Read it through once

Monmouth and Grey were now to be conveyed to London, for which purpose they set out on the 11th, and arrived in the vicinity of the metropolis on the 13th of July. In the meanwhile, the queen dowager, who seems to have behaved with a uniformity of kindness towards her husband's son that does her great honour, urgently pressed the king to admit his nephew to an audience. Importuned, therefore, by entreaties, and instigated by the curiosity which Monmouth's mysterious expressions, and Sheldon's story, had excited, he consented, though with a fixed determination to show no mercy. James was not of the number of those, in whom the want of an extensive understanding is compensated by a delicacy of sentiment, or by those right feelings, which are often found to be better guides for the conduct than the most accurate reasoning. His nature did not revolt, his blood did not run cold, at the thoughts of beholding the son of a brother whom he had loved embracing his knees, petitioning, and petitioning in vain, for life; of interchanging words and looks with a nephew, on whom he was inexorably determined, within forty-eight short hours, to inflict an ignominious death.