Chapter XVII: THE REIGN OF QUEEN ANNE (continued) (2)

As De Torcy could not bring the Dutch Ministers to concede anything, he consented to meet Prince Eugene and Marlborough, who had now returned from England with Lord Townshend. To these was added Count Zinzendorf, as Minister for the Emperor. The French Minister, assisted by Bouillé, though he was treating in a condition of the deepest anxiety, yet maintained all the high pretensions which his Court had so long assumed. He offered the surrender of Spain, but he would give no guarantee for its evacuation. He contended that the word of his king was enough---as if the word of any king could be accepted in such a case, and especially of Louis, who had broken his a thousand times. He pleaded that the king's great age, his earnest desire for peace and repose in his declining years, and the situation of his affairs, were of themselves ample guarantees for the fulfilment of that Article of the treaty; and he even melted into tears in his earnestness to bring the ambassadors to accept the word of the Grand Monarque. This was all mere child's play in a treaty which was to be the result of such a war, and to establish the future peace of Europe. As time was going on, the representatives of the Allies, at the end of May, presented their _ultimatum_, in forty Articles, the chief of which were these:--That Philip should within two months totally evacuate Spain and Sicily, which with the Indies were to be made over to Charles; that if Philip refused to evacuate Spain and Sicily, the King of France, so far from helping him, should assist the Allies to expel him; that Spain should never, nor any part of it, be united to the crown of France; that the Dutch should receive, as a barrier to their States, Furnes, Fort Kenoq, Menin, Saverge, Ypres, Warneton, Comines, Vervick, Lille, Condé, Tournay, and Maubeuge; that the French should deliver up all the towns, cities, and fortresses which they had taken in the Netherlands; that the fortifications of Dunkirk should be destroyed and never again be restored; that the Pretender should quit France; that the Queen of England's title and that of the Protestant succession should be acknowledged; that the interests of the Electors of Bavaria and Cologne should be settled by the congress which should settle this peace; and that the Duke of Savoy should receive back everything taken from him, and should also retain Exilles, Feneshelles, Chaumont, and the valley of Pragelas. Strasburg and Kehl were to be given up by Louis, but Alsace itself retained. The new King of Prussia and the new Elector of Hanover should both be acknowledged, and all these preliminaries should be adopted and the treaty completed within two months.

De Torcy, who could not expect for a moment that Louis would consent to any such terms, to gain time, however, engaged to send them to Versailles. He set off for Paris, but at Douay he saw Marshal Villars, showed him the conditions of peace, and told him to put his army in order, for they would never be accepted. Villars replied that he should be prepared, but that the army was on the point of utter starvation, and such was the destitution of the country that he had no conception how the troops were to exist. No sooner did De Torcy reach Paris than it was announced to the Allies that Louis would never accept such terms. Bouillé was recalled, and was commissioned by the Allies to assure the king that no others would be offered; and that, if they were not accepted by the 15th of June, they should take the field. But the French king had gained one great object by the negotiation--it enabled him to represent to his subjects his earnest efforts for peace, and the arrogant obstinacy of the Allies. He had letters circulated all over France representing the anxious endeavours he had made to put an end to bloodshed and to the miseries of Europe; that he had offered to make unheard-of sacrifices, but to no purpose; everything had been rejected by the Allies but a fresh carnage and spoliation. He represented that the more he had conceded, the more they had risen in their demands; that he found it impossible to satisfy their inordinate demands, except at the cost of the ruin and the eternal infamy of France.

The effect of this representation was wonderful. The whole of France was so roused by indignation at the supposed treatment of their king, the insolent rejection of his peaceful desires, that they execrated the selfish arrogance of the Allies, for Louis had insinuated that they were carrying on the war only for their own personal interests. The kingdom, impoverished and reduced as it was, determined to support the ill-used monarch with the last remnant of its substance; and such exertions were made for the continued struggle as astonished the world. Nor was the effect of Louis's representations lost on Marlborough's enemies in England. They declaimed on the unreasonableness of the Allies almost as loudly as the French, and they particularly denounced the demand that Louis should help to dethrone and expatriate his own grandson, as the most astounding piece of assumption that had ever been heard of.

On the 21st of June Marlborough and Prince Eugene crossed the frontiers of France, and with a force of one hundred and ten thousand men drew up in a plain near Lille. Marshal Villars, considered now the ablest general of France, encamped his army on the plain of Sens, between two impassable morasses, and began to entrench himself. The Allies reconnoitred his position, but found it too strong to attack him in it; and as they could not advance towards Paris, leaving such an enemy behind them, they made a feint of attacking Ypres; and then, suddenly marching on Tournay in the night of the 27th of June, they presented themselves before it on the 7th of July. The place was strong, but the garrison was weak. It consisted of only twelve battalions of infantry and four squadrons of horse, in very inefficient condition. Villars endeavoured to throw into the place seven thousand fresh troops, but he could not effect it. The governor, Lieutenant de Surville, was a man of great military skill and determination, and he maintained the siege with such vigour that the Allies were not only detained before the place for a long and invaluable time, but lost many men. The town capitulated on the 28th of July, when the Allies were about to carry it by storm, but the citadel held out till the 3rd of September. The same day, leaving a detachment under the Earl of Albemarle to level the defences, the Allies crossed the Scheldt and determined to besiege Mons. They sent forward a detachment under the Prince of Hesse to attack the French lines from the Haine to the Sambre, which were abandoned at his approach. At this juncture Marshal Boufflers arrived to support Villars, and, though his superior in command, agreed to serve under him. Marlborough, hearing that Villars had quitted his camp, and that the French were on the march to attack the Prince of Hesse and cut off the approaches to Mons, made a rapid movement, which brought him face to face with the French army, which consisted of one hundred and twenty thousand men--ten thousand more than the army of the Allies. Villars and Boufflers were encamped behind the woods of Lanière and Tasnière, in the neighbourhood of Malplaquet. The Allies encamped with their right near Sart and Bleron, and the left on the edge of the wood of Lanière, the headquarters being at Blaregines. On the 9th of September the outposts of the two armies began to skirmish; but the French fell back on an encampment near Malplaquet, and spent the night in fortifying their position. Had the Allies immediately attacked them the battle would have been less obstinate; but Marlborough was waiting for the coming up of eighteen battalions, left to rase the fortifications of Tournay. For the two days that he thus continued to wait, the French, with unremitting activity, proceeded to cast up triple entrenchments; and were, in fact, so completely covered with lines, hedges, entrenchments, cannon, and trees laid across, that the Dutch field-deputies declared that it would be madness to attack them in such a situation. But on the 10th, when the expected battalions had arrived, Marlborough and Eugene determined to give battle.

Early on the morning of the 11th of September they availed themselves of a thick fog to erect batteries on each wing, and, the day clearing about eight o'clock, the engagement began. The battle began on the right by eighty-six battalions, commanded by General Schuylemberg and the Duke of Argyll, supported by two-and-twenty battalions under Count Lottum, who broke through the French lines, and fought with such fury that, notwithstanding their strong barricades, the French in less than an hour were forced from their entrenchments, and compelled to seek refuge in the woods of Sart and Tasnière. The contest was far more desperate on the left, where the Prince of Orange and Baron Fagel, with six-and-thirty battalions, attacked the right of the enemy, posted in the woods of Lanière, and covered with three entrenchments. The Prince of Orange led on the charge with wonderful bravery, having two horses killed under him, and the greater part of his officers killed around him. The engagement was now general, and the French continued to fight with the fury of despair from eight in the morning till three in the afternoon, when, seeing all their lines forced, their left being utterly routed, and the centre under Villars giving way, Villars himself being dangerously wounded, they began to retreat towards Bavay, under the direction of Boufflers, and retired to a position between Quesnoy and Valenciennes. The forest of Ardennes served to protect the French from the pursuit of their enemies, and enabled them to carry off most of their cannon and standards. About forty colours and standards, and sixteen pieces of cannon, were taken by the Allies, with a considerable number of prisoners. But on surveying the field of battle they found that this was the dearest victory which they had ever purchased. About twenty thousand of their soldiers lay slain, and about ten thousand of the enemy. Thirty thousand lives sacrificed in one battle! Neither Blenheim nor Ramillies could compare with Malplaquet in monstrosity of carnage. Nor was the impression produced equal to the destruction. The French, under the able command of Villars, notwithstanding their defeat, felt rather reassured than depressed. They had inflicted far more damage than they had received; and Villars declared that, had he not been so severely wounded, he would not have left the field without the victory. The French having retired into Valenciennes, the Allies continued the siege of Mons, which capitulated on the 23rd of October, and the armies then retired into winter quarters, after which some resultless negotiations ensued.

The Parliament of Great Britain met on the 15th of November, and the queen, opening it in person, announced in her speech that France had been endeavouring, by false and hollow artifices, to amuse the Allies with a prospect of peace, but with the real intent to sow jealousies amongst them; that the Allies had wisely rejected the insidious overtures; that our arms had been as successful as in any former campaign, and had now laid France open to the advance of the confederate troops; and that if they granted her, as she trusted they would, liberal supplies, she believed that she would now soon reduce that exorbitant and oppressive power which had so long threatened the liberties of Europe. Both Lords and Commons presented addresses fully approving of the rejection of the king of France's delusive overtures. They thanked the Duke of Marlborough for his splendid victory at Malplaquet. The Commons voted six million two hundred thousand pounds for the services of the year, and established the lottery and other schemes for raising this heavy sum.

The great topic, however, which engrossed almost the whole attention this Session, not only of Parliament, but of the whole nation, was not foreign affairs, not the general war, but a party war at home, which was carried on with the most extraordinary furor, and put the whole public into a flame. The ostensible cause of this vehement conflict was the publication of a couple of sermons by a clergyman, hitherto of no mark; the real cause was the determination of Harley and the Tories to damage the Whigs irremediably, and to drive them at once from the service of the State and the support of the people. They therefore seized with consummate tact on these sermons, which were, as printed, stupid though rabid performances; and which, had they not been adroitly steeped in party spirit--the most inflammable of all spirits--and set fire to, might soon have slept forgotten in the linings of trunks, or as wrappers of butter and cheese.

On the 13th of December, 1709, Mr. Dolben, the son of the Archbishop of York, denounced, in the House of Commons, two sermons preached and published by Dr. Henry Sacheverell, Rector of St. Saviour's, in Southwark. The first of these sermons had been preached, on the 15th of August, at the assizes at Derby, before the Judge and Sheriff. The second had been preached, on the 5th of November, before the Lord Mayor and Corporation in St. Paul's Cathedral. In both these sermons he had made an attack, if not avowedly on the Government, on the principles on which the Throne and the whole Government were established. He professed the most entire doctrines of non-resistance and passive obedience, which, at the same time that they made him appear incapable, if he had the power, of over-turning any Government, led him to entirely sap and undermine the Government and title of the queen, by representing the resistance which had been made to the encroachments of the Stuarts, and especially to James II., as perfectly impious and treasonable, contrary to the laws of God and the political institutions of men. He reprobated the Revolution and all that flowed from it; and thus, pretending to passive obedience, he was, in the fullest sense, preaching resistance and a counter-revolution. Whilst crying non-resistance, he was, as far as in him lay, arming all those who were hostilely inclined to overturn the throne of Anne, as built only on rebellion and on maxims subversive of the divine right of kings. In his second sermon, which he called "Perils of False Brethren," he preached flamingly against the danger to the Church; danger from the false and democratic bishops who had been put in by the usurper William of Orange; danger from the Dissenters, whom he had by law tolerated, and made powerful in the State and against the true Church. With such a jubilant avidity was this war-note responded to by High Church clergy, High Church zealots of all sorts, and the Tories ready to rush to the assault on any promising occasion, that no less than forty thousand copies of these sermons are said to have been sold. "Nothing," says Dr. Johnson, "ever sold like it, except 'The Whole Duty of Man.'"

The motion made by Mr. Dolben in regard to Sacheverell in the House of Commons was seconded by Sir Peter King, one of the Aldermen of London, who had listened to the sermon in St. Paul's with astonishment and indignation. He denounced it as abounding with matter false, injurious, impious, and tending to sedition and schism in the Church. This had not been the case with all the City dignitaries on that occasion. Sir Gilbert Heathcote had indeed been equally astonished at it, and declared that the preacher ought to be called to account for it; but the Lord Mayor, Sir Samuel Garrard, had applauded it, and had allowed it to be published with his sanction. Neither was it the first of the kind which had been preached in London. One Francis Higgins had been haranguing on the same topics in the pulpits all over the metropolis, with the most outrageous declamations on the dangers of the Church. Sacheverell, however, had brought the fever to a crisis. The most violent paragraphs were read in the House of Commons, and voted scandalous and seditious libels. The doctor was summoned to the bar of the House, and, having acknowledged the authorship of the sermons, pleaded the encouragement which he had received from the Lord Mayor to print the one on "The Perils of False Brethren." Sir Samuel Garrard, who was a member of the House, now repudiated his encouragement, and the doctor being ordered to withdraw, it was resolved that he should be impeached of high crimes and misdemeanours at the bar of the Lords, and Mr. Dolben was ordered to conduct his impeachment. A committee was appointed to prepare the Articles, and Sacheverell was taken into custody.

When the impeachment was carried up to the Lords, Sacheverell petitioned to be admitted to bail, but this was refused. The Commons committed him to the custody of the Deputy-Usher of the Black Rod, but the Lords afterwards admitted him to bail. The Articles were carried up to the Lords on the 13th of January, 1710, and Sacheverell drew up an answer, in which he wholly denied some of the Articles, and endeavoured to justify himself in respect to the rest. The Commons made a reply, and declared themselves ready to prove the charge. A long delay, however, took place before the day of trial could be fixed. The queen was more than suspected of being favourable to Sacheverell, as influenced by Harley, Mrs. Masham, and the Tories. When the doctor appeared before the Commons, he was attended by Dr. Lancaster, the Vice-Chancellor of Oxford, and above a hundred of the most distinguished clergymen of London and other towns, conspicuous amongst them being several of the queen's own chaplains. From the moment that Sacheverell was taken into custody by the Commons, the Church and Tory party had set all their engines to work to raise the populace. These agents were everywhere, distributing money, treating the mob to ale, and spreading the most alarming rumours--that the Puritans, the Presbyterians, and the Dissenters were all combined to pull down the Church and restore the old republican practices, and that the prosecution of Sacheverell was a trial of their strength. The pulpits resounded in all quarters with these alarms, with the intention of working up the people to a pitch of desperation, and they succeeded. The mob became furious, and paraded the streets and round the palace, crying, "God save the Queen and Dr. Sacheverell! Queen and High Church!"

Marlborough took his departure for Holland, and the trial of Sacheverell was fixed for the 27th of February in Westminster Hall. The managers for the Commons were the Lords William Paulet and Coningsby, Sir Thomas Parker, Sir Joseph Jekyl, Sir John Hollis, Sir John Holland, Sir James Montague, Sir Peter King (Recorder of London), Mr. Robert Eyre (Solicitor-General), Mr. James Stanhope, Mr. Robert Walpole, Mr. Spencer Cowper, Mr. John Smith, Mr. John Dolben, and Mr. William Thompson. The prisoner was defended by Sir Simon Harcourt and Mr. Constantine Phipps, and was attended by Drs. Smallridge and Atterbury. The Lord Chancellor Cowper demanded of the Lords whether it was their pleasure that Dr. Sacheverell should be called before them; and the answer being in the affirmative, he was placed at the bar, his friends Atterbury and Smallridge standing at his side. Silence being ordered, the doctor was asked whether he was ready to take his trial; to which he answered with great confidence that he was, and should always be ready to obey the laws of the land. The Articles of Impeachment were then read. They accused him of having publicly reflected on the late Revolution; of having suggested that it was brought about by odious and unjustifiable means; of having defamed the Act of Toleration, and cast scurrilous reflections on those who advocated religious toleration; of asserting that the Church was in great peril from her Majesty's Administration; of maintaining that the civil Constitution of the country was also in danger; of stigmatising many of the dignitaries of the Church--some of whom the queen herself had placed in their posts--as false brethren; and of libelling her Majesty's Ministers, and especially of branding the Lord High Treasurer with the name of "Volpone;" and, finally, with having, in discharge of his sacred office, wickedly wrested and perverted the Holy Scriptures.

These charges were well supported by various members of the Commons, and amongst them Robert Walpole particularly distinguished himself. The counsel for the doctor then pleaded in his behalf, and endeavoured to answer the arguments adduced against him. Sacheverell, however, was not contented with this; he delivered a defence himself which has been generally considered to be the work of the high Tory divine Atterbury, and probably with good reason. In this he dwelt much on his responsibility as a clergyman, and represented the interests of all his brethren and of the Church as involved in this attack made upon them through his person. He expressed the utmost loyalty towards the queen and the Constitution; denied having called in question the Revolution, though he had certainly condemned in the strongest terms the resistance by which it was achieved. He declared himself in favour of the Protestant succession, and asserted that, as his principle was that of non-resistance in all cases, he could not by any word or act of his own endanger the Government as by law established; as if his very declaration of the principle of non-resistance and passive obedience did not condemn _in toto_ the Revolution, the means by which the queen came to the throne, and encourage all those who were seeking to restore Popery and the Stuarts as the rightful religion and rightful possessors of the throne, both of which had been, according to his doctrines, forced from their legitimate place by ungodly and un-Christian violence; and he concluded by calling on God and His holy angels to witness that he had never been guilty of the wicked, seditious, or malicious acts imputed to him in the impeachment.

As the doctor went to and from the Hall, his chair was thronged round by dense crowds, which attended him to his lodgings in the Temple, or thence to Westminster Hall. Numbers pressed forward to kiss his hand; they lifted their hats to him with the utmost reverence. The windows were crowded by ladies and gentlemen, who cheered him vociferously, and many flung down presents to him. The doctor returned the salutations by continual bows and smiles, and seemed wonderfully elated by his sudden consequence. His chairmen seemed to partake of his glory, and stepped on as proudly as if they had been carrying the queen. "This huzzaing," says Defoe, "made the doctor so popular that the ladies began to talk of falling in love with him; but this was only a prelude to the High Church affair. An essay was to be made on the mob, and the huzzaing of the rabble was to be artfully improved." Accordingly after the trial the next day, February 28th, the mob assembled in dense masses--sweeps, link-boys, butchers, by a sturdy guard of whom the doctor was always escorted to and from the Hall--collected in the City and began to cry "Down with the Dissenters! High Church for ever!" And they soon put their cries in practice by assaulting the Dissenting chapels, and sacking their interiors. The Tory writers of the time pretend that the rioters did this of their own accord, as the mobs had destroyed the Catholic chapels in 1688; but this was not the case. The proceedings of the mob were stimulated and directed by gentlemen, who followed them in hackney coaches, according to Cunningham, who is the only writer who has furnished us with full details of these outrages. They then directed their rage against the house of Bishop Burnet, which stood on the other side of St. John's Square, and attempted to demolish it. This they must have done under instructions from their disguised instigators, for Burnet was hated by the High Church and Tory party for the distinguished part which he had borne in the Revolution, for his constant attachment to King William and his measures, and especially for his advocacy of toleration. They vowed they would put the Low Church Bishop to death if they could catch him; but the respectable inhabitants vigorously interposed in defence of the Bishop's house and life, and the mob were compelled to desist.

So long as the rioters were only burning and ruining the Dissenting chapels, the Court remained most calmly quiescent; but when the news came that they were beginning to attack "Low Church as by law established," there was a bustle and a fright at St. James's. This fright was wonderfully increased when Sunderland rushed into the presence of the queen and announced that the mob was on the march to pull down and rifle the Bank of England in honour of "High Church and Dr. Sacheverell." At this news the queen turned deadly pale, and trembled. She bade Sunderland send instantly the Horse and Foot Guards and disperse the rioters. Captain Horsey, the officer on duty at St. James's, was at once summoned into the royal presence, and Sunderland delivered to him the queen's order to disperse the mob, but to use discretion, and not to proceed to extremities. Horsey was one of the anti-Marlborough faction, and received the command in evident dudgeon. "Am I to preach to the mob, or am I to fight them?" he asked. "If you want preaching, please to send some one with me who is a better hand at holding forth than I am; if you want fighting, it is my trade, and I will do my best." Sunderland could only repeat the order. Horsey easily dispersed the rabble, who were more valiant against peaceable Dissenters than against soldiers. In one or two places they seemed as though they would make a stand; but on any attempt of the Guards to charge them they flew like leaves before the wind.

The trial lasted for three weeks, and every day the same crowds assembled, the same hurraing of Sacheverell, the same appeals to the queen on behalf of the Church and Dr. Sacheverell were shouted by the enthusiastic mob. No one scarcely dared to appear abroad without an artificial oak-leaf in his hat, which was considered the badge of restored monarchy, and all the time the doctor carried the air of a conqueror. At length, on the 10th of March, the Lords adjourned to their own House to consider this point, raised by the counsel for Sacheverell--whether in prosecutions by impeachments the particular words supposed to be criminal should be expressly specified in such impeachments. The question was referred to the judges, who decided that the particular words ought to be so specified. It was objected that the judges had decided according to the rules of Westminster Hall, and not according to the usages of Parliament, and it was resolved to adhere to the usages of Parliament, lest it should become a practice for the judges to decide on questions of Parliamentary right and privilege. On the 16th of March the Lords came to the consideration of their judgment, and the queen attended _incognita_ to hear the debate, which was long and earnest. In the end Sacheverell was pronounced guilty by a majority of seventeen; but four-and-thirty peers entered a protest against the judgment, and his sentence bore no proportion to the usual ones in such cases. He was merely suspended from preaching for three years, and his sermons were condemned to be burnt by the common hangman.

This gentle sentence was regarded by the people and the Tories as a real triumph. It was proof of the decline of the Whig party, and of the fear of offending the public. The event was celebrated by Sacheverell's mob-friends by bonfires, and by the inhabitants of London and Westminster by illuminations. There was plenty of beer supplied to the populace from some quarter, and every one passing along was compelled to drink the health of Dr. Sacheverell, the "champion of the Church." Sacheverell himself went from house to house in a state of triumph to thank the lords and gentlemen who had taken his side. From some of these, as the Duke of Argyll, he met with a rebuff; but the great doctor, with a roaring mob at his heels, was generally flatteringly received, and he took care to boast that after his sentence it was clear that the Whigs were down and the Church was saved. The University of Oxford, which had received a snub from the Lords by their ordering its famous decree asserting the absolute authority and indefeasible right of princes, to be burnt with Sacheverell's sermons, was loud in professed triumph and sympathy with the doctor. The House of Commons was indignant at the lenity of his treatment, and declared that his sentence was an actual benefit to him, by exempting him from the duties of his living, and enabling him to go about fomenting sedition.

The queen prorogued Parliament on the 5th of April, expressing her concern for the occasion which had occupied so much of the Session. She declared that no prince could have a more zealous desire for the welfare of the Church than she had, and that it was mischievous in wicked and malicious libels to pretend that the Church was in danger; and she trusted that men would now study to be quiet, and mind their own business, instead of busying themselves to revive questions of a very high nature, and which could only be with an ill intention. But every one knew all the while that Anne was only too pleased at the demonstrations which had been made through Sacheverell; that they had damaged the Whigs essentially, and brought the day near when she could safely send them adrift, and liberate herself for ever from them and the Marlboroughs. Mrs. Masham now ruled triumphantly, and disposed of commissions and offices as royally as ever the duchess had done. It was openly said in the army that fighting was not the road to promotion, but carrying Mrs. Masham's lapdogs, or putting a heavy purse into the hand of Mrs. Abigail Earwig. The Duchess of Marlborough did not abate her exertions to recover favour, but they were in vain; and the great Marlborough complained in a letter to the queen that all his victories for her Majesty's honour could not shield him from the malice of a bedchamber-woman.

Indeed, the display of the queen's bias now became rapid and open. The Duke of Shrewsbury, who had now joined the Tories, returned from his long residence at Rome, where he had married an Italian lady, and had taken the part of Sacheverell in the trial. The queen immediately dismissed the Marquis of Kent, a staunch Whig, from the office of Lord Chamberlain, and, much to the grief and consternation of the Lord Treasurer, Godolphin, bestowed it on Shrewsbury. There was great alarm among the Whigs, and Walpole recommended the instant and entire resignation of the whole Cabinet as the only means to intimidate the queen and her secret advisers; but Harley is said to have persuaded the rest of the Ministers that the only object was to get rid of Godolphin, Marlborough, and his son-in-law Sunderland. The rumour of Sunderland's dismissal became general, and not without foundation. The queen had an extreme dislike to him, not only because of his belonging to Marlborough's clique, but on account of his blunt and outspoken manners. He was perfectly undisguised in his expressions of dislike for Mrs. Masham, and of his resolve, if possible, to turn her out of the palace; but, with the queen's devotion to that lady, he could have taken no surer way of getting himself out. The Duchess of Marlborough, who could not now obtain access to the queen, yet wrote to her, imploring her to defer any intention of removing Lord Sunderland till the duke's return; but the queen forthwith gave Sunderland his dismissal, and appointed Lord Dartmouth, an actual Jacobite, in his place. Anne endeavoured to qualify Lord Sunderland's dismissal by offering him a retiring pension, but he rejected it with disdain; and such was the fear that the Duke of Marlborough, on this act of disrespect to him, would throw up the command of the army, that all the leading Ministers--including Cowper, Somers, Halifax, Devonshire, Godolphin, and Orford--wrote to him, imploring him to retain his command, as well for the security of the Whig Government as for his own glory and the good of the country. The Allies on the Continent were equally alarmed at this indication of the declining favour of Marlborough, and France was just as elated at it. But nothing could now stay the fall of the Whigs. Anne, indeed, ordered Mr. Secretary Boyle to write to the Allied sovereigns and to the States-General to assure them that nothing was farther from her thoughts than the removal of the Duke of Marlborough from his command, and that she still proposed to conduct her government by the same party. The hollowness of these assurances was immediately shown by her also dismissing Godolphin from the Treasury, and appointing Harley Chancellor of the Exchequer. Harley thereupon proposed to Lord Chancellor Cowper and Walpole to make a coalition, but they rejected the overture; and as a Tory Cabinet could not expect to carry on with a Whig House of Commons, a dissolution was determined upon, and Parliament was dissolved accordingly, and writs were issued for a new election.

The nomination of the Tory Cabinet immediately followed. Lord Rochester, the queen's High Church and deep-drinking uncle, was made President of the Council in place of Somers; the Duke of Buckingham succeeded the Duke of Devonshire as Lord Steward; St. John succeeded Mr. Secretary Boyle; Sir Simon Harcourt, as Lord Chancellor, superseded Lord Cowper; the Duke of Ormonde took the Lord-Lieutenancy of Ireland from Lord Wharton; the Duke of Somerset had anticipated these changes by throwing up his post of Master of the Horse, and the Earl of Orford was removed from the Admiralty, and that office was put in commission. In the room of Walpole, George Granville was made Secretary at War. Here was a clean sweep of all the Whigs, except some subordinate officials, who clung to office as long as it was permitted. Dr. Sacheverell had done a mighty work for the Tories, and, having a living in Wales conferred on him, he made quite a triumphant progress thither in May, during all the heat and violence of the elections, still labouring in his vocation of self-glorification, and of damaging the Whig cause as much as he could, in which he was energetically supported by his patrons.

On the Continent war and negotiation were going on at the same time whilst the Sacheverell fever had been raging at home. Early in the spring Louis XIV., sensible of the miserable condition of his kingdom, had again made overtures for peace. The Ministers of the two parties met at first on board a yacht at Maardyk, but the French preferred the wretched little town of Gertruydenberg for their sojourn, where they complained of the miserable accommodations they obtained. The Dutch States-General had sent a pressing request that Marlborough might be allowed to go to Holland in time to give his advice in these negotiations, and the two Houses of Parliament seconded this request. The queen readily consented, though it was suspected the whole was done at the suggestion of Marlborough himself, to show how essential his services were deemed by the Allies. Though Marlborough hastened to the Hague in consequence, he did not in any way appear openly in the matter, but appeared busy with Prince Eugene in setting early on foot the campaign. The French ambassadors represented themselves as being not only most meanly entertained, but as meanly and narrowly watched--their letters being opened, and their propositions met by haughty discourtesy. Certainly, if we were to regard the concessions made by Louis XIV. on this occasion as honestly offered, the Allies had never a fairer opportunity of closing the war triumphantly, and were most culpable in refusing them. Louis offered to give up all Spain, and the Indies, East and West; to acknowledge Charles king of undivided Spain; to give no support to Philip, but to claim for him only Sicily and Naples. When it was objected that Naples was already in the possession of Austria, and could not be given up, the ambassadors waived the claim of Naples, and contented themselves with Sicily and Sardinia for Philip. As a security for Philip evacuating Spain, they offered to give up four cautionary towns in Flanders; to restore Strasburg and Brisac; to destroy all their fortifications on the Rhine from Basle to Philippsburg; to level all the fortifications of Dunkirk; and to surrender to the Dutch Maubeuge, Condé, Furnes, Menin, Ypres, Tournai, and Lille.

Surely nothing could be more complete. By gaining all these advantages the Allies gained everything they had been fighting for. They wanted not only an agreement for the surrender of Spain, but a sufficient guarantee for it; and this guarantee they demanded in the shape of an engagement that Louis should help them with actual money and arms to expel Philip from Spain if he refused to evacuate it, and really to place Austria in possession of it. This was certainly putting the sincerity of Louis to sufficient test, and Louis failed under it. He contended that it would be monstrous and unnatural to take arms against his own grandson, but that he would contribute money for this purpose--which, to ordinary intellects, looks quite as monstrous. He offered, according to his able Prime Minister De Torcy, to pay five hundred thousand livres a month towards this object, or even to raise it to a million of money if the Allies would not be satisfied with less. But as the Allies, in the first place, knew that Louis had not money to meet the demands of his own Government, and, in the second place, that Philip had sent an express declaration to the Allies, when this question was mooted before, that he stood on his rightful claim through the will of Charles II., the late King of Spain, and would recognise no pretensions of any party to deal with his patrimony--they declined the offer, and declared they would be contented with nothing less than the actual possession of the country. They knew that at the very time that these negotiations were going on, Philip was making fresh and strenuous exertions to drive Charles from Spain; that he had appealed to Louis to send him the Duc de Vendôme to take the command in that country, with which request Louis promptly complied. They knew that France had only to close the passes of the Pyrenees, and, under the pretence of protecting her own frontiers from the armies in Spain, shut out all attack on Philip, except by sea.

On this rock, therefore, the whole negotiation was wrecked. Louis had flattered himself that Marlborough, distracted by the state of affairs in England, would be anxious to make peace, in order that he might be on the spot to resist the fall of the Whig party at home, and with it of his influence. But the wiser De Torcy reasoned very differently. He saw that the party of Marlborough was already ruined, and for him to return home would be to return to insignificance, mortification, and insult. His only safety and strength lay in the continuance of the war; on the chance of reaping new victories, and, therefore, new humiliation to his enemies. And in this De Torcy was correct. Marlborough did not appear in the matter. Lord Townshend for England, and Count Zinzendorff for the Emperor, were consulted by the States-General on all the points of the treaty; but the Pensionary Heinsius, the devoted friend of Marlborough and Eugene, kept them _au fait_ on the whole subject, and influenced the States-General as they dictated. The result was that, after the negotiations had continued from the 19th of March to the 21st of July, during which there was a rapid and frequent interchange of messages with Versailles, the conference broke up.

The campaign had not paused for the issue of the conference. Eugene and Marlborough left the Hague on the 15th of March, and assembled their troops, which quartered on the Meuse, at Tournai. The confederate army amounted to sixty thousand men, with which they invested Douay, and, Eugene remaining to carry on the siege, Marlborough advanced to Vitry, where he encamped. Marshal Villars--at the head of an army numerous and well appointed, considering the distresses of France, and all the more numerous because men, destitute of the means of livelihood, flocked to the royal banners--passed the Scheldt and encamped at Bouchain, declaring that he would engage the Allies; but he thought better of it. His aim was to embarrass the siege of Douay, in which there was a strong French garrison, commanded by General Albergotti. The defence was vigorous, Albergotti making frequent sallies, and altogether the Allies suffered severely before the town. It was compelled, however, to capitulate on the 26th of June. Eugene and Marlborough, being again united, contemplated forcing the lines of the enemy between Arras and Miramont, but finding them too strong, they resolved to besiege Béthune, which in spite of the menacing attitude of Marshal Villars, who marched out of his entrenchments as if going to attack them, surrendered on the 29th of August. They afterwards took also the inconsiderable towns of Aire and Verrant, and there the campaign ended. The armies broke up and retired to winter quarters.

This was a poor result after the grand schemes of storming Boulogne and marching upon Paris. The fact was, that the anxious condition of affairs at home completely paralysed Marlborough. He was no longer the man he had been. His mind was dragged different ways, and was harassed with anxieties. He could no longer concentrate his attention on one great plan of warfare, and the consequence was, that his action was spiritless and indecisive. He seemed to have lost the secret of success, and met with annoyances which his vigilance and promptitude had hitherto prevented. On one occasion a great supply of powder and other stores was intercepted by the enemy, though under the guard of twelve hundred foot and four hundred and eighty horse. In a word he was discouraged, divided in his own mind, and the spell of victory, or rather of high enterprise, was broken.

In other quarters the scene was not more encouraging. Nothing of consequence was effected on the Rhine, and in Piedmont the Duke of Savoy, still out of humour with the Emperor, did nothing. The Imperial forces were commanded by Count Daun, who endeavoured to cross the Alps and penetrate into Dauphiné, but was effectually kept back by the Duke of Berwick, who held the mountain passes. In Spain, after a brilliant commencement of the campaign, everything went to ruin. General Stanhope, having passed in his Parliamentary character through the Sacheverell campaign, joined the Imperial general, Count Stahremberg, in Catalonia, in May. On the 10th of July they encountered the army of King Philip at Almenara. Stanhope had the charge of the cavalry, killed with his own hand the commander of Philip's guards, General Amessaga, and routed the whole body of horse, upon which the infantry retired precipitately on Lerida. General Stahremberg pursued the flying army to Saragossa, where King Philip made a stand, but was again defeated, with a loss of five thousand men, seven thousand taken prisoners, with all his artillery, and a great number of colours and standards. Charles and his confederates entered Saragossa in triumph, and Philip continued his flight to Madrid. Whilst victory was with them, General Stanhope urged King Charles to push on to Madrid, drive Philip into the Pyrenees, and secure the pass of Pampeluna, the only one by which Louis could send reinforcements. But the inert Austrian loitered away a whole month at Saragossa, and it was not till the middle of September that Stanhope could induce him to advance. On the 21st of that month Stanhope, still leading the way, entered Madrid without opposition, Philip and all the grandees having retreated to Valladolid. On the 28th Charles himself made his entry into Madrid, but General Stanhope soon perceived that he had no welcome. The Castilians to a man were for Philip, and did the army of Charles all the mischief they could, cutting off his supplies, attacking his outposts, and destroying all the stragglers and foragers that they could meet with. Stanhope still urged Charles to send on a detachment to secure Toledo, and to keep open the passage of the Tagus to facilitate an expected advance of Portuguese troops in his favour. The Portuguese, however, did not make their appearance; provisions failed in Madrid, for the peasantry held back the supply, and the whole army marched to Toledo, where it found itself still worse off. Philip, meanwhile, had sent in haste to request reinforcements from Louis under the command of the Duc de Vendôme, and these approaching, the timid Charles hastened back into Catalonia as the only place of security.

Such was continually the fluctuating condition of the war in Spain. The Spaniards had no inclination to support Charles, and the Allies only sent troops sufficient to win victories, but not to maintain them, still less to secure the passes in the Pyrenees and keep back fresh French armies. It was another of our futile attempts to support a man who, unless he could support himself, had no business there. At this juncture the Tories, having risen into power, withheld fresh reinforcements. They were not hearty in the war, and our small army there was left to contend with impossibilities. The English and Imperialists unwillingly following in the track of the king towards Catalonia, for the sake of better procuring provisions on the route, had separated and marched at some distance from each other, though in parallel lines. In this condition they were suddenly overtaken by Vendôme on the 8th of December, and Stanhope, with his five thousand men, found himself surrounded by the main army of the French. This was an instance of want of circumspection which was not anticipated in General Stanhope after his vigorous and able operations hitherto, and procured him severe blame. He managed to despatch a messenger to Stahremberg for help; but his powder was nearly exhausted, and after courageously defending himself till the next day, he was compelled to surrender himself in the little town of Brihuega. Stahremberg was accused of tardy movement for the relief of Stanhope, but he was probably prevented from coming up by the forces of Vendôme, who attacked him also on the 10th at Villaviciosa. Vendôme's troops are said to have doubled in number those of Stahremberg. Stahremberg's left wing was routed, and great slaughter made of them; but Stahremberg himself maintained the fight with his right wing till night, when the French retreated, having suffered equally severely with the troops of Stahremberg. The Imperial general, however, found himself unable to pursue the advantage; he ordered all the guns to be spiked, and retreated as fast as possible into Catalonia. Vendôme pursued him, took Balaguer on the way, in which he left a garrison, and followed Stahremberg to the very walls of Barcelona. About the same time the Duc de Noailles invested Gironne, and took it in the severity of the winter weather; and thus was Charles, after a few months' campaign, which began so splendidly, stripped of the whole Spanish monarchy, with the exception of Catalonia, which was itself greatly exposed and very inefficiently defended.

At home the new Parliament met on the 25th of November. There was a strong infusion of Tories sent up, but there was still also a strong party of Whigs. The Tories, however, carried the Speakership in the person of Mr. Bromley, in the place of the late Whig Speaker, Onslow; but the chief managers of the Sacheverell trial had managed to secure their own return. The queen, on the other hand, showed her prejudice by knighting Mr. Constantine Phipps, Sacheverell's counsel, and making him Lord Chancellor of Ireland, and giving other promotions to marked Tories. In her Speech, Anne declared that she would support the Church of England, maintain the Constitution, and grant the indulgence allowed by law to scrupulous consciences. The word was no longer "toleration," but "indulgence," the very phrase used by Sacheverell--another proof of the queen's leaning towards the doctor. And this phrase now became general in the High Church, the doctrine being that whatever liberty the Dissenters enjoyed was of indulgence, and not of right. In the House of Lords the Earl of Scarborough moved the usual vote of thanks to the Duke of Marlborough, but the Duke of Argyll opposed it; and the duke's friends let the matter drop, hoping to carry it when the duke returned. Other signs of the great change which had taken place in the domestic policy of the nation quickly followed. The Earl of Peterborough, who had so long suffered from the overwhelming shade of Marlborough, was appointed Ambassador-Extraordinary to the Imperial Court. The Earl of Rivers was appointed Ambassador to Hanover; and Richard Hill, a kinsman of Mrs. Masham, Ambassador-Extraordinary to the States-General, and also to the Council of State appointed for the government of the Spanish Netherlands, in the place of Lieutenant-General Cadogan. Colonels Meredith, Macartney, and Honeywood, were deprived of their regiments for drinking confusion to the enemies of the Duke of Marlborough. The Marlborough reign was at an end.

The Tories being now in power, there was an entire revolution of opinion and of measures. Everything which had been applauded and encouraged under the Whigs was now to be decried; everything which had been kept down was to be set on high. When Marlborough, therefore, arrived during the Christmas holidays, it was to a most cold reception. There were no longer popular acclamations, nor Lords and Commons hurrying to offer him thanks and eulogies for his eminent services. The public mind had been carefully indoctrinated on this point, and the great commander landed in a most expressive silence. He waited, as was his duty, on the queen, was admitted to about half an hours audience, and the next morning attended a meeting of the Privy Council. But both in the Presence and the Council Chamber the same ominous and freezing silence reigned. The queen plainly told him that he was now no longer to expect the thanks of Parliament as formerly; and she added that, notwithstanding, she trusted he would act in harmony with her Ministers. Marlborough showed no outward signs of resentment. He was anxious still to continue the command of the army, and to put the finish to his successes by compelling a satisfactory peace from Louis, now reduced to the most terrible straits.

The duke saw that it was time for the duchess to resign her offices. The queen had repeatedly insisted to Marlborough that the duchess should deliver up the gold keys, the token of her offices of Groom of the Stole and Mistress of the Robes; but that resolute woman refused to comply. Marlborough, unable to obtain the keys, endeavoured to mollify the queen's anger at the delay. His appeal, however, did not decrease the queen's impatience, and Marlborough imperatively demanded the keys from his wife. For some time she vehemently refused to part with them, but after a violent and stormy altercation (according to Cunningham) she finished by flinging them at his head. The duke snatched them up and hurried to the palace with them, where, says the same authority, the Queen received them with far greater pleasure than if he had brought her the spoils of the army; at which, he says, "the duchess flew about the town in a rage, and with eyes and words full of vengeance."

There was no doubt that the queen's exultation was great at being at length liberated from the heavy and imperious yoke of the Marlboroughs. People who had absented themselves from Court for years, now presented themselves there to pay their respects, and, amongst them, the Duke of Beaufort congratulated Anne that he could now salute his queen in reality. The duchess's places were immediately given to the Duchess of Somerset and Mrs. Masham. The Tory raid against the Whigs was pursued with unpausing ardour. An inquiry was set on foot in the Lords into the conduct of the war in Spain. The Earl of Peterborough's turn was now come. He was examined before a committee, and imputed the mismanagement of the war in Spain to Galway and General Stanhope. Galway made an able defence, but the House, notwithstanding, passed a resolution that Lord Peterborough had most honourably distinguished himself by his able counsels and active services in Spain; and that Galway, Lord Tyrawley, and General Stanhope had been very culpable in advising an offensive war in Spain, which had caused all our misfortunes, and especially the battle of Almanza. But in blaming the generals they blamed also the Ministers who sanctioned the war, and then so badly supported it. The failure of the attempt on Toulon was attributed to the same cause. Thanks were voted to Lord Peterborough; and in rendering them it was not forgotten to make some caustic criticisms on Marlborough.