3. =Argyle's Landing. 1685.=--In Scotland the upper classes were animated by a savage resolve to keep no terms with the Covenanters, whose fanatical violence alarmed them. The Scottish Parliament, soon after the accession of James, passed a law punishing with death any one attending a conventicle. Argyle, believing, in his exile in Holland, that all honest Scots would be ready to join him against the tyranny of the Government, sailed early in May at the head of a small expedition, and arrived in the Firth of Clyde. He had himself no military skill, and his followers, no less ignorant than himself, overruled everything that he proposed. Soon after landing he was captured and carried to Edinburgh, where, as he was already legally condemned to death (see p. 623), he was executed on June 30 without further trial. On the night before his death a member of the Council came to see him in his cell, where he found him in a placid slumber. The visitor rushed off in agony to the house of a friend. "I have been," he said, "in Argyle's prison. I have seen him within an hour of eternity, sleeping as sweetly as ever man did. But as for me--" His voice failed him, and he could say no more. 4. =Monmouth's Landing. 1685.=--In the meanwhile Monmouth, the champion of the Dissenters and extreme Protestants, had, on June 11, landed at Lyme. So popular was he in the west of England that the trained bands could not be trusted to oppose him, and he was left unassailed till regiments of the regular army could be brought against him. The peasants and townsmen of the western counties flocked to join Monmouth, and he entered Taunton at the head of 5,000 men; but not a single country gentleman gave him his support. Parliament passed against him an Act of Attainder, condemning him to death without further trial, and the king marched in person against him at the head of a disciplined force. Monmouth declared himself to be the legitimate king, and, his name being James, he was popularly known amongst his followers as King Monmouth, in order to prevent confusion. He advanced as far as Philip's Norton: there, hopeless of gaining support amongst the governing classes, he fell back on Bridgwater. The king followed him with 2,500 regular troops, and 1,500 from the Wiltshire trained bands. Monmouth was soldier enough to know that, with his raw recruits, his only chance lay in surprising the enemy. The king's army lay on Sedgemoor, and Monmouth, in the early morning of July 6, attempted to fall on the enemy unawares. Broad ditches filled with water checked his course, and the sun was up before he reached his goal. It was inevitable that he should be beaten; the only wonder was that his untrained men fought so long as they did. Monmouth himself fled to the New Forest, where he was captured and brought to London. James admitted him to his presence, but refused to pardon him. On July 15 he was executed as an attainted traitor without further trial.