[41] Among the absurdities sworn to, and believed at the time of the Popish plot, Bedloe’s assertion, that 40,000 pilgrims, assembled in Spain to pay their devotion to Saint James, were to be employed in the invasion of England, was not the less terrifying because so eminently incredible. A false report that the Pilgrims had actually landed, obtained general credit, and one nobleman gallopped to London with the news. [42] Many of the opposition members, particularly those for the city of London, went armed and escorted to the parliament of Oxford, so that they resembled Titus Oates, who in his days of splendour was always attended by a guard. See vol. ix. p. 355. [43] Jean Le Clerc, otherwise called Bussy, once a _procureur_ before the parliament of Paris; being a bold, active, and ferocious man, he was created governor of the Bastile by the Duke of Guise, and employed in seizing the persons of the President Harlai, and other counsellors of parliament, and exercising severities on all those suspected of disaffection to the cause of the League. Dryden compares him to Waller, whom the Catholics accused of pillaging their houses, under pretence of searching for relics during the times of the plot. See him described under the character of Arod in “Absalom and Achitophel,” pp. 11. 335; and the note, p. 381, Vol. IX. [44] Francisco de Faria, who designed himself interpreter and secretary of languages to Gaspar de Abreu de Freitas, ambassador from the crown of Portugal, was one of the witnesses concerning the popish plot. He pretended he had been employed by the Portuguese ambassador to assassinate Oates, Bedlow, and Shaftesbury. His narrative was licenced for publication on 19th November, 1680; and concludes with an impudent affectation of admiring the Divine Providence, which had brought him, “from almost the utmost parts of the far distant habitable world, to be an instrument, in England, to detect, or at least more convincingly to prove the truth of these horrid treasons and conspiracies.” Faria was a native of Fernambuco, in Brazil, and apparently a Portuguese Jew. [45] Sir Robert Peyton was expelled the House, and committed to the Tower, on account of expressing some hesitation as to the credibility of Oates. [46] White was the dress affected by those who crowded to see Monmouth in his western tour. See Vol. VII. p. 257. Mr Trenchard undertook to raise 1500 men in and about Taunton alone. See _Lord Grey’s Account of the Rye-house Plot_, p. 18; where the plan of the city insurrection is also distinctly detailed.—Pp. 32-40.