they had no other intention than to increase, at the expence of my crown, the states bordering upon France, and to open to themselves easy ways to penetrate into the heart of my kingdom, as often as it would suit with their interest to begin a new war. Nor would the war I now maintain, and was willing to have ended, have ceased had I consented to the proposals they have made to me. For they fixed within two months the term wherein I was, on my part, to execute the treaty; and during that interval they pretended to oblige me to deliver up to them the places they demanded of me in the Low Countries and Alsace, and to raze those, on the demolishing whereof they insisted; refusing, on their part, to enter into any other engagements than the suspension of all acts of hostility till the first day of August, and reserv-. ing to themselves the liberty of acting then by force of arms, in case the king of Spain, my grandson, persisted, in the resolution of defending the crown God has given him; and rather to perish than to abandon faithful people who for nine years have acknowledged him as their lawful king.

Such a suspension, more dangerous than war itself, would rather put off than forward peace. For it not only would have been necessary to continue the same expence for the maintaining of my armies, but as soon as the term of the suspension of arms would have ex-. pired, my enemies would have attacked me with the new advantages they would have derived from the towns into which I should have introduced them myself; at the, same time, that I should have demolished those that are, a bulwark to some of my frontier provinces.

I pass over in silence the proposals they have insinu

ated to me of joining my forces with those of the confederates, and to compel my grandson to descend the throne, if he did not voluntarily consent to live for the future without dominions, and to reduce himself to the condition of a private man. It is against humanity to believe that they had even the thought of engaging me in such an alliance with them; but although the tenderness I have for my people be as hearty as for my own children; although I bear a part in all the ills which the war makes such faithful subjects undergo, and I have shewn to all Europe that I sincerely desired to make them enjoy peace, I am persuaded they would themselves oppose the acceptance of it on conditions equally opposite to justice, and to the honor of the French

name.

It is, therefore, my intention that all those who, for so many years past, have given me demonstrations of their zeal, by contributing with their labors, fortunes, and blood, towards the maintaining so heavy a war, may know that the only value my enemies pretended to set on the offers I was willing to make to them, was a suspension of arms, which being stinted to the space of two months, would have procured to them more considerable advantages than they may expect from the confidence they put in their troops. As I repose mine in the protection of God, hoping that the purity of my inten tions will draw the divine blessing upon my arms, I write to the archbishops and bishops of my kingdom to excite more and more the fervency of prayer in their respective dioceses; and at the same time, I order you to acquaint my people within the extent of your government, that they should enjoy peace if it had been

in my power, as it was in my will to procure them a good they wish for with reason, but which must be obtained by new efforts, since the immense conditions I would have granted are useless towards the restoring of the public tranquillity. I therefore leave it to your prudence to make my intentions known in such a manner as you shall judge convenient. And so I pray God to have you in his holy keeping.

LOUIS.*

Notwithstanding the mortifying repulse which the advances of the king of France had met with, he continued, with laudable assiduity, his efforts for peace. The fact is, that the Dutch nation in general, and the pensionary Heinsius in particular, were, as Louis well knew, desirous to terminate the war, and of opinion that the concessions of his most christian majesty formed a solid ground of accommodation. But the courts of Vienna and London were eager for the prosecution of the war, with and for the avowed purpose of wresting the whole Spanish monarchy from the prince, who had now held it for ten years, by the best of titles-the good-will and affection of his subjects. In the month of April, 1709, Mr. secretary Boyle informs the duke of Marlborough, then at the Hague, that his "grace's letter, of the 6th, was read on Sunday at the cabinet council, where M. Buys's politics of the dismembering the Spanish monarchy, and continuing the conferences with monsieur Rouillé, were thought very disagreeable." And on the 15th July ensuing, the conferences being at that time concluded, Mr. Boyle affirms to lord Townshend, one * Lamberti.

of the English plenipotentiaries in Holland, "that her majesty thinks she had reason to expect that de Torcy's letter should not have been answered till her majesty's thoughts upon it had been known, that so the sentiments both of England and Holland might have been expressed at the same time upon so nice a subject, and of so much consequence.-I must own, says he, to your excellency, that her majesty would not have agreed to the pensionary's answer to de Torcy, because it shows too great a desire to treat with the French. Whenever the negotiations shall be renewed, it is most probable that the greatest difficulty will consist in the security to be given for restoring the whole Spanish monarchy to the house of Austria, and particularly for evacuating Spain, in which case it will be necessary to insist, among other things, that Cadiz, Alicant, Lerida, Tortosa, Roses, Pampelona, and Badajox, be immediately put into the hands of the allies, which, for the most part, is in the French king's power to do, and will be some mark of the sincerity of his intentions."

No sooner was the campaign in Flanders at an end, than the correspondence between the marquis de Torcy and the pensionary was renewed, through the medium of M. Petkum, resident of Holstein, at the Hague, in order to devise some equivalent, or substitute, for the 37th article of the preliminaries. And the French king at length went so far as to offer, exclusive of his royak promise not to assist his grandson, king Philip, directly or indirectly, three fortified towns on the Flemish frontier, as a security for the performance of it, to be restored to France when Spain should be delivered up to king Charles. But this was treated as a very unsatis

factory proposition, and Louis was required to surren der forthwith those places in Spain which were actually in his hands. This he peremptorily refused, and likewise the ensuing demand, that the three fortified towns, to be held in pledge, should be Bayonne and Perpignan on the side of Spain, and Thionville on that of the em pire. Even on the frontier of Flanders, Douay, Arras, and Cambray were declared excepted places, and it was plainly asserted that the king of France could not part with the keys of the kingdom. It was therefore evident that, notwithstanding the anxious desire of Louis to withdraw himself from the war, his professions were not altogether sincere that he was well aware resistance would be made by Spain to the execution of the treaty→ that the Spanish monarchy would not, and could not, be surrendered into the hands of the allies at the end of two months, and expecting the towns offered in pledge to be retained, he would not part with such as would lay his kingdom open to invasion. He hoped and believed that the king of Spain would be able, by resistance, to obtain some compensation or provision for himself, though abandoned to his fate by France, and it would have been much better to have made such provision, openly and avowedly, a sine qua non of the treaty. But his extreme eagerness to procure peace for himself, made him willing to leave the event of the Spanish war to chance, and gave an air of insincerity to his conduct throughout the whole course of the transaction. After some time, M. Torcy wrote to Petkum to desire, since the point in dispute could not be adjusted by letters, that passes might be granted for some ministers from France to come to Holland, and renew the conferences,