276

mSTOBY or ENGLAND.

CHAP.

XV.

1G!I0.

covered the spots where the palaces and churches of Heidel-berg and Manheim had once stood. The parsonage over-shadowed by the old steeple, the farmhouse peeping fromamong beehives and appleblossoms, the manorial hall em-bosomed in elms, would be given up to a soldiery which knewnot what it was to pity old men or delicate women or suckingchildren. The words, “The French are coming,” like a spell,quelled at once all murmurs about taxes and abuses, aboutWilliam’s ungracious manners and Portland’s lucrative places,and raised a spirit as high and unconquerable as had pervaded,a hundred years before, the ranks which Elizabeth reviewed atTilbury. Had the army of Humieres landed, it would assuredlyhave been withstood by almost every male capable of bearingarms. Not only the muskets and pikes but the scythes andpitchforks would have been too few for the hundreds of thou-sands who, forgetting all distinction of sect or faction, wouldhave risen up like one man to defend the English soil.

The immediate effect therefore of the disasters in theChannel and in Flanders was to unite for a moment the greatbody of the people. The national antipathy to the Hutchseemed to be suspended. Their gallant conduct in the fightoff Beachy Head was loudly applauded. The inaction of Tor-rington was loudly condemned. London set the example ofconcert and of exertion. The irritation produced by the lateelection at once subsided. All distinctions of party disappeared.The Lord Mayor was summoned to attend the Queen. Sherequested him to ascertain as soon as possible what the capitalwould undertake to do if the enemy should venture to make adescent. He called together the representatives of the wards,conferred with them, and returned to Whitehall to report thatthey had unanimously bound themselves to stand by thegovernment with life and fortune; that a hundred thousandpounds were ready to be paid into the Exchequer; that ten