nd secret from everybody but Sunderland.
The public indignation at this new violation of the law was clamorously
expressed; and it was remarked that the Roman Catholics were even louder
in censure than the Protestants. The vain and ambitious Jesuit was now
charged with the business of destroying and reconstructing half
the constituent bodies in the kingdom. Under the committee of Privy
Councillors a subcommittee consisting of bustling agents less eminent in
rank was entrusted with the management of details. Local subcommittees
of regulators all over the country corresponded with the central board
at Westminster. [312]

The persons on whom James chiefly relied for assistance in his new and
arduous enterprise were the Lords Lieutenants. Every Lord Lieutenant
received written orders directing him to go down immediately into his
county. There he was to summon before him all his deputies, and all the
justices of the Peace, and to put to them a series of interrogatories
framed for the purpose of ascertaining how they would act at a general
election. He was to take down the answers in writing, and to transmit
them to the government. He was to furnish a list of such Roman
Catholics, and such Protestant Dissenters, as might be best qualified
for the bench and for commands in the militia. He was also to examine
into the state of all the boroughs in his county, and to make such
reports as might be necessary to guide the operations of the board of
regulators. It was intimated to him that he must himself perform these
duties, and that he could not be permitted to delegate them to any other
person. [313]

The first effect produced by these orders would have at once sobered a
prince less infatuated than James. Half the Lords Lieutenants of England
peremptorily refused to stoop to the odious service which was required
of them. They were immediately dismissed. All those who incurred this
glorious disgrace were peers of high consideration; and all had hitherto
been regarded as firm supporters of monarchy. Some names in the list
deserve especial notice.

The noblest subject in England, and indeed, as Englishmen loved to say,
the noblest subject in Europe, was Aubrey de Vere, twentieth and last of
the old Earls of Oxford. He derived his title through an uninterrupted
male descent from a time when the families of Howard and Seymour were
still obscure, when the Nevilles and Percies enjoyed only a provincial
celebrity, and when even the gr