Portsmouth, it was said, was to be put into the hands of that ambitious monarch: England was to be filled with French and Irish troops: and every man who refused to embrace the Romish superstition, was by these bigoted princes devoted to certain destruction.
* That there really was no new alliance formed betwixt France and England, appears both, from Sunderland's Apology, and from D'Avaux's Negotiations, lately published: see vol.
iv.p.18.Eng translation, 27th of September, 1687; 16th of March, 6th of May, 10th of August, 2d, 23d, and 24th of September, 5th and 7th of October, 11th of November, 1688.
These suggestions were every where spread abroad, and tended to augment the discontents of which both the fleet and army, as well as the people, betrayed every day the most evident symptoms.

The fleet had begun to mutiny; because Stricland, the admiral, a Roman Catholic, introduced the mass aboard his ship, and dismissed the Protestant chaplain.

It was with some difficulty the seamen could be appeased; and they still persisted in declaring that they would not fight against the Dutch, whom they called friends and brethren; but would willingly give battle to the French, whom they regarded as national enemies.

The king had intended to augment his army with Irish recruits; and he resolved to try the experiment on the regiment of the duke of Berwick, his natural son: but Beaumont, the lieutenant-colonel, refused to admit them; and to this opposition five captains steadily adhered.

They were all cashiered; and had not the discontents of the army on this occasion become very apparent, it was resolved to have punished those officers for mutiny.
The king made a trial of the dispositions of his army, in a manner still more undisguised.