have been ruinous; and Lewis was eager to avert this danger by
promising Charles a subsidy should the Parliament strive to force on him
a war policy by refusing or limiting supplies. Charles, who still looked
to France for aid in his plans and who believed war would deliver him
helplessly into the power of the Parliament, was as ready to accept the
money as Lewis to give it. At this juncture therefore he called on Danby
to sign a treaty by which, on consideration of a yearly pension
guaranteed on the part of France, the two sovereigns bound themselves to
enter into no engagements with other powers, and to lend each other aid
in case of rebellion in their dominions. Such a treaty not only bound
England to dependence on France, but freed the king from all
Parliamentary control. But his minister pleaded in vain for delay and
for the advice of the Council. Charles answered his entreaties by
signing the treaty with his own hand.

[Sidenote: Danby's measures.]

Danby found himself duped by the king as Shaftesbury had found himself
duped; but his bold temper was only spurred to fresh plans for rescuing
the king from his bondage to Lewis. To do this the first step was fully
to reconcile the king and the Parliament, which met again in February
1677 after a prorogation of fifteen months. The Country party stood in
the way of such a reconciliation, but Danby resolved to break its
strength by measures of unscrupulous vigour for which a blunder of
Shaftesbury's gave an opportunity. Shaftesbury despaired of bringing the
House of Commons, elected as it had been fifteen years before in a
moment of religious and political reaction, to any steady opposition to
the Crown. He had already moved an address for its dissolution; and he
now urged that as a statute of Edward the Third ordained that
Parliaments should be held "once a year or oftener if need be" the
Parliament by the recent prorogation of a year and a half had ceased
legally to exist. The Triennial Act deprived such an argument of any
force, and its only effect was to place the Country party in an
injudicious position of general hostility to the existing Parliament.
But Danby represented it as a contempt of the House, and the Lords at
his bidding committed its supporters, Shaftesbury, Buckingham,
Salisbury, and Wharton, to the Tower. While the Opposition cowered under
the blow Danby pushed on a measure which was designed to win back
alarmed Churchmen to confidence in the Crown.