an address to the
King, beseeching him to extend mercy to the noblemen in prison. Walpole
himself had spoken very harshly in the House of Commons, and condemned in
unmeasured terms those of his party--the Whig party--who could be so
unworthy as, without blushing, to open their mouths in favor of rebels
and parricides, and he had carried an adjournment of the House of Commons
from the 22d of February to the 1st of March, in order to prevent an