clemency of the
conqueror. Persons deeply implicated in the illegal transactions of the
late reign not only walked the streets in safety, but offered themselves
as candidates for seats in the Convention. Mulgrave was received not
ungraciously at St. James's. Feversham was released from arrest, and was
permitted to resume the only office for which he was qualified, that of
keeping the bank at the Queen Dowager's basset table. But no body of men
had so much reason to feel grateful to William as the Roman Catholics.
It would not have been safe to rescind formally the severe resolutions
which the Peers had passed against the professors of a religion
generally abhorred by the nation: but, by the prudence and humanity of
the Prince, those resolutions were practically annulled. On his line of
march from Torbay to London, he had given orders that no outrage should
be committed on the persons or dwellings of Papists. He now renewed
those orders, and directed Burnet to see that they were strictly obeyed.
A better choice could not have been made; for Burnet was a man of such
generosity and good nature, that his heart always warmed towards
the unhappy; and at the same time his known hatred of Popery was a
sufficient guarantee to the most zealous Protestants that the interests
of their religion would be safe in his hands. He listened kindly to
the complaints of the Roman Catholics, procured passports for those
who wished to go beyond sea, and went himself to Newgate to visit the
prelates who were imprisoned there. He ordered them to be removed to
a more commodious apartment and supplied with every indulgence. He
solemnly assured them that not a hair of their heads should be touched,
and that, as soon as the Prince could venture to act as he wished,
they should be set at liberty. The Spanish minister reported to his
government, and, through his government, to the Pope, that no Catholic
need feel any scruple of conscience on account of the late revolution
in England, that for the danger to which the members of the true Church
were exposed James alone was responsible, and that William alone had
saved them from a sanguinary persecution. [622]

There was, therefore, little alloy to the satisfaction with which the
princes of the House of Austria and the Sovereign Pontiff learned that
the long vassalage of England was at an end. When it was known at Madrid
that William was in the full career of success, a single voice in the
Spanish Counc