might be remarked in him the most odious vice which is incident to human nature, a delight in misery merely as misery. There was a fiendish exultation in the way in which he pronounced sentence on offenders. Their weeping and imploring seemed to titillate him voluptuously; and he loved to scare them into fits by dilating with luxuriant amplification on all the details of what they were to suffer. Thus, when he had an opportunity of ordering an unlucky adventuress to be whipped at the cart's tail, "Hangman," he would exclaim, "I charge you to pay particular attention to this lady! Scourge her soundly, man! Scourge her till the blood runs down! It is Christmas; a cold time for madam to strip in! See that you warm her shoulders thoroughly!"* He was hardly less facetious when he passed judgment on Ludowick Muggleton, the drunken tailor who fancied himself a prophet. "Impudent rogue!" roared Jeffreys, "thou shalt have an easy, easy, easy punishment!" One part of this easy punishment was the pillory, in which the wretched fanatic was almost killed with brickbats.†

By this time the nature of Jeffreys had been hardened to that temper which tyrants require in their worst implements. He had hitherto looked for professional adHe had therevancement to the corporation of London.

fore professed himself a Roundhead, and had always appeared to be in a higher state of exhilaration when he explained to popish priests that they were to be cut down alive, and were to see their own bodies burned, than when he passed ordinary sentences of death. But, as soon as he had got all that the city could give, he made haste to sell his forehead of brass and his tongue of venom to the court. Chiffinch, who was accustomed to act as broker in infamous contracts of more than one kind, lent his aid.

* Christmas Sessions Paper of 1678.

In this

The Acts of the Witnesses of the Spirit, Part v., chapter v. work, Ludowick, after his fashion, revenges himself on the "bawling devil," as he calls Jeffreys, by a string of curses which Ernulphus might have envied. The trial was in January, 1677

He had conducted many amorous and many political intrigues, but he assuredly never rendered a more scandalous service to his masters than when he introduced Jeffreys to Whitehall. The renegade soon found a patron in the obdurate and revengeful James, but was always regarded with scorn and disgust by Charles, whose faults, great as they were, had no affinity with insolence and cruelty. "That man," said the king, "has no learning, no sense, no manners, and more impudence than ten carted street-walkers."* Work was to be done, however, which could be trusted to no man who reverenced law or was sensible of shame; and thus Jeffreys, at an age at which a barrister thinks himself fortunate if he is employed to lead an important cause, was made Chief Justice of the King's Bench.

His enemies could not deny that he possessed some of the qualities of a great judge. His legal knowledge, indeed, was merely such as he had picked up in practice of no very high kind; but he had one of those happily-constituted intellects which, across labyrinths of sophistry and through masses of immaterial facts, go straight to the true point. Of his intellect, however, he seldom had the full use. Even in civil causes his malevolent and despotic temper perpetually disordered his judgment. To enter his court was to enter the den of a wild beast, which none could tame, and which was as likely to be roused to rage by caresses as by attacks. He frequently poured forth on plaintiffs and defendants, barristers and attorneys, witnesses and jurymen, torrents of frantic abuse, intermixed with oaths and curses. His looks and tones had inspired terror when he was merely a young advocate struggling into practice. Now that he was at the head of the most formidable tribunal in the realm, there were few indeed who did not tremble before him. Even when he was sober, his violence was sufficiently frightful; but, in general, his reason was overclouded, and his evil pas

This saying is to be found in many cotemporary pamphlets. Titus Oates was never tired of quoting it.—See his Elkov ẞaoiλikǹ.

His even

sions stimulated by the fumes of intoxication. ings were ordinarily given to revelry. People who saw him only over his bottle would have supposed him to be a man gross indeed, sottish, and addicted to low company and low merriment, but social and good-humored. He was constantly surrounded on such occasions by buffoons, selected, for the most part, from among the vilest pettifoggers who practiced before him. These men bantered and abused each other for his entertainment. He joined in their ribald talk, sang catches with them, and, when his head grew hot, hugged and kissed them in an ecstasy of drunken fondness. But, though wine at first seemed to soften his heart, the effect a few hours later was very different. He often came to the judgment seat, having kept the court waiting long, and yet having but half slept off his debauch, his cheeks on fire, his eyes staring like those of a maniac. When he was in this state, his boon companions of the preceding night, if they were wise, kept out of his way, for the recollection of the familiarity to which he had admitted them inflamed his malignity, and he was sure to take every opportunity of overwhelming them with execration and invective. Not the least odious of his many odious peculiarities was the pleasure which he took in publicly browbeating and mortifying those whom, in his fits of maudlin tenderness, he had encouraged to presume on his favor.

The services which the government had expected from him were performed, not merely without flinching, but eagerly and triumphantly. His first exploit was the judicial murder of Algernon Sidney. What followed was in perfect harmony with this beginning. Respectable Tories lamented the disgrace which the barbarity and indecency of so great a functionary brought upon the administration of justice; but the excesses which filled such men with horror were titles to the esteem of James. Jeffreys, therefore, after the death of Charles, obtained a seat in the cabinet and a peerage. This last honor was a signal mark of royal approbation; for, since the judicial

system of the realm had been remodeled in the thir teenth century, no chief justice had been a lord of Parliament.*

Guildford now found himself superseded in all his political functions, and restricted to his business as a judge in equity. At council he was treated by Jeffreys with marked incivility. The whole legal patronage was in the hands of the chief justice; and it was well known by the bar that the surest way to propitiate the chief justice was to treat the lord keeper with disrespect.

James had not been many hours king when a dispute arose between the two heads of the law. The customs had been settled on Charles only for life, and could not, therefore, be legally exacted by the new sovereign. Some weeks must elapse before a House of Commons could be chosen. If, in the mean time, the duties were suspended, the revenue would suffer; the regular course of trade would be interrupted; the consumer would derive no benefit; and the only gainers would be those fortunate speculators whose cargoes might happen to arrive during the interval between the demise of the crown and the meeting of the Parliament. The Treasury was besieged by merchants whose warehouses were filled with goods on which duty had been paid, and who were in grievous apprehension of being undersold and ruined. Impartial men must admit that this was one of those cases in which a government may be justified in deviating from the strictly constitutional course; but, when it is necessary to deviate from the strictly constitutional course, the deviation clearly ought to be no greater than the necessity requires. Guildford felt this, and gave advice which did him honor.

He

*The chief sources of information concerning Jeffreys are the State Trials and North's Life of Lord Guildford. Some touches of minor importance I owe to cotemporary pamphlets in verse and prose. Such are the Bloody Assizes, the Life and Death of George Lord Jeffreys, the Panegyric on the late Lord Jeffreys, the letter to the Lord Chancellor, Jeffreys's Elegy See, also, Evelyn's Diary, Dec. 5, 1683, Oct. 31, 1685. I scarcely need advise every reader to consult Lord Campbell's excellent book.

proposed that the duties should be levied, but should be kept in the Exchequer apart from other sums till the Parliament should meet. In this way the king, while violating the letter of the laws, would show that he wished to conform to their spirit. Jeffreys gave very different counsel. He advised James to put forth an edict declaring it to be his majesty's will and pleasure that the customs should continue to be paid. This advice was well suited to the king's temper. The judicious proposition of the lord keeper was rejected as worthy only of a Whig, or of what was still worse, a Trimmer. A proclamation, such as the chief justice had suggested, appeared. Some people expected that a violent outbreak of public indignation would be the consequence; but they were deceived. The spirit of opposition had not yet revived; and the court might safely venture to take steps which, five years before, would have produced a rebellion. In the city of London, lately so turbulent, scarcely a murmur was heard.*

The proclamation which announced that the customs would still be levied, announced also that a Parliament would shortly meet. It was not without many misgiv-. ings that James had determined to call the estates of his realm together. The moment was, indeed, most auspicious for a general election. Never since the accession of the house of Stuart had the constituent bodies been so favorably disposed toward the court. But the new sovereign's mind was haunted by an apprehension not to be mentioned, even at this distance of time, without shame and indignation. He was afraid that by summoning the Parliament of England he might incur the displeasure of the King of France.

To the King of France it mattered little which of the two English parties triumphed at the elections; for all the Parliaments which had met since the Restoration, whatever might have been their temper as to domestic politics, had been jealous of the growing power of the house of Bourbon. On this subject there was little difference be

* London Gazette, Feb. 12, 168; North's Life of Guildford, 254.