by making worsted stockings and other articles in wool, and that one thousand todds of wool are the least quantity necessary to keep them at work, which quantity being equally divided among the number of persons mentioned, only gives four pounds and a-half to each individual in a year; we humbly pray your highness that you may be pleased, out of your favour, to grant to the poor inhabitants of your said isle, the same indulgence and grace already bestowed on the inhabitants of Jersey, by the very noble father of your highness, of happy memory, for the sake of the cordial affection they bear to your highness. And according to their duty, they will pray God to continue his benediction on the person, posterity, and government of your highness."

To Charles II., immediately on his succession, an address, in which there is a conspicuous absence of the spirit which had been so lately displayed. But this was, to a great extent, the case with the whole English nation. The following passages, however, can scarcely be read with pleasure by any one:

"At the court of Whitehall, the 18th of August, 1660; present, the king's most excellent majesty in council.

"Upon reading the petition of Amias Andros, of Saumarez, bailiff of the island

of Guernsey, and Nathaniel Darell, both of them his majesty's servants, and deputies of the island of Guernsey, on behalf of the inhabitants of the said island. humbly acknowledging their great guilt and unfeigned grief of heart, for having, since the disorders these many years past, submitted to the usurping powers (which at last tyrannized over his majesty's subjects,) and quitted their duties of obedience to their native sovereign, for which great crimes, imploring his majesty's gracious pardon; it is ordered by this board (his majesty being present) that Mr. Attorney-General do forthwith draw up, in due manner, a full and effectual pardon for all the inhabitants of the said island of Guernsey; the said pardon to prove i in the accustomed manner to pass the great seal of England, so to remain as a monument of his majesty's most royal clemency to all in the said pardon. Tha Sir Henry Devic, knight and baronet, Mr. Amias Andros, of Saumarez, bailiff the said island, Edmond Andros, son of the said Amias, Charles Andros, brother of the said Amias, and Nathaniel Darell, have, to their great honour, during th late rebellion, continued inviolably faithful to his majesty, and consequently har no need to be included in this general pardon."

Again,

"Your majesty's most gracious letters, brought unto us by Colonel Jonath Atkyns, your majesty's commissioner in this, your poor island of Guernsey, have so revived the drooping and dejected spirits of the magistrates and people in ♬ and have had such an influence upon the hearts and hands of all of them, that = could wish your majesty were informed of the fruits of your own labours, arð with what joy, what alacrity we received them,-what blessings, what acclamations of joy and gratitude there were expressed in all places after the reading of thes for your majesty's long life and prosperous reign, with blessings upon all y ** majesty's undertakings, certainly great. As condemned persons, unexpected! hearing that joyful acclamation of pardon and liberty, cast off all remembra of past miseries; so this jurisdiction, your majesty's most humble and faithf subjects and servants, with the rest of the inhabitants, hearing and seeing bey : expectation those gracious promises of encouragement under your majesty's our hand, and seconded from your own mouth by that worthy gentleman whom yo majesty has been pleased to entrust with the government of this island, as also the assurance we had before of it by that worthy gentleman, Captain Sheldon, yo majesty's deputy-governor, all this has wrought such a change in us all, wher reflect on our past conduct, that we can never sufficiently admire and acknowledg your majesty's incomparable goodness and mercy towards us, for which we bas God and your majesty, devoting ourselves, our services, the remainder of our po estates, and all that is near and dear to us for the advancement of your majesty's service in general, or for the defence of this poor island, part of the remains

your ancient duchy of Normandy which (with God's blessing, and under the conduct of those gallant gentlemen your majesty has been pleased lately to send to command over us) we will defend and secure against all attempts whatsoever; so prostrating ourselves at your majesty's feet with all humility, we subscribe ourselves, &c., &c."

In fact, it is clear that, during the whole decennium, internal faction ran high in Guernsey; and that, when we turn our attention from the nobler transactions between the two primary parties to the details of individual biography, we find both intestine dissension and constitutional disturbance.

In the Restoration, we get a decided historical landmark: for the reign of Charles II. was marked by no events of importance. As in Great Britain in general, the material interests of the country flourished: and, though Jersey had more especially favoured the royal cause, and, on two occasions, served as a refuge to the king, Guernsey, where his cause had been opposed, met with equal favour. The explanation of the decided difference of political feeling, as shown by the two islands, is impossible for an English, and difficult for a native, historian. Probably, if, at the beginning of the civil war, the votes of the two islands could have been polled, there was much greater equality than was shown by the events of the subsequent history. That there was a party in Jersey hostile to Sir George Carteret at least is shown by the complaint against him; a complaint laid before the London, not before the Oxford, parliament. That there was a royalist party in Guernsey is shown in more than one

narrative.

The personal influence of individuals seems, to an unbiassed looker-on, to have had much to do with the turn matters took. Sir George Carteret was a Jerseyman, and one of a powerful Jersey family. The parliamentarian feeling of the Guernseymen seems to have been determined by the Carys, De Beauvoirs, and similar influential families. Deeper reasons than this may easily be; but they are not very visible ones.

A second visit of Charles to Jersey has been alluded to. took place two years after the first. The details of it are more obscure than those of the first; and they were less important. That that island deserved well of the king, and his party, is beyond doubt. There were few other places where he could have been equally safe. In Holland he would have been under the watchful eye of the prince of Orange: in France, there is more than sufficient evidence to show that Mazarin, at least, was capable of intriguing with the parliament.

During the short reign of James II., little that affected any of the islands took place. That the will on the part of the king to make proselytes to his own religion, under the plea of toleration, was by no means wanting, is clear. The governors were Roman Catholics, and the majority of the soldiers the same. Mass was performed. The organization of the troops was improved. What might have happened had the reign been prolonged is a matter of speculation. As soon as it was heard that the Prince of Orange had landed at Torbay, the authorities acted with laudable promptitude, and anticipated anything that might have been expected from the partizans of James. With the accession, however, of William III., a new division in the history of the islands begins.

A rough measure of their industry is got from a grant made by James of wool for the manufacture of stockings. To Jersey, four thousand; to Guernsey, two thousand; to Alderney, four hundred; and to Sark, two hundred tods of wool a year were allowed. They were to be shipped from Southampton. The difference between the two allowances suggests the difference, in respect to one manufacture at least, between Jersey and Guernsey.

CHAPTER XVII.

MODERN HISTORY-FROM THE ACCESSION OF

WILLIAM III. TO THE PRESENT TIME.

THE first four years of the reign of William III. were years of anxiety and watchfulness to the islanders rather than danger or distress. There was in every island a Jacobite minority, though a small one. There was the notion afloat that, for French support, the first price that would be asked would be cession of the islands. More than this, the French navy was never in a more effective state than at this time; and one of the ablest of the French admirals, Tourville, was in command of it. On the side of England, there was only Torrington, eminent for his incompetence, to oppose him. The result was the French victory off Beachy Head, and the peril to the very soil of England that followed it. The great victory, however, of La Hogue, in the following year, brought security, and with it went out the last sparks of Jacobitism.

The great event of William's reign, so far as the islands are concerned, belongs to commercial rather than to political history, -the abolition of the privilege of neutrality. When it began