is, that we came four days before they expected us.' This movement was preparatory to the siege of Douay. It was expected that Villars would venture a battle for its relief, for it was a post of great importance, to which the allies could bring all their stores by water, even from Amsterdam, and the French had a great superiority of numbers. Marlborough looked for an action, but no longer with that joyous expectation which hitherto he had always felt, for the cursed spirit of faction which was undermining every thing at home had now begun to prevail, and was manifesting itself even in the army. If the battle was fought he believed that, from the nature of the country, it must be very decisive. 'I long for an end of the war,' says he, so God's will be done. Whatever the event may be, I shall have nothing to reproach myself with, having with all my heart done my duty, and being hitherto blessed with more success than ever was known before. My wishes and duty are the same: but I can't say I have the same sanguine prophetic spirit I did use to have, for in all the former actions I did never doubt of success, we having had constantly the great blessing of being of one mind. I cannot say it is so now, for I fear some are run so far into villainous faction, that it would give them more content to see us beaten; but if I live I will be so watchful that it shall not be in their power to do much hurt.' Douay fell; the skilful dispositions of Villars prevented the allies from laying siege to Arras, which had been their intention; they therefore turned upon Bethune, which they invested, and won. The French marshals constructed a series of defences to cover the interior of France; and the allies closed the campaign by the capture of Aire and St. Venant.

Meantime the administration of the whigs had been effectually. undermined, and they had ample reason to regret the impolitic way in which they forced themselves into office, and the illjudged and intemperate manner in which they had conducted the late negociation, and given the king of France so great an advantage over them in the opinion of the world. A large portion of Mr. Coxe's work is necessarily employed in developing the miserable intrigues by which they were fooled as well as overthrown. We may be allowed to avoid the pain and humiliation of following him through the disgraceful detail, except in that part wherein Marlborough was more particularly concerned. By a strange inconsistency, the duchess, high-minded as she was, after her long bickerings with the Queen, and the total alienation which she had in some degree provoked and deserved, dreaded a dismissal from her office as something disgraceful: and when the intention of dismissing her was intimated, Marlborough, in a personal interview, requested the Queen not to remove her

till the end of the war, which might reasonably be expected in the course of a year, when, he said, they would both retire together. The Queen, who had all the inflexibility of her father's character, insisted that the gold key should be delivered to her within three days, and Marlborough, even on his knees, intreated for an interval of ten days, that means might be devised for rendering the blow less mortifying and disgraceful. It is mortifying to record this, but it was his last, or rather his only weakness, and its palliation may be found in that affection for his wife, which, had he been less than what he was, would have degenerated into uxoriousness. From all the other trials which were preparing for him he came off like gold from the furnace. And on this occasion also he perfectly recovered himself. The queen, with her characteristic temper, insisted upon having the key within the time that she had specified: Marlborough delivered it that same evening; and not being prepared for so ready an obedience, her behaviour was such as if a sense of her own ingratitude had then confounded her. His own feeling of resentment would have led him to resign the command at the same time: the advice of the duchess, and of Godolphin, a consideration of what was due to Eugene, to the allies, and to the general good, -finally, the hope of being yet enabled to complete the services which he had rendered to Europe, and to his country (ungratefully as that country was now beginning to requite him) by concluding a safe and lasting peace, overcame this impulse. Mr. Coxe appears to regret this: in an evil hour, he says, he yielded to their representations, and continued in the command only to encounter the disgrace and persecution with which he had been threatened, and to lament the conclusion of that dishonourable peace which he so much deprecated. In this instance we differ from his biographer, and consider the magnanimity with which Marlborough then sacrificed all private considerations, and even hazarded his military reputation, by serving under a ministry whose malevolence he knew, and from whom he had reason to expect nothing but ill usage, as one of the many proofs of true greatness in the life of this illustrious man.

Under these circumstances he entered upon his last campaign, and with the further disadvantage of losing his worthy colleague Eugene, who, in consequence of the death of the Emperor Joseph, was called away, taking with him all his cavalry, and a considerable part of his foot. The French had been busily employed during the latter part of the autumn, and through the winter, in forming and strengthening a series of lines extending from Namur to the coast of Picardy, near Montreuil. Villars relied so much upon the strength of these defences that he boasted of having at

last

last brought Marlborough to his ne plus ultra: he was encouraged also by the immediate diminution of force which Eugene's departure had occasioned, and sent word to his antagonist that he should be 30,000 stronger than the allies. Upon this Marlborough observed, if their superiority be as great as he says it will be, I should not apprehend much from them, but that of their being able to hinder us from acting, which to my own particular would be mortification enough; for, since constant success has not met with approbation, what may I not expect when nothing is done! As I rely very much on Providence, so I shall be ready at improving all occasions that may offer.' But whatever superiority of numbers the French might have possessed, Louis was at that time playing too sure a game with the English cabinet to hazard any thing in the field: Villars therefore received positive orders not to risk an engagement. Marlborough's object was to invest Bouchain; to do this he must break through the lines, and he well knew that the consent of the generals and Dutch deputies could never be obtained for so difficult an attempt: he must, therefore, imperceptibly bring them into a situation where they would perceive the necessity of the measure, and he must deceive the enemy at the same time. He effected both objects, and duped the enemy so effectually, that having first made them demolish the fortifications at Arleux which impeded his project, he got within their lines without losing a single man-being, says Colonel Blackader, one of the finest projects and best executed which has been during the war. Villars endeavoured then to lure him to a battle, as the only means of wiping off the disgrace, and even the Dutch deputies were so elated with this great and unexpected success that they urged him to attack the French; but Marlborough knew, from the nature of the ground, and the exhausted state of the men, who had marched ten or twelve leagues the preceding day, that this could not be done with any reasonable prospect of advantage. He had gained his object without a battle; and he chose to expose himself to the censure of envious tongues and evil minded men, rather than hazard the lives of his men without an adequate cause. Blackader, while he expresses his regret at the disappointment, bears, at the same time, a just testimony to the commander. It was very near carried in a council of war,' he says, ' that we should attack them, but it was resolved otherwise, to the regret of most part of the army. In such cases vox exercitus vox Dei. Our soldiers were much encouraged by their success in passing the lines, and the enemy much discouraged. When God delivers our enemy into our hand, and we let them escape, he often allows them to be more troublesome afterwards. On the other hand, we are not to be suspiciou

suspicious of our general's conduct; we have more reason to admire it, and to believe he knows a thousand times better what is -to be done than we. Submissive obedience is our duty, and I give it heartily. If any man deserves implicit obedience I think he does, both in respect of his capacity and integrity.'

In the face of a superior force Marlborough now laid siege to Bouchain, the armies being so near and in so extraordinary a situation that the besiegers were bombarded by the enemy. But the only fruit which Villars derived from this was the mortification of seeing the garrison, consisting of eight battalions and 500 horse, march out as prisoners of war. An anecdote of Marlborough at this time ought never to be omitted in any account of his life, however brief. Fenelon was then archbishop of Cambray. The estates of his see were exposed to plunder, and, from respect to his genius and virtues, the English commander ordered a detachment to guard the magazines of corn at Chateau Cambresis, and gave a safe-conduct for their conveyance to Cambray. But apprehending afterwards that even this protection might not be respected because of the scarcity of bread, he sent a corps of dragoons with waggons to transport the grain, and escort it to the precincts of the town. He meditated next the capture of Quesnoy; the ministers at home affected to approve of his intention, and assured him that they were making the strongest representations to the Dutch for the purpose of obtaining their concurrence. While these very ministers were deceiving their general, they were carrying on a secret negociation with France, and had actually agreed to the preliminaries of that peace by which the interests of their allies and their country were betrayed.

We may be spared the humiliating task of following the manoeuvres by which the peace of Utrecht was brought about, and of entering into the details of that abominable transaction; a transaction in which the agents at home felt so secure of their power, and at the same time so conscious of their deserts, that they jested among themselves about the gallows and the scaffold, to which they might be exposed if they lost the protection of the Queen, and the ministers abroad espoused so openly the interest of the enemy, as to provoke from Eugene the indignant question whether they were acting as negociators on the side of England or of France. The whole scheme of this infamous administration could not be effected as long as Marlborough was at the head of the army. It was impossible to make him act treacherously towards the allies; and it was always to be feared that by some signal stroke he might at once defeat the French army and the schemes of the English cabinet. The removal of Marlborough therefore was necessary to the success of their plans, and

this

this alone would prove how rightly he acted in not resigning the command. The means by which they brought about his dismissal were worthy of the men. They accused him of peculation, because he had received the same perquisites which had always been allowed to the commander-in-chief in those countries for secret service money; which he had been privileged to receive, moreover, and to employ without account, by the Queen's royal warrant, and which had been applied, as Marlborough, said in his defence, from time to time for intelligence and secret service, hand with such success, that next to the blessing of God and the bravery of the troops, we might in great measure attribute most of the advantages of the war in the Low Countries to the timely and good advice procured with the help of this money.' Upon this ground, and upon the undeniable fact that the same allowance had been always paid to his predecessors, Marlborough so completely vindicated himself, that though the commissioners of public accounts, who were the tools of the reigning faction, pronounced an opinion against him, in a report as flagrantly false as it was malicious, and though upon that report the Queen dismissed him from all his employments, that the matter might undergo an impartial investigation' his enemies, malignant as they were, dared not pursue the investigation. When Louis heard of this act, he added with his own hand a sentence in his dispatches to his agent at London, saying, the affair of displacing the Duke of Marlborough will do for us all we desire.'.

Every means was now used to blacken the late ministry;-for this purpose no accusation was either too absurd or too atrocious. A cry of peculation was raised against them, as that which was most likely to obtain belief among the vulgar, and excite popular outcry. A deficit of thirty-five millions was charged against them, as if they were responsible for all the unsettled accounts since the Restoration; and this charge, as has generally been the case, dwindled to nothing when it was examined. In those days it was the custom on the anniversary of Queen Elizabeth's inauguration, to burn in effigy the Pope, the Devil and the Pretender. The effigies were arrested upon a pretence that the whigs intended + to take advantage of the holiday to excite an insurrection; and 1 this ridiculous story has found its way into historical writings at home and abroad, with the additional absurdity, that Marlborough was to put himself at the head of the mob, and that Prince Eugene was to support him. Another fable accused them of a design to fire the city, murder the ministers, seize and depose the Queen, and place the Elector of Hanover on the throne! Slanders of this kind were too gross to deserve contradiction, nor could the slanderer be fixed upon. At length a personal insult

of