leader of a different stamp from these. In September 1715 six thousand
Highlanders joined him at Perth, but his cowardice or want of conduct
kept his army idle till the Duke of Argyle had gathered forces to meet
it in an indecisive engagement at Sheriffmuir. The Pretender, who
arrived too late for the action, proved a yet more sluggish and
incapable leader than Mar: and at the close of the year an advance of
six thousand men under General Carpenter drove James over-sea again and
dispersed the clans to their hills. In England the danger passed away
like a dream. The accession of the new king had been followed by some
outbreaks of riotous discontent; but at the talk of Highland risings
and French invasions Tories and Whigs alike rallied round the throne;
while the army, which had bitterly resented the interruption of its
victories by the treachery of St. John, and hailed with delight the
restoration of Marlborough to its command, went hotly for King George.
The suspension of the Habeas Corpus Act, and the arrest of their leader,
Sir William Wyndham, cowed the Jacobites; and not a man stirred in the
west when Ormond appeared off the coast of Devon and called on his party
to rise. Oxford alone, where the University was a hotbed of Jacobitism,
showed itself restless; and a few of the Catholic gentry rose in
Northumberland, under Lord Derwentwater and Mr. Forster. The arrival of
two thousand Highlanders who had been sent to join them by Mar spurred
these insurgents to march into Lancashire, where the Catholic party was
strongest; but they were soon cooped up in Preston, and driven to a
surrender.

[Sidenote: England and France.]

The Ministry availed itself of their triumph to gratify the
Nonconformists by a repeal of the Schism and Occasional Conformity Acts,
and to venture on a great constitutional change. Under the Triennial
Bill in William's reign the duration of a Parliament was limited to
three years. Now that the House of Commons however was become the ruling
power in the State, a change was absolutely required to secure
steadiness and fixity of political action; and in 1716 this necessity
coincided with the desire of the Whigs to maintain in power a thoroughly
Whig Parliament. The duration of Parliament was therefore extended to
seven years by the Septennial Bill. But while the Jacobite rising
produced these important changes at home, it brought about a yet more
momentous change in English policy abroad. The foresig