164

LOUIS RETURNS TO VERSAILLES.

[1693

prince de Vaudemont, that he was lost-that he could only escape by a miracle." Luxemburg urged Louis to advance. To the astonishment of the French armies the king announced his determination, on the 8th of June, to return to Versailles, and to send part of the great force into Germany. St. Simon attributes this resolution to the remembrance of the tears which Madame de Maintenon had shed at their parting, and to the letters in which she urged the return of her royal lover or husband. The same shrewd witness of what was clearly regarded as pusillanimity in the great king, describes the bursts of laughter amongst friends, the sneers, the whispered indignation, which even the most extravagant loyalty could not suppress. Louis retraced his steps to Namur, and on the 25th of June he arrived with his ladies at Versailles.

Boufflers had left the army of the Netherlands with the detached force sent to the Rhine. Luxemburg was now in the sole command of the French army, which was still superior to that of William. But this ablest of the generals of Louis by his skilful manoeuvres contrived to weaken William's force. William had learnt that Luxemburg was advancing to lay siege to Liège, and he determined to detach a large body to assist in its defence, leaving his own entrenched camp near Louvain, and marching with his remaining fifty thousand men to a favourable position on the river Gette. The feint of Luxemburg was successful. He suddenly turned from the road to Liège; and on the 28th of July, William was aware that he had been deceived, and that the enemy was coming fast upon him with a greatly superior army. He would not retreat. All that could be done was to strengthen his position. In one night of incessant labour entrenchments had been thrown up; redoubts had been constructed; the hedges and mud walls of the two villages which the allies occupied had been converted into barricades. "It is incredible," says

St. Simon, "that in so few hours, such an extent of regular defences could have been created." On the morning of the 29th of July, their value was to be tested.

When Luxemburg suddenly changed his apparent determination to move upon Liège, he ordered the fascines to be burnt, with which each battalion had been provided for the siege. By a rapid march of eight leagues he had reached a plain within hearing of the multitudinous sounds of William's camp. All the night these noises were heard, and "we began to fear," says St. Simon, "that the enemy was about to retreat." The sun had scarcely risen when the batteries of the allied army gave effectual proof that no flight was meditated. The French artillery could not be brought up till an hour afterwards. "We then began to see," says St. Simon, "that the affair would be difficult." The allies occupied the heights, and the two villages of Neerwinden and of Bas-Landen, one on the right and the other on the left. A long entrenchment, on the high ground, connected one village with the other. As the French cavalry advanced, the batteries from their commanding entrenchment did great execution. The great struggle was for the possession of these villages, especially of Neerwinden. The French infantry attacked with the impetuosity of their nation, and they were repulsed by the English characteristic obstinacy. At Neerwinden their general Montchevreul was killed, and the young duke of Berwick was taken prisoner. The French cavalry endeavoured to force the entrenchments, and were suffered to approach within

1693.]

BATTLE OF LANDEN.

165

pistol-shot of the allied infantry, when, says St. Simon, "the enemy gave such a well-directed volley, that the horse wheeled round, and retired faster than they came." During four hours had this struggle been carried on. Twice had the French infantry been repulsed, and thrice the French cavalry. St. Simon relates how Luxemburg called the princes of the blood, and his fellow marshals, to a conference at a spot out of reach of the cannon of the allies, and there for half an hour earnestly debated what course should be adopted, under the circumstances of such obstinate resistance. A third time it was resolved to attack Neerwinden, but with such an overwhelming force as should carry the victory, if victory were to be won. The household troops of Louis, headed by the prince of Conti, attacked with irresistible fury. When they had carried the walled gardens and cleared the entrenched street, the carbineers and the cavalry poured in. The allies began to retreat as the French gained possession of Neerwinden, from the top of whose clock-tower the curé of the village looked down upon the terrible struggle. Suddenly William appeared at the head of his English guards; and the famous household troops of France," until now invincible" says St. Simon, gave way before him. But all was in vain. The entrenchments of the main line could not be adequately defended, whilst the brunt of the conflict had to be borne in the two villages on the extreme right and left. The line was broken; a retreat was necessary; but it was not a disorderly retreat. William, according to the sober narrative of St. Simon, fought to the last, and he with the elector of Bavaria passed over the bridge which the allies had constructed over the Gette, when he saw that there was no reasonable hope in a further contest. A more enthusiastic relation thus paints the king: "Gallant mortal! This moment, now that all is lost, I see him galloping across me, corporal, to the left, to bring up the remains of the English horse along with him to support the right, and tear the laurel from Luxemburg's brows, if yet 'tis possible-I see him with the knot of his scarf just shot off, infusing fresh spirit into poor Galway's regiment-riding along the line-then wheeling about, and charging Conti at the head of it-Brave! brave by heaven! cried my uncle Toby,-he deserves a crown." It is the fire of genius which thus lights up the traditions of Sterne's boyhood. The daring of William, "when all was lost," was not "to tear the laurel from Luxemburg's brow," but to cover the retreat of his scattered forces, as they had to cross the temporary bridges, or plunge into the fords and climb the steep banks of the Gette. The exhausted victors remained upon the ground they had won. There had been twelve hours of fighting. Twenty thousand of both armies fell in that terrible battle-field, which the French call Neerwinden and the English call Landen. The victory of Luxemburg had no direct results. The retreat of William involved no greater disaster. He was not a fortunate general, but no one could deny his courage and his indomitable energy. He was one of those who possess the rare faculty of considering no misfortune, however severe, to be irretrievable. On the night of the battle he wrote a note to his friend Portland, in which he says, "These are great trials, which God has been pleased to send me in quick succession. I must try to submit to His pleasure without murmuring, and to deserve His anger less." In three weeks he had gathered all his forces around him at Brussels. The detachment that had been unfortunately sent to Liège had joined the head-quarters in safety.

166

NAVAL MISCARRIAGES.

[1693. The crisis, William said, had been terrible; but he thanked God it had ended no worse. The only successful result of the campaign in which Louis took the field with a hundred and forty thousand men, to sweep the allies from the Netherlands, was the taking of Charleroy, to which siege William offered no opposition. The biographer of James pours out his complaints that the court of France had not availed itself of the advantages gained over the Allies, especially "at the famous battle of Landen," to be zealous in the matter of his restoration to the crown of England; "for there never was greater hopes of terrifying the English into their duty than at this time." His Most Christian Majesty did not avail himself of the favourable occasion. James had published a Declaration in April, which promised all sorts of good things to his rebellious subjects, in which promises no one confided. The dream so long indulged of "terrifying the English into their duty" was the last hope; and that was doomed to disappointment. The French, says the biographer of James, "began to be so weary of the war, and were indeed so terrified themselves by the great scarcity which happened that year, that his Most Christian Majesty thought fit to make offers of peace, by mediation of the crown of Denmark." He adds, "It is not improbable but when the English saw the French so disheartened after such mighty advantages, that it allayed their apprehensions of the king's being forced upon them, and consequently their endeavours of restoring him themselves." *

During the absence of the king, England had undergone other disasters besides that of Landen. She saw the operation of the Allies unsuccessful in every quarter. The French army which had been detached from Gembloux crossed the Rhine, and enabled another French force to take Heidelberg, and repeat the ravages which had previously disgraced their arms in the Palatinate. Catalonia was invaded, and the fortress of Rosas was taken by the French. The duke of Savoy sustained a memorable defeat at Marsiglia. Worst of all, through the mismanagement of naval affairs, the rich Smyrna fleet of English and Dutch merchantmen, which was to be convoyed by English and Dutch men-of-war, was intercepted by Tourville, and captured, destroyed, or scattered. In the utter want of correct intelligence, the English admirals, Killigrew and Delaval, had thought the squadron safe when they had sailed to a certain point beyond Ushant; for they believed that Tourville was in Brest harbour. He had come out, and had joined the Toulon fleet. Rooke, against his remonstrances, was left with a very inadequate force, and the other admirals sailed homeward, ready to avert any attempt upon the English coasts. Off Cape St. Vincent Rooke learnt that a French fleet was in the bay of Lagos. He soon found himself in presence of an enemy of four times his strength. The Dutch fought bravely, while Rooke made all speed with part of his unfortunate convoy to Madeira. The loss to the mercantile interest of England and Holland was enormous. suffering merchants of London sent a deputation to the queen, to pray for inquiry into the cause of this misfortune; and Mary's conciliatory reply disarmed some portion of the anger of the people. It was a time of great excitement. Violent pamphlets against the government were scattered abroad from secret presses. A printer named William Anderson was indicted

"Life of James II." vol. ii. p. 516.

The

1693.]

A MINISTRY FORMED.

167

for high treason, was convicted, and was executed. It requires a rather violent stretch of historical partisanship to affirm that such a conviction was legal, although the tracts inculcated a general insurrection, and the nation was exhorted to free itself from its tyrant. There was no proof of the printing of these tracts at the press of Anderson beyond what resulted from a comparison of the impressions of the types used with the types seized on his premises. Even if the proof of printing had been complete, we may conclude that there is "much danger in the construction which draws printed libels, unconnected with any conspiracy, within the pale of treason, and especially the treason of compassing the king's death, unless where they directly tended to his assassination." The punishment of Anderson only increased the virulence of the Jacobite pamphleteers, as must ever be the case when extreme punishments are resorted to as the readiest means of prevention for political offences. The hanging of Anderson in London, and the torturing of Nevil Payne in Edinburgh,† did more injury to the cause of William than the defeats of Steinkirk or Landen. He came to put down the injustice and cruelty of arbitrary power; and yet, said his enemies with some truth, tyranny still walks abroad under the mask of freedom.

*

At the beginning of November William was again at Kensington. The Parliament was to meet on the 7th. A great change in the administrative system of England was about to take place. The king for five years had endeavoured to govern by choosing his ministers from each of the two great parties of the State; sometimes giving the preponderance to the Whigs, at other times to the Tories. These ministers carried on the public affairs of their several departments without very well defined principles of action, amidst personal. hatreds and jealousies which were too often highly injurious to the national interests. An experiment was now to be made to substitute for this individual direction of public affairs the administration of a party. The heads of departments were to be united by some common consent upon political principles. "Party divisions," says Burke, "whether on the whole operating for good or evil, are things inseparable from free government." He held it to be a duty for public men "to act in party," with all the moderation consistent with vigour and fervency of spirit,-a duty not very easy at any time, and almost impossible in the earlier stages of representative government, when all were going through a sort of education in constitutional principles. William was about to change some of his ministers; at the same time to select new advisers from those who would "act in party;" who would submit their own wills to a general agreement; who would constitute what we now understand as a Ministry, whose possession of power under the authority of the sovereign, and with the command of a parliamentary majority, implied the superior influence of the general principles which constituted their bond of political union. William had become convinced that he could best carry on his government through the party which had mainly accomplished the Revolution. He would not compose his administration

Hallam, "Constitutional History," chap. xv.

We omitted to mention (ante, p. 131) that the warrant for the torture of Nevil Payne bears William's signature; a mere formal act, perhaps, but one which attaches obloquy to his memory. "Observations on a late State of the Nation."

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GOVERNMENT BY PARTY.

[1693 exclusively of Whigs, but there should be such a preponderance of those who held Whig principles, that the Tory party, so closely bordering upon the Jacobite party, should be neutralised in what we may now call a Cabinet. The functions of the Privy Council had become merged in the Cabinet Council. In a debate in 1692, on Advice given to the king, one member exclaimed, "Cabinet Council is not a word to be found in our law-books. We knew it not before. We took it for a nickname."* Another member described what the Cabinet was: "The method is this; things are concerted in the Cabinet, and brought and put upon them for their assent, without showing any of the reasons. That has not been the method of England. If this method be, you will never know who gives advice." The objectors to a Cabinet desired that every counsellor should, in the acts of Council, set his hand to assent or dissent. This was to secure individual responsibility for evil measures-a responsibility which has vanished in the united responsibility of a Ministry. However strong was the Parliamentary jealousy of a Cabinet, the exclusion of the Privy Council from the real business of the State became more and more established in the reign of William. But the jealousy remained. In a clause of the Statute of the 12 & 13 Will. III., "for the further Limitation of the Crown," it was enacted, that "all matters and things relating to the well-government of the kingdom, which are properly cognizable in the Privy Council, by the laws and customs of this realm, shall be transacted there." This was a prospective clause, to take effect after the succession contemplated by the Act. It was repealed by the 4 & 5 of Anne, c. 20, where the clause is recited. To make the supreme administration of affairs-the questions of armaments that required profound secresy, and of diplomacy whose success depended upon ministerial reserve-" properly cognizable in the Privy Council," has been impossible even if it had been salutary, since the power and influence of England gradually assumed the extension and proportions which began to characterise her policy subsequent to the Revolution. As representative government gradually compelled the sovereign to choose an administration founded upon the preponderance of a party, so this administration by party gradually broke up that unseemly division of the servants of the Crown into factions, which was occasionally manifested until the middle of the eighteenth century.

The earl of Sunderland had become a confidential adviser of king William. "By his long experience," says Burnet, "and his knowledge of men and things, he had gained an ascendancy over him, and had more credit with him than any Englishman ever had." § Sunderland's "knowledge of men and things" had been acquired in a long course of shaping his opinions by his conviction of what he thought the most expedient and profitable system for his own advancement and security. He had publicly supported the most tyrannous actions of James, however he might have secretly opposed some of them. To please his master, he had declared himself a Papist. To make himself safe in the Revolution which he saw at hand, he had betrayed

* Waller, "Parliamentary History," vol. v. col. 731. Wharton, "Parliamentary History," vol. v. col. 733.

Curiously enough, the clause does not appear in the Act of William, as given in the "Statutes of the Realm."

§ "Own Time," vol. iv. p. 215.