S479), who was especially hated by the King
on account of his support of that Exclusion Bill (S478) which was
intended to shut James out from the throne. On the same day on which
Cornish was executed, Jeffreys also had the satisfaction of knowing
that Elizabeth Gaunt was burned alive at Tyburn, London, for having
assisted one of the Rye-House conspirators, who had fought for
Monmouth at Sedgemoor, to escape.

488. The King makes Further Attempts to reestablish Catholicism;
Second Declaration of Indulgence (1687); Oxford.

An event occurred about this time which encouraged James to make a
more decided attempt to restore Catholicism. Henry IV of France had
granted the Protestants of his kingdom liberty of worship, by the
Edict of Nantes (1598). Louis XIV deliberately revoked it (1685). By
that shortsighted act the Huguenots, or French Protestants, were
exposed to cruel persecution, and thousands of them fled to England
and America.

James, who, like his late brother Charles II, was "the pensioned slave
of the French King" (S476), resolved to profit by the example set him
by Louis. He did not expect to drive the Protestants out of Great
Britain as Louis had driven them from France, but he hoped to restore
the country to its allegiance to Rome (SS370, 382, 477). He began by
suspending the Test Act (S477) and putting Catholics into important
offices in both Church and State.[1] He furthermore established an
army of 13,000 men on Hounslow Heath, just outside London (1686), to
hold the city in subjection in case it should rebel.

[1] The Dispensing Power and the Suspending Power were prerogatives by
which the King claimed the right of preventing the enforcement of such
laws as he deemed contrary to public good. A packed bench of judges
sustained the King in this position, but the power so to act was
finally abolished by the Bill of Rights (1689). See S497 and top of
page xxxii, Article XII.

He next recalled the Protestant Duke of Ormonde, governor of Ireland,
and put in his place Talbot, Earl of Tyrconnel, a Catholic. Tyrconnel
had orders to recruit an Irish Roman Catholic army to aid the King in
carrying out his designs (1687). He raised some soldiers, but he also
raised that famous song of "Lilli Burlero," by which, as its author
boasted, James was eventually "sung out of his kingdom."[2]

[2] Lord Wharton, a prominent English Whig (S479), was the author of
this satirical political ballad, which, it is sai