the coffeehouses of London were filled during the latter part of
February. So intense was the public anxiety that, if any man of
rank was missed, two days running, at his usual haunts, it was
immediately whispered that he had stolen away to Saint
Germains.34

The second of March arrived; and the event quieted the fears of
one party, and confounded the hopes of the other. The Primate
indeed and several of his suffragans stood obstinately aloof: but
three Bishops and seventy-three temporal peers took the oaths. At
the next meeting of the Upper House several more prelates came
in. Within a week about a hundred Lords had qualified themselves
to sit. Others, who were prevented by illness from appearing,
sent excuses and professions of attachment to their Majesties.
Grafton refuted all the stories which had been circulated about
him by coming to be sworn on the first day. Two members of the
Ecclesiastical Commission, Mulgrave and Sprat, hastened to make
atonement for their fault by plighting their faith to William.
Beaufort, who had long been considered as the type of a royalist
of the old school, submitted after a very short hesitation.
Aylesbury and Dartmouth, though vehement Jacobites, had as little
scruple about taking the oath of allegiance as they afterwards
had about breaking it.35 The Hydes took different paths.
Rochester complied with the law; but Clarendon proved refractory.
Many thought it strange that the brother who had adhered to James
till James absconded should be less sturdy than the brother who
had been in the Dutch camp. The explanation perhaps is that
Rochester would have sacrificed much more than Clarendon by
refusing to take the oaths. Clarendon's income did not depend on
the pleasure of the Government