the press. But many passages are
written with an art and a vigour which assuredly did not belong to him.
Those who judge by internal evidence may perhaps think that, in some
parts of this remarkable tract, they can discern the last gleam of the
malignant genius of Montgomery. A few weeks after the appearance of the
Letter he sank, unhonoured and unlamented, into the grave. [541]

There were then no printed newspapers except the London Gazette.
But since the Revolution the newsletter had become a more important
political engine than it had previously been. The newsletters of one
writer named Dyer were widely circulated in manuscript. He affected to
be a Tory and a High Churchman, and was consequently regarded by the
foxhunting lords of manors, all over the kingdom, as an oracle. He had
already been twice in prison; but his gains had more than compensated
for his sufferings, and he still persisted in seasoning his intelligence
to suit the taste of the country gentlemen. He now turned the Lancashire
plot into ridicule, declared that the guns which had been found were old
fowling pieces, that the saddles were meant only for hunting, and that
the swords were rusty reliques of Edge Hill and Marston Moor. [542] The
effect produced by all this invective and sarcasm on the public mind
seems to have been great. Even at the Dutch Embassy, where assuredly
there was no leaning towards Jacobitism, there was a strong impression
that it would be unwise to bring the prisoners to trial. In Lancashire
and Cheshire the prevailing sentiments were pity for the accused and
hatred of the prosecutors. The government however persevered. In October
four Judges went down to Manchester. At present the population of that
town is made up of persons born in every part of the British Isles, and
consequently has no especial sympathy with the landowners, the farmers
and the agricultural labourers of the neighbouring districts. But in
the seventeenth century the Manchester man was a Lancashire man. His
politics were those of his county. For the old Cavalier families of his
county he felt a great respect; and he was furious when he thought that
some of the best blood of his county was about to be shed by a knot
of Roundhead pettifoggers from London. Multitudes of people from the
neighbouring villages filled the streets of the town, and saw with grief
and indignation the array of drawn swords and loaded carbines which
surrounded the culprits. Aaron Smith's a