Nonjuring circles in the Metropolis must often have been agitated by rumours of plots, real or imagined. In the saloons of Jacobite nobles, in the back rooms of city shops, in the garrets of Little Britain, stories would be whispered of preparations made for restoring the legitimate Sovereign. In the autumn of 1698 such tales reached the ears of the Duke of Shrewsbury’s Secretary. A Jacobite party had provided sixty horses: these were dispersed in Kent and about town, some in the hands of jockeys. They had engaged a Canterbury innkeeper to help onward their project, had raised a fund of above £1,000, were on the tiptoe of expectation, and only waited for a signal to mount their steeds and be off like the wind. So the Secretary heard, and, in connection with the retailing of all this talk, he stated, that he was on the point of apprehending a person who dealt in policies of insurance upon James’s restoration. He paid a guinea--so runs the letter--to receive fifty if the King or his son should reascend the throne by the following Michaelmas--certainly a strange scheme for promoting his return, since it became the interest of everyone who received the guinea to keep the Royal refugee away.[471] [Sidenote: 1694–1702.] [Sidenote: NONJURORS.] Centres of Nonjuring influence and activity existed in the country. Shottesbrook Park, near Maidenhead, with its beautiful church of decorated Gothic, and its manor-house full of convenience and comfort--the home of Francis Cherry, a country gentleman, both handsome and accomplished, “the idol of Berkshire”--offered a pleasant retreat for the deprived.[472] Many could be accommodated within the spacious Hall, for it contained not less than seventy beds; and the owner was as free in his hospitality as he was rich in his resources. His heart went with the exiled King, and a story is told to the effect that once, in a hunting-field, when closely pressed by William’s steed, he plunged into the Thames where the river was deep and broad, hoping that the piqued monarch might be induced to follow through the uncomfortable if not perilous passage. To Shottesbrook House, Robert Nelson often repaired. There the Nonjuror Charles Leslie found a welcome, and at a later period than this volume embraces, disguised in regimentals, when, in danger of apprehension, he obtained shelter in a neighbouring house until by Cherry’s help he made his escape, and set out to Bar-le-duc to attempt the conversion of the Pretender. Many a scene of excitement, many a flush of hope, many a flutter of fear, many a pang of disappointment must have occurred under the roof of the Shottesbrook squire, as persons deep in political intrigues met for conference. Bowdler, Nelson’s neighbour in Ormond Street, accompanied by his family, was a visitor to this spot; Brokesby, a deprived clergyman of Rowley, near Hull, found in it a resting-place; and the learned Prussian Lutheran, Dr. Grabe, who had come over to