France saw the snare,and resolved to run any risk rather than to be caught in it.We continued to demand,under pretence of securing the cession of Spain and the West Indies,that Louis the Fourteenth should take on him to dethrone his grandson in the space of two months;and if he did not effect it in that time,that we should be at liberty to renew the war without restoring the places that were to be put into our hands according to the preliminaries;which were the most important places France possessed on the side of the Low Countries.Louis offered to abandon his grandson;and,if he could not prevail on him to resign,to furnish money to the allies,who might at the expense of France force him to evacuate Spain.The proposition made by the allies had an air of inhumanity:and the rest of mankind might be shocked to see the grandfather obliged to make war on his grandson.But Louis the Fourteenth had treated mankind with too much inhumanity in his prosperous days,to have any reason to complain even of this proposition.His people,indeed,who are apt to have great partiality for their kings,might pity his distress.This happened,and he found his account in it.Philip must have evacuated Spain,I think,notwithstanding his own obstinacy,the spirit of his queen,and the resolute attachment of the Spaniards,if his grandfather had insisted,and been in earnest to force him.But if this expedient was,as it was,odious,why did we prefer to continue the war against France and Spain,rather than accept the other?why did we neglect the opportunity of reducing,effectually and immediately,the exorbitant power of France,and of rendering the conquest of Spain practicable?both which might have been brought about,and consequently the avowed ends of the war might have been answered,by accepting the expedient that France offered."France,"it was said,"was not sincere:she meant nothing more than to amuse,and divide."This reason was given at the time;but some of those who gave it then,I have seen ashamed to insist on it since.France was not in a condition to act the part she had acted in former treaties:and her distress was no bad pledge of her sincerity on this occasion.But there was a better still.The strong places that she must have put into the hands of the allies,would have exposed her,on the least breach of faith,to see,not her frontier alone,but even the provinces that lie behind it,desolated:and prince Eugene might have had the satisfaction,it is said,I know not how truly,he desired,of marching with the torch in his hand to Versailles.
Your lordship will observe,that the conferences at Gertruydenberg ending in the manner they did,the inflexibility of the allies gave new life and spirit to the French and Spanish nations,distressed and exhausted as they were.The troops of the former withdrawn out of Spain,and the Spaniards left to defend themselves as they could,the Spaniards alone obliged us to retreat from Madrid,and defeated us in our retreat.But your lordship may think perhaps,as I do,that if Louis the Fourteenth had bound himself by a solemn treaty to abandon his grandson,had paid a subsidy to dethrone him,and had consented to acknowledge another king of Spain,the Spaniards would not have exerted the same zeal for Philip;the actions of Almenara and Saragossa might have been decisive,and those of Brihuega and Villa Viciosa would not have happened.After all these events,how could any reasonable man expect that a war should be supported with advantage in Spain,to which the court of Vienna had contributed nothing from the first,scarce bread to their archduke;which Portugal waged faintly and with deficient quotas;and which the Dutch had in a manner renounced,by neglecting to recruit their forces?How was Charles to be placed on the Spanish throne,or Philip at least to be driven out of it?By the success of the confederate arms in other parts.But what success,sufficient to this purpose,could we expect?This question may be answered best,by showing what success we had.
Portugal and Savoy did nothing before the death of the emperor Joseph;and declared in form,as soon as he was dead,that they would carry on the war no longer to set the crown of Spain on the head of Charles,since this would be to fight against the very principle they had fought for.The Rhine was a scene of inaction.The sole efforts,that were to bring about the great event of dethroning Philip,were those which the Duke of Marlborough was able to make.He took three towns in one thousand seven hundred and ten,Aire,Methune,and St.Venant:and one,Bouchain,in one thousand seven hundred and eleven.Now this conquest being in fact the only one the confederates made that year,Bouchain may be said properly and truly to have cost our nation very near seven millions sterling:for your lordship will find,Ibelieve,that the charge of the war for that year amounted to no less.It is true that the Duke of Marlborough had proposed a very great project,by which incursions would have been made during the winter into France;the next campaign might have been opened early on our side;and several other great and obvious advantages might have been obtained:but the Dutch refused to contribute,even less than their proportion,for the queen had offered to take the deficiency on herself,to the expense of barracks and forage;and disappointed by their obstinacy the whole design.
