The Seven Bishops were confined--huddled together would be the more literal term--in the Martin Tower, during the troublous days of James II., for refusing to subscribe to the Declaration of Indulgence. “A warrant was issued for their committal to the Tower,” we are told by Dr. Luckock in his _Bishops in the Tower_, and “the spectacle of the 8th of June [1688] has had no parallel in the annals of history. It has often been painted, and in vivid colours, but no adequate description can ever be given of a scene that was unique.” As the barge containing the Bishops was pushed off from Whitehall Steps, “men and women rushed into the water and the people ran along the banks cheering with the wildest enthusiasm, and crying, ‘God bless the Bishops!’ When they reached the Traitor’s Gate and passed into the Tower, the soldiers on guard, officers as well as men, fell on their knees and begged for a blessing. It was evening when they arrived, and they asked for permission to attend the service in the chapel [of St. Peter]; and the Lesson for the day, by a happy coincidence, was one well calculated to inspire them with courage: ‘In all things approving ourselves as the ministers of God, in much patience, in afflictions, in necessities, in distresses, in strifes, in imprisonments.’ ... The enthusiasm was continued long after the ponderous gates of the Tower had closed upon them. The soldiers of the garrison drank to the health of the Bishops at their mess, and nothing could stop them from such a manifestation of their sympathy.” The Bishops were in the Martin Tower until June 15, when they returned by water from the Wharf and were taken to the Court of King’s Bench. They were tried on June 29. When Sir Robert Langley, foreman of the jury, declared that the prisoners were found “not guilty” the scene again became one of the wildest joy and excitement. “The released Bishops, hearing the bells of a neighbouring church, escaped from the crowd to join in the service, and, by a second coincidence, more striking even than the first, the Lesson that they heard was the story of St. Peter’s miraculous deliverance from prison.”