ing poisoned will be found below 4. The himself, pretending to be indisposed; which looked very odd." -The reader has now sufficient materials to form a judgment of this much controverted fact. The suspicions of his being poisoned are to be mentioned.]" There were very many apparent suspicions," says Burnet, " of his being poysoned: for though the first access looked like an apoplexy, yet it was plain in the progress of it that it was no apoplexy. When his body was opened, the physicians who viewed it were as it were led by those who might suspect the truth to look upon the parts that were certainly sound. But both Lower and Needham, two famous physicians, told me, they plainly discerned two or three blue spots on the outside of the stomach. Needham called twice to have it opened: but the surgeons seemed not to hear him. And when he moved it the second time, he, as he told me, heard Lower say to one that stood next him, Needham will undo us, calling thus to have the stomach opened; for he may see they will not do it. They were diverted to look to somewhat else: and when they returned to look upon the stomach, it was carried away: so that it was never viewed. Le Fevre, a French physician, told me, he saw a blackness in the shoulder: upon which he made an incision, and saw it was all mortified. Short, another physician, who was a papist, but after a form of his own, did very much suspect foul dealing: and he had talked more freely of it than any of the protestants durst do at that time. But he was not long after taken suddenly ill, upon a large draught of worin *Diary of Henry, Earl of Clarendon, at the end of his State Letters. impious, profligate manners, introduced or wood wine, which he had drunk in the house of a popish patient that lived near the Tower, who had sent for him, of which he died. And, as he said to Lower, Millington, and some other physicians, he believed that he himself was poisoned for his having spoken so freely of the kings death. The kings body was indecently neglected. Some parts of his inwards, and some pieces of the fat, were so carelessly looked after, that the water being poured out at a scullery hole that went to a drain, in the mouth of which a grate lay, these were seen lying on the grate many days after. His funeral was very mean. He did not lie in state: no mournings were given: and the expence of it was not equal to what an ordinary noblemans funeral will amount to. Many upon this said, that he deserv ed better from his brother than to be thus ungratefully treated in ceremonies that are public, and that make an impression on those who see them, and who will make severe observations and inferences upon such omissions. But since I have mentioned the suspicions of poison as the cause of his death; I must add, I never heard any lay those suspicions on his brother. But his dying so critically, as it were in the minute in which he seemed to begin a turn of affairs, made it to be generally the more believed, and that the papists had done it, either by the means of some of lady Portsmouths servants, or, as some fancied, by poisoned snuff: for so many of the small veins of the brain were burst, that the brain was in great disorder, and no judgment could be made concerning it. To this I shall add a very surprising story, that I had, in November, 1709, from Mr. Henly of Hampshire. He told me, that when the duchess of Portsmouth came over a to England, in the year 1699, he heard, that she had talked as if king Charles had been poisoned: which he desiring to have from her own mouth, she gave this account of it:-She was always pressing the king to make both himself and his people easy, and to come to a full agreement with his parliament; and he was come to a final resolution of sending away his brother and of calling a parliament, which was to be executed the next day after he fell into that fit of which he died. She was put upon the secret, and spoke of it to no person alive but to her confessor; but the confessor, she believed, told it to some, who, seeing what was to follow, took that wicked course to prevent it."--It ap pears, indeed, by some passages out of the duke of Monmouth's pocket-book, that he had assurances of being taken into favour, and of the duke of York's removal from court. However, we are to observe, that all the circumstances attending the death of Charles, and what happened on the inspection of his body, are far enough from amounting to a proof of his being poisoned: for, notwithstanding all of them, he might die merely through disease: at least this is Dr. Welwood's opinion. It must not be omitted, that the part of Burnet's narrative, which he received from Mr. Henly, galled the late lord Lansdown; an able determined friend, as far as he dared, to the Stuart family; so much, as to make him speak of the bishop in terms very indelicate." The bishops hear-says," he observes, "are, in most cases, very doubtful. His history is little else but such-a-one told such-a-one, and such-a-one told me. This sort of testimony," continues he, "is allowed in no case; nor can the least a Burnet, vol. I. p. 609; and Sheffield's Works, vol. II. p. 60. certainty be built upon stories handed about from one to another, which must necessarily alter in the several repetitions by different persons. I shall then conclude with one observation only upon the most important hear-say in his whole book, upon which the credit of the rest may depend. His lordship had it from Mr. Henly, who had it from the duchess of Portsmouth, that king Charles the Second was poisoned. It was my fortune to be residing at Paris when this history was published. Such a particular was too remarkable not to raise my curiosity. The duchess was then likewise at Paris. I employed a person, who had the honour to be intimate with her grace, to enquire from her own mouth into the truth of this passage. Her reply was this: That she recollected no acquaintance with Mr. Henly; but she remembered well Dr. Burnet and his character. That the king and the duke, and the whole court, looked upon him as the greatest lyar upon the face of the earth; and there was no believing one word that he said. I only repeat the answer I receiv→ ed: far be it from me to make any such reflexion." This very courtly language of the lady's was intended by his lordship as a full answer to the bishop's hearsay. What sort of an answer it is, appears from the remarks made on it by a very sensible writer, to whom his lordship had the wit to make no reply."When an historian," says he, "whose book was in the hands of all mankind, had charged her grace with having said to others, as well as Mr. Henly, that she believed king Charles was poisoned; and this fact was designedly enquired into, in order to falsify the historian; was it possible to have it more strongly established? Does her grace even pretend to deny, that she • Lansdown's Works, vol. II. p. 177. countenanced by him, will, for ever, mark his reign with infamy". believed king Charles was poisoned? Does she affirm (which if the thing was false she might safely have done) that she never told any person that the king was poisoned? Nay, does she so much as take upon her to say, that she never gave Mr. Henly such an account? These might have been offered as contradictions to the bishops hearsay; but, surely, the bare not recollecting an acquaintance with Mr. Henly, is none. It was not necessary he should have such an acquaintance in order to enquire into the truth of a story, of which the duchess of Portsmouth was reported the author: the meeting her grace in a visit, at a third place, was a sufficient opportunity for putting such a question to her. As to the character she gave of Dr. Burnet, as from the king and the duke (were there no objection to her grace's testimony), princes are so seldom acquainted with the real characters of men who are odious to their ministers; and when they are incensed against a man, are apt to indulge themselves in such liberties, that, I believe, their calling Dr. Burnet a lyar, will be understood, by men of sense, to import no more, than that he had spoken truths to them which they were no ways inclined to believe or hear. One of these, mentioned in the history, was so contrary to the duchess's interest, that it may, possibly, have given her a prejudice against the bishop."These reflexions, in my opinion, are very judicious. "The impious profligate manners, introduced or countenanced by him, will mark his reign with infamy.] Few courts have been free from vice. The 'Remarks on Lansdown's Letter, p. 19. |