In particular he had promised that, if proper respect were shown to the royal wishes, the trade in tin should be freed from the oppressive restrictions under which it lay.

But this lure, which at another time would have proved irresistible, was now slighted.

All the justices and Deputy Lieutenants of Devonshire and Cornwall, without a single dissenting voice, declared that they would put life and property in jeopardy for the King, but that the Protestant religion was dearer to them than either life or property.

"And, sir," said Bath, "if your Majesty should dismiss all these gentlemen, their successors would give exactly the same answer." [331] If there was any district in which the government might have hoped for success, that district was Lancashire.
Considerable doubts had been felt as to the result of what was passing there.

In no part of the realm had so many opulent and honourable families adhered to the old religion.