Over the past few decades a pattern has emerged in studies of Jacobitism. After a series of works that tried to establish the viability of the movement to return the legitimate Stuart monarchs to the throne after the 1688 revolution in Britain and Ireland, we have begun to arrive at a more subtle appreciation of its impact. There may never have been any serious prospect that James II or his heirs would return to power, but it is clear that his supporters nevertheless influenced the culture and politics of the post-revolutionary world. Kevin Sharpe's last book, for example, demonstrated how Williamite propaganda was destabilized by the Jacobite's counter-campaign. Mark Goldie and others have shown Jacobite ideas filtering into mainstream political debates—particularly in the “country” position, and in ecclesiological disputes. Several scholars have shown that at least rhetorical celebration of the exiled dynasty might provide a discourse of opposition to governments and elites—a way of expressing grievance; while my own recent rereading of early Jacobite writings has shown me how they shaped the images and tropes that would be used in Tory critiques of Whig corruption and war-mongering in the last years of Queen Anne's reign. And now we have this informative and entertaining work by Rachel Weil. Weil's book details the supposed plots against the regime in the 1690s—and more particularly the debates around them and official strategies to contain them—and then shows how these alleged conspiracies raised profound issues of trust for an administration that had come to power claiming to defend Englishmen's liberties but then insisted it had to curtail these freedoms so that it could deal with supposedly pressing threats to national security. This subject has a contemporary resonance, of course, that Weil is happy to reflect upon: issues of credit and trust are at the heart of government campaigns against subversion and terrorism in the early twenty-first century.

Given the shadowy, and frequently fictitious, nature of Jacobite conspiracy in the 1690s, Weil wisely eschews any overall narrative of plotting (though she does provide clear accounts of the facts “to the best of [her knowledge]” as she wittily subtitles one chapter section, and she tells ripping individual yarns when working through the case studies that fill the second part of the volume). Instead she concentrates on what was believed, or disbelieved; and on the social, administrative, and rhetorical structures that supported such beliefs. So, after an introduction musing on the “modernity” of the dilemmas facing folk under William, she outlines Whig-Tory debates about regime security. She then goes on to cover the trustworthiness of the instruments of government charged with detecting treason (interestingly giving the post office as much, if not more, coverage than JPs or officials such as excisemen); the difficulties of using informer evidence, given that it was frequently paid for, provided as part of personal vendetta, or secured in return for judicial clemency; and the complexities of informer identity and credit (trying to answer, with great insight, why people informed). For the last chapter she shows how the issues she has outlined played themselves out in particular instances. She narrates the career of informer Richard Kingston; the history of the effective evaporation of the Lancashire “sham” plot of 1694; and the events surrounding the probably more real “assassination” plot of 1696.

Throughout, a rich diversity of issues are raised and analyzed. In fact, if I had a criticism of the volume it would be that too much is discussed, with insufficient guide to readers of exactly how this all fits together, and what main things we are supposed to take away from this account. The conclusion—mainly taken up with an account of the life of John Bernardi, imprisoned without trial for over three decades—feels like a wistful coda, rather than a bold new interpretation of the age. Among the rich tapestry of argument and suggestion, perhaps the most interesting topic is the contextualizing of the “trust” remolded in response to plotting within wider discussion of various forms of credit in the 1690s. These were especially important in finance as the government engaged in a major exercise in re-coinage and public debt, and in legitimacy as Locke and his allies reinterpreted authority as a trust from the people. Also important is Weil's reflection on the ways subjects were coming to engage more closely with the state in the seventeenth century. Of course this included participation in the rapidly expanding machinery of government and perhaps a greater sense of influence over official policy as parliament, press, and other dimensions of the “public sphere” became more established and powerful. Yet, as Weil shows, the practice of informing (which could involve putting loyalty to the state above other ties and allegiances) and the whole population's need to negotiate the challenge of vigilance in response to possible subversion also played central roles in tying ordinary folk to the central administration governed from Westminster. Overall, therefore, this is a significant and thought-provoking study that leaves this reviewer, anyway, with an enriched—and satisfyingly destabilized —view of William's reign.