CHAP. on the other hand, the people at large were mur VII. 1716. muring at the oppressive and unwonted burden of a standing army, which, therefore, it seemed equally dangerous to disband or to maintain. On the whole, it plainly appeared that it was hopeless to expect any restoration of quiet and security, unless France, our nearest and most formidable neighbour, and the power that could afford by far the greatest aid to the Pretender, should be effectually detached from his cause. Now, to effect this necessary object, either of two plans might be pursued. The first and most obvious was to follow up the principles of the Grand Alliance, and form a close connection with the States-General and the Emperor, so as to compel France to dismiss the Pretender, and his principal partisans, Mar and Ormond, from all her dominions or dependencies. But to this course there were strong, and indeed invincible, objections. The protracted struggle of the Cabinets of Vienna and the Hague, with respect to the Barrier Treaty, and the bitter animosity which had thereby arisen on both sides, prevented any close and cordial union between them. Nor was the Emperor friendly to King George, as Elector of Hanover; he viewed with peculiar jealousy the claims upon Bremen and Verden, which will presently be noticed; and without relinquishing these, it would have been impossible at that juncture to enter into a thorough concert of measures with the Cabinet of Vienna. The States-General, it is true, had no such jea VII. 1716. lousy; but their administration, once so active and CHA P. able, was daily lapsing more and more into weakness and imbecility: "it is now," says Horace Walpole, the British Minister at the Hague,* "a "many-headed, headless Government, containing as many masters as minds." Their torpid obstinacy, which had so often defied even the mastermind of Marlborough, was far beyond the control of any other English Minister. Besides, what sufficient inducements could be held out to them or to the Emperor for incurring the hazard of another war? Would the Catholics of Vienna be so very zealous for the service of the Protestant Succession? Would the Austrian politicians—at all times eminently selfish-consider the banishment of the Pretender from France as more than a merely English object? Would they risk every thing to promote it? Why, even when their own dearest interests were at issue-when the monarchy of Spain was the stake-they had shown a remarkable slackness and indifference. "We look upon the House of "Austria," said Lord Bolingbroke, in 1711, "as a 66 party who sues for a great estate IN FORMA PAU"PERIS." And he adds elsewhere: "I never "think of the conduct of that family without recollecting the image of a man braiding a rope of 66 hay, whilst his ass bites it off at the other end.” * See his Life by Coxe, p. 12. †To Mr. Drummond, August 7, 1711. To Mr. Drummond, January 5, 1711. Marlborough himself was sometimes provoked into similar expressions : "The VII. CHAP. On the whole, therefore, it appeared in 1716, that the utmost to which the States-General and the 1716. Emperor could be brought, was a defensive alliance with England, in case of aggression from France or other powers; and such alliances were accordingly concluded with Holland on the 6th of February, and with the Emperor on the 25th of May, with a mutual guarantee of territory; but these still left the desired removal of the Pretender and his adherents unaccomplished. It became necessary, therefore, to consider the second plan for attaining this great object; namely, by treaty and friendly union with France herself. Nor were there wanting, since the death of Louis the Fourteenth, many circumstances highly favourable to such views. The Regent Duke of Orleans had, in nearly all respects, adopted a different political course. So long, indeed, as the Jacobites were in arms in Scotland, he clung to the hope of the restoration of the Stuarts; or, in other words, the establishment in England of an entirely French policy. But the suppression of the rebellion and the return of the Pretender having dissipated, or at least delayed, all such hopes, and the Regent considering the new Government of England as more firmly established, seriously turned his mind. to the advantage which might arise to him from 66 Emperor is in the wrong in almost every thing he does." To Lord Sunderland, June 27, 1707. * See Lamberty, Mem. vol. ix. p. 395, and p. 471. VII. 1716. a friendly union with it. Besides the public in- CHAP. terests of France, he had also personal objects at stake; and he looked to the chance of his own succession to the throne. Not that he had even for a single moment, or in the slightest degree, formed any design against the rights of Louis the Fifteenth; with all his failings (and he had very many) in private life, he was certainly a man of honour in public, and nothing could be more pure and above reproach than his care of his infant sovereign. But he might fairly and justly contemplate the possibility that the life of a sickly boy might prematurely end; on which event the Regent would have become the legitimate heir, since the birthright of Philip the Fifth of Spain had been solemnly renounced. It was, however, generally understood, that in such a case Philip was not disposed to be bound by his renunciation; and, in fact, in his position, he might disclaim it with some show of plausibility, since his own rights upon the Spanish Crown were only founded upon the invalidity of a renunciation precisely similar. His grandmother, the Infanta Maria Theresa, on her marriage with the King of France, had in the most solemn manner, for herself and her descendants, renounced all claim to the Crown of Spain. Yet her grandson was now reigning at Madrid. How could, then, that grandson be expected cordially to concur in the principle that renunciations are sacred and inviolable, and cheerfully forego the sceptre of France if once placed within his grasp ? СНАР. 1716. Foreseeing this opposition, and not without apprehensions that the King of Spain might, meanwhile, attempt to wrest the Regency from his hands, the Duke of Orleans was anxious to provide himself with foreign support, and knew that none could be stronger than a guarantee from England of the succession to the House of Orleans. For this object he was willing, on the part of France, to make corresponding concessions. Such a guarantee would also, not merely thus indirectly, but in itself, be highly advantageous to England, as tending to prevent that great subject of apprehension, the union of the French and Spanish Crowns upon the same head. Thus, then, the Cabinet of St. James and the Palais Royal had, at this period, each a strong interest to enter into friendly and confidential relations with each other. This was first perceived and acted upon by the Regent. Townshend and Stanhope were for 66 * Coxe tells us in his Memoirs of Walpole, that "Townshend "was the original adviser and promoter of the French treaty, " and had gradually surmounted the indifference of the King, the opposition of Sunderland, and the disapprobation of Stanhope." But this statement in his first volume (p. 98) is disproved by the documents published by himself in the second. On Aug. 17, 1716, Old Style, Mr. Poyntz writes to Stanhope, "His Majesty "knows that Lord Townshend has long been of opinion that any "further engagements with the Regent, particularly with respect "to the succession, would only serve to strengthen the Regent, "and to put it in his power to do the King greater mischief.” And Lord Townshend himself, in his letter to the King, of November 11, 1716, Old Style, expressly limits the period when he began to approve and forward this French treaty to the time |