‘And if that were all it would be enough; but it is not all. There are more questions we should answer. Why can we win no battle neither by land nor by sea against the Spanish? Why do our soldiers come home and tell us they had nothing to eat? And no powder to fire their guns? Who is in charge of the army but the duke? When our sailors tell us that the ships are not fit to put to sea and the provisions are mouldering before they are eaten – who is the High Admiral? The duke again!

‘And when our brothers and sisters in faith at La Rochelle in France, Protestants like us, ask us for help against a Papist army of France, do we send them our aid? Our own brothers, praying as we do, escaped as we have escaped from the curse of Popery? Do we send them help? No! This great duke sends English ships and English sailors to help the forces of darkness, the army of Rome, the Navy of Richelieu! He sends good Protestant Englishmen for hire to the Devil, to the painted whore of Rome.’

The man was sweating, he swayed back against the stonework and wiped his face. ‘Worst of all,’ he said very low, ‘there are those who wonder that in his last hours our King James, our good King James, was watched over only by Villiers and his mother. That the king seemed to be better, but they sent away his physicians and his surgeons and under their nursing he grew worse and died!’

There was an awe-struck whisper at this scandal, which came so close to naming the greatest crime in the world: regicide. The preacher pulled back. ‘No wonder that the plague comes among us!’ he exclaimed. ‘No wonder. For why should the Lord of Hosts smile down on us who are betrayed and betrayed and let the betrayal go on!’

Someone shouted from the back of the crowd and those around him laughed. The preacher replied at once to the challenge.

‘You’re right, I cannot speak like this to the duke himself! But others will speak for me. We have a parliament of men, good men, who know how the country feels. They will speak to the king and warn him that this duke is a false friend. They will advise him to turn from Villiers and to listen to the needs of the nation. And he will turn! He will turn! He will give justice to the people and food to the children, and land to the landless. For it is very clear in the Bible that every man shall have his own land to dig and grow, and every woman shall have her own place. This king will turn from his evil advisers and give us that. An acre for every man and a cottage for every woman, and freedom from want for every child.’