r it was no
less,--which began about the close of 1693, and was completed about the
close of 1696. But every body could perceive that, at the close of
1693, the chief offices in the government were distributed not unequally
between the two great parties, that the men who held those offices were
perpetually caballing against each other, haranguing against each
other, moving votes of censure on each other, exhibiting articles of
impeachment against each other, and that the temper of the House of
Commons was wild, ungovernable and uncertain. Everybody could perceive
that at the close of 1696, all the principal servants of the Crown were
Whigs, closely bound together by public and private ties, and prompt to
defend one another against every attack, and that the majority of the
House of Commons was arrayed in good order under those leaders, and had
learned to move, like one man, at the word of command. The history
of the period of transition and of the steps by which the change was
effected is in a high degree curious and interesting.

The statesman who had the chief share in forming the first English
Ministry had once been but too well known, but had long hidden himself
from the public gaze, and had but recently emerged from the obscurity
in which it had been expected that he would pass the remains of an
ignominious and disastrous life. During that period of general terror
and confusion which followed the flight of James, Sunderland had
disappeared. It was high time; for of all the agents of the fallen
government he was, with the single exception of Jeffreys, the most
odious to the nation. Few knew that Sunderland's voice had in secret
been given against the spoliation of Magdalene College and the
prosecution of the Bishops; but all knew that he had signed numerous
instruments dispensing with statutes, that he had sate in the High
Commission, that he had turned or pretended to turn Papist, that he had,
a few days after his apostasy, appeared in Westminster Hall as a witness
against the oppressed fathers of the Church. He had indeed atoned for
many crimes by one crime baser than all the rest. As soon as he had
reason to believe that the day of deliverance and retribution was at
hand, he had, by a most dexterous and seasonable treason, earned his
pardon. During the three months which preceded the arrival of the Dutch
armament in Torbay, he had rendered to the cause of liberty and of the
Protestant religion services of which i