At Whitehall all was confusion and dismay. Pepys has given a vivid description of the scene. He himself fully expected to be murdered in a burst of popular fury. The one man who could be trusted to do his duty--Monk, the Lord General--was sent to take command at Chatham. Train-bands and militia were mobilized in frantic haste--all too late. [Illustration: _Emery Walker, Ltd._ JAMES, DUKE OF MONMOUTH (1649-1685). Probably a natural son of Charles II. by Lucy Walters. He was a weak, pleasure-loving man, but nevertheless a popular favourite owing to his good looks and general amiability. After his father’s death he rose against James II. and claimed the crown, but was defeated and executed.] On June 9 the advance squadron of the Dutch, under Admiral van Ghent, was off Gravesend, chasing merchantmen and naval light craft in panic-terror up the Thames, while the boom of his guns could, it is said, be heard in London. There must have been few who on that day did not look back with regret to the victorious years of the Commonwealth. The Dutch fleet, however, carried no great landing force, and De Ruijter, judging that London could not be safely attacked, decided to recall Van Ghent and turn against Chatham, the headquarters of the English Navy. Monk reached Rochester on the 11th, but he could do little. His hard fate was to end his military career as a helpless spectator of the national disgrace. The available troops consisted of a weak Scottish regiment and some seamen at Sheerness, under Admiral Sir Edward Spragge. The fortifications were unfinished and unarmed. The ships were not manned, and, to complete the disgrace, the seamen refused point-blank to fight for the king who had starved and robbed them. There is an even darker side to the gloomy picture. The oncoming Dutch fleet was full of English and Scottish seamen, who preferred the good treatment and regular pay of the States to that of their discredited king. The dockyard hands--starving, unpaid, and mutinous--deserted _en masse_. [Illustration: THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. (_From a Dutch contemporary engraving._)]