All over the county the peasants chanted a ballad of which the burden is still remembered: "And shall Trelawney die, and shall Trelawney die?
Then thirty thousand Cornish boys will know the reason why." The miners from their caverns reechoed the song with a variation: "Then twenty thousand under ground will know the reason why." [387] The rustics in many parts of the country loudly expressed a strange hope which had never ceased to live in their hearts.

Their Protestant Duke, their beloved Monmouth, would suddenly appear, would lead them to victory, and would tread down the King and the Jesuits under his feet.
[388] The ministers were appalled.

Even Jeffreys would gladly have retraced his steps.

He charged Clarendon with friendly messages to the Bishops, and threw on others the blame of the prosecution which he had himself recommended.

Sunderland again ventured to recommend concession.
The late auspicious birth, he said, had furnished the King with an excellent opportunity of withdrawing from a position full of danger and inconvenience without incurring the reproach of timidity or of caprice.
On such happy occasions it had been usual for sovereigns to make the hearts of subjects glad by acts of clemency; and nothing could be more advantageous to the Prince of Wales than that he should, while still in his cradle, be the peacemaker between his father and the agitated nation.