and all through King William's life, 'tis
known there were constant intrigues for the restoration of the exiled
family; but if my Lord Castlewood took any share of these, as is probable,
'twas only for a short time, and when Harry Esmond was too young to be
introduced into such important secrets.

But in the year 1695, when that conspiracy of Sir John Fenwick, Colonel
Lowick, and others, was set on foot, for waylaying King William as he came
from Hampton Court to London, and a secret plot was formed, in which a
vast number of the nobility and people of honour were engaged; Father Holt
appeared at Castlewood, and brought a young friend with him, a gentleman
whom 'twas easy to see that both my lord and the father treated with
uncommon deference. Harry Esmond saw this gentleman, and knew and
recognized him in after-life, as shall be shown in its place; and he has
little doubt now that my lord viscount was implicated somewhat in the
transactions which always kept Father Holt employed and travelling hither
and thither under a dozen of different names and disguises. The father's
companion went by the name of Captain James; and it was under a very
different name and appearance that Harry Esmond afterwards saw him.

It was the next year that the Fenwick conspiracy blew up, which is a
matter of public history now, and which ended in the execution of Sir John
and many more, who suffered manfully for their treason, and who were
attended to Tyburn by my lady's father, Dean Armstrong, Mr. Collier, and
other stout nonjuring clergymen, who absolved them at the gallows' foot.

'Tis known that when Sir John was apprehended, discovery was made of a
great number of names of gentlemen engaged in the conspiracy; when, with a
noble wisdom and clemency, the prince burned the list of conspirators
furnished to him, and said he would know no more. Now it was, after this,
that Lord Castlewood swore his great oath, that he would never, so help
him Heaven, be engaged in any transaction against that brave and merciful
man; and so he told Holt when the indefatigable priest visited him, and
would have had him engage in a farther conspiracy. After this my lord ever
spoke of King William as he was--as one of the wisest, the bravest, and the
greatest of men. My Lady Esmond (for her part) said she could never pardon
the king, first, for ousting his father-in-law from his throne, and
secondly, for not being constant to his wife, the Princess Mary. Indeed,