majority of the Commons, too, were jealous of interfering with those whom they hailed as friends to reform; while the King, the Court, and the Archbishop, exaggerated the disturbance, and were for coercing the people as enemies of order. The whole story, as it appears from the documents we have mentioned, indicates rudeness and insolence on the part of the populace, but not any disposition in the first instance to proceed to violence. Their opponents sought to bolster up their own cause by highly-coloured reports of the uproar; the irritated pride and hot revenge of a few royalist officers having really brought on the bloodshed, to be followed by the blackest recrimination on the Puritan side.[249] The squabble would be beneath our notice, were it not for the consequences which followed it;[250] and for its significance as illustrating the way in which religious questions became mixed up with political ones, and how both, in some cases, sunk down to the most vulgar level. [Sidenote: _Protest of the Bishops._] [Sidenote: 1641, December.] Bishop Hall relates, in connection with the riot, that in the afternoon of the 28th of December, the Marquis of Hartford came up to the Bishops' bench, and informed their lordships that they were in danger, because the people were watching outside with torches, and would look into every coach to discover them; he adds that a motion made for their safety was received with smiles; and that some sought the protection of certain peers, whilst others escaped home by "secret and far-fetched passages."[251] From the same authority--corroborated by other witnesses--we also learn, that Archbishop Williams, with the cry of "No Bishop" ringing in his ears, with a still more unpleasant recollection of the apprentice's attack, and also alarmed by the Marquis of Hartford's story, determined to protest against this state of things, not simply as a violation of his personal liberty, but as a violation of the freedom and rights of the Upper House. We Bishops, he argued, can no longer perform our Parliamentary duties if this be the case, and without the bishops the House of Lords is a nullity in the legislature. Upon this view being taken, twelve prelates, Williams being one of the number, repaired to the "Jerusalem Chamber in the Dean's lodgings"--that room which has witnessed so many ecclesiastical discussions, and which is so linked to the fortunes of the Church of England--and there drew up a protest against whatever should be done during the absence of their order from the House of Lords.[252] [Sidenote: 1641, December.] To this protest signatures were hastily procured. On the 27th, Williams was assaulted; on the 29th, the protest reached the house of the Bishop of Lichfield, between six and seven o'clock at night, he not having heard of it before.[253]