less Mind to it now than they had at the End of the last Campania the new Ministers being less inclin'd to it than the old had been so that there was not one of the Allies that had any Mind to it besides the States That for his own Part he should be always in the same Mind with them and therefore very much desir'd it but did not know which way to go about it at least so as to compass it before the next Campania And if that once began they should be all at Sea again and should be forc'd to go just as the Wind should drive them That if His Majesty had a Mind to make it and would let him know freely the Conditions upon which either he desir'd or believ'd it might be made he would endeavour to concert it the best he could with His Majesty and that with all the Freedom and Sincereness in the World so it might be done with any Safety to his own Honour and the Interests of his Country All this he desir'd me to write directly to his Majesty from him as he knew I had not only Leave but Command to do upon any Occasion that I thought deserv'd it Two Days after I saw the Pensioner Fagel upon some common Affairs incident to my Ambassy at the Hague which had been left in the Hands of the Secretary of that Ambassay When these Discourses were past he ask'd me if I had brought them the Peace from Nimeguen I replyed That since he was so ignorant of what had pass'd there I would tell him That they had carried their Matters there En habiles gens That to bring their Allies to the Congress they had pretended to treat by the first of November whether they came or no. That after that Day past they had found fault with the Powers exhibited had offer'd at new made the Mediators course from one to t'other spun out two Months time in these Paces and thereby were gotten in sight both of Spanish and Imperial Ministers which I suppos'd was the Point they always intended and afterwards to keep Pace with them The Pensioner answer'd me with something in his Face both serious and sad That either I did not know them and the Course of their Affairs since I left the Hague or else I would not seem to know them That they not only desir'd the Peace from their Hearts but thought it absolutely necessary for them That they would certainly have enter'd into Treaty at the time if the French had either exhibited Powers in a Form to be at all admitted or would have oblig'd themselves to procure new ones Nay That they would not insist upon a Peace according to their Allies Pretensions nor could he answer that they would not make a separate one I said That was a matter of such Moment as I was sure they would think of it another Year before they did it With this he drew up his Chair closer to me and began a Discourse with more Heat and Earnestness than agreed well with the Posture of Health he was in saying first That they had thought enough of it already and with thinking much had begun to find it was without Remedy That they had great Obligations to Spain for entring the War to save their Country and thereby to save Flanders too but they had made them no ill Return by continuing it now three Years only for the Interests of Spain since there remain'd nothing of Consequence between France and them That they had further engag'd themselves to carry it on this following Year and so would have done with the Forces they did the last if their Allies had perform'd the Parts they had likewise engag'd But for Spain they took no Care but to let them see they were resolv'd to perish That they had sent their Fleet home from Sicily without the Payments agreed on and left them to be paid by the States at their Return That not a Penny could be got of a great Sum they ow'd them for Carriages and Provisions the last Summer and which was design'd for Magazines against next Year in Flanders without which their Armies could not march in that Country where they were sure to find none of the Spaniards providing That they had represented to Spain the necessity but of keeping so many Forces well regulated and paid as might defend their Towns while the Prince should take the Field with the Army of the State and hinder or divert any great Sieges there but not a Word of Answer That they had then desir'd them to receive so many of the Troops of the German Princes their Allies as might defend their most important Places but instead of this they drove them out of their Country That for the Emperor they had always told him That unless his Army would march into France or at least force them to a Battel by such Forces as might draw great Detachments of the French out of Flanders that Countrey would not be sav'd the last Summer or at least not the next unless his Army took up their Quartiers this Winter in Alsatia or on that side of the Rhine But at Vienna they consider'd Flanders as much as the Dutch do Hungary and because the Imperial Officers could better find their private Account by Winter-quarters in Germany than in a Country harass'd like Alsatia their Armies must repass the Rhine this Winter and thereby lose all the Advantages of the last Campania and Hopes of the next That for want of Magazines in Flanders two or three strong Frontiers would be lost there next Spring before the Imperialists could take the Field and if Cambray Valencines and Mons were taken all the rest would revolt considering the Miseries they had already suffer'd and must by a longer War That the Prince would not be able to prevent it or be soon enough in the Field to march for want of Provisions in Flanders the Country growing desolate by the unsettled Contributions or at least not with such an Army as to venture a Battel or raise a Siege while the Spanish Troops were so weak and the French would be so strong at a time when they had no Enemy to divert them upon the Rhine That the Prince's Friends could not suffer him to go into the Field only to see Towns lost under his Nose and perhaps all Flanders while He was expected to defend it and at the same time was rendred incapable of doing it by the Faults of the Spaniards who yet would not fail to reproach Him as well as his Enemies abroad and Ill-willers at home that would be glad of the Occasion In the mean time from France they could have whatever Conditions they pretended either by restoring Mastricht a Reglement of Commerce or any Advantages to the House of Orange and as to this last whatever the Prince himself would demand That to this Purpose they had every Week pressing Letters from Monsieur d'Estrades to make the Separate Peace and tho' he
many difficulties between the two Confederacies and many more between the Parties that compos'd each of them two Chambers were at length agreed for the Parties and one for the Mediators by which our pains was lessen'd but without other advantage Nor was there any point that gave us more trouble than the adjusting this among the Parties for the French were from the very first most declaredly averse from treating either by Writings or from agreeing to a place of Publick conference conceiving this would tend to keep the body of the Confederacy united in the Treaty as well as the War whereas their design was to break that union here which they could not in the Field and find some way or other of entring into separate measures for a Peace with some of the Parties engag'd In the mean time the Allies found or took as many occasions as they could of delaying the dispatch of their Ministers to the Congress while they had hopes of hindring the Dutch from proceeding without them and that they believ'd might be done till this Campania should end from the events whereof the several Princes might the better take their measures for the conditions of a Peace that should be propos'd or insisted on in this Treaty and this disposition of theirs was so well pursu'd that no other Ambassadors arriv'd at Nimeguen till November tho' we and the French and the Dutch had been so long upon the place and the Swedes soon after In the mean time the successes of the Campania that were expected absolutely to govern the motions of the Treaty were various as to the gross of the War but run as high to the advantage of the French as to the disadvantage of the Swedish Affairs By force of great Treasures and great order in disposing them The French Magazines were always fill'd in the Winter so as to enable them to take the Field as they pleas'd in the Spring without fearing the weather for their Foot or expecting Grass for their Horse on t'other side the Spaniards want of Money and Order left their Troops in Flanders neither capable to act by themselves upon any sudden attempt nor to supply with Provisions in their March either Dutch or Germans that should come to their relief Their Towns were ill fortified and worse defended so that the King of France Marching in the Head of a brave and numerous Army took Conde in four days in the month of April this year 1676. before any of the Confederates were in the Field in May sent the Duke of Orleans to besiege Bouchain with some part of his Troops being a small tho' strong place and very considerable for its scituation to the defence of the Spanish Netherlands The King with the strength of his Army Posted himself so advantageously as to hinder the Prince of Orange from being able to relieve it or to Fight without disadvantage The Prince strugled through all the difficulties from the Season or want of Provisions and Magazines in Flanders and March'd with his Army in sight of the French King by the middle of May the Armies continued some days facing one another and several times drawing out in order to a Battel which neither of them thought fit to begin whether not willing to hazard without necessity or advantage so decisive an action as this was like to prove or whether the French contented themselves to carry their point by hindring the Relief of Bouchain which must fall without it while the Prince of Orange with-held by the Spaniards from pursuing his which was to give a Battel that the Spaniards knew could not be lost without the loss of Flanders The Armies continued facing one another till Bouchain was surrendred the Eighth day of the Siege The Prince return'd to refresh his Army harass'd with so hasty a March upon so suddain preparations and the King of France return'd home leaving his Army under the Mareschal Schomberg to attend the motions of the Enemies The Prince fell into concert with the Spanjard and German Princes near the lower Rhine for the Siege of Mastricht which tho the strongest of the Dutch Frontiers when it was taken had been yet fortified by the French since they possess'd it with all the advantages of Art and Expence and with a Garison of eight Thousand chosen Men under Calvo a resolute Catalonian who commanded there under the Mareschal d'Estrades Governour of the place but then at Nimeguen About the end of July the Trenches were open'd by the Prince and the Siege carried on with such Bravery so many and desperate Assaults for about Three Weeks that as Wagers were continually offer'd with odds at Nimeguen that it would be taken within such or such a time so we did not observe the Mareschal d'Estrades was willing to take them or seem'd at all confident it would be so well defended The Prince or the Rhingrave who was dâ—sign'd for Governour of the Town as his Father had been were ever in the head of the Attacks and made great use as well as proof of the desperate Courage of the English Troops upon all those occasions many of the out-works were taken with great slaughter on both sides but were supplied by new Retrenchments and by all the Art and Industry of a resolute Captain and brave Soldiers within About the middle of August the Prince exposing himself upon all occasions receiv'd a Musket-shot in his Arm at which perceiving those about him were daunted he immediately pull'd off his Hat with the Arm that was hurt and waved it about his Head to shew the wound was but in the Flesh and the Bone safe at which they all reviv'd and the Prince went on without interruption in all the Paces of the Siege But a cruel sickness falling into his Army weaken'd it more than all the Assaults they had given the Town The Germans came not up with the Supplies they had promis'd and upon which assurance the Siege was undertaken and the Rhindgravâ— who next the Prince was the spring of this Action happening to be wounded soon after was forc'd to leave the Camp for a Castle in the Neighbourhood where he died by all which the Army grew disheartned and the Siege faint In the mean time Monsieur Schomberg who trusted to a vigorous defence at Mastricht had besig'd and taken Aire and after the Prince's Army was weaken'd by the accidents of the Siege March'd with all the French Forces through the heart of the Spanish Low Countries to the relief of Mastricht upon whose approach and their solutions of the Councel of War in the Prince's Camp the Siege was rais'd and with it the Campania ended in the Dutch or Spanish Provinces And from this time the Prince of Orange began to despair of any success in a War after such tryals and experience of such weakness in the Spanish Forces and Conduct and uncertainty in the German Councels or Resolutions However the Imperial Army took Philipsburgh in the end of September this year 1676.
so enrag'd at the Growth of my Lord Treasurer's Credit upon the Fall of His Own that he fell in with the common humour of the Parliament in fomenting those Jealousies and Practices in the House of Commons which center'd in a Measure agreed among the most considerable of them Not to consent to give the King any Money whil'st the present Lord Treasurer continued Upon these occasions or dispositions they grew very high in pursuing the Lord Lauderdale the only remainder of the Cabal that had now any credit left at Court and they pressed the King very earnestly to recal all the English Troops in the French Service tho there was a greater number in the Dutch But besides they fell into so great dissentions between the Two Houses rais'd upon punctilious disputes and deductions of their several Priviledges in opposition to one another that about the end of June the King Prorogued them Upon my arrival soon after His Majesty telling me the several reasons that had mov'd him to it said That he doubted much while the War lasted abroad it would give occasion or pretence for these heats that had of late appeared in the Parliament and make him very uneasie in his Revenue which so much needed their assistance That some of the warm Leaders in both Houses had a mind to engage him in a War with France which they should not do for many reasons and among the rest because he was sure if they did they would leave him in it and make use of it to ruin his Ministers and make him depend upon Them more than he intended or any King would desire But besides all this he doubted an impertinent quarrel between my Lord Treasurer and Lord Chamberlain did him more disservice in the Parliament than I could imagin for the last did not care what harm he did His business there so he could hope to ruin my Lord Treasurer and had perswaded a great many in the House of Commons that this would certainly be compass'd if they were stanch and declar'd in giving no Money during his Ministry That he knew they were both my Friends and therefore desir'd I would try to reconcile them while I stay'd in England I endeavour'd it but fail'd my Lord Danby was very inclinable being so posted as to desire only to continue where he was and that the King's business might go well in his hands but my Lord Arlington was so uneasie in the posture he stood which he attributed chiefly to my Lord Treasurer's present Greatness that he was untreatable upon this Subject So when I found the Wound was too much wrankled to be cur'd I gave it over telling each of them That since I could not make them Friends I would at least live with them both as if they were so and desir'd them not to expect I should sacrifice one Friend to another My Lord Treasurer was content with this frankness but Lord Arlington could not bear this neither grew dry from this time and stiff in all that pass'd between us still mingling little reproaches or touches of my greatness with the other and grew so weary of the Scene at Court where he found himself left out that he went into the Countrey for the rest of the Summer Thus the seeds of discontents that had been sown in the Parliament under the Councels of the Cabal began to spring fast and root deep after their Power and Influence was wholly at an end and those Heats were under other covers fomented by two of the chief that composs'd that Ministry and with help of time and accident grew to such flames as have since appear'd But whatever began or increas'd them 't is certain these agitations in England had great effect upon those of the War and Peace abroad For the Confederates were confident That the humour of the Parliament and People would at last engage the King in their quarrel which they knew would force France to such a Peace as they desir'd and Spain was so presuming That England would not suffer the loss of Flanders that they grew careless of its Defence or of those Orders and Supplies that were necessary to it trusting for the present to the Dutch to preserve it and to the King hereafter whenever he should find it more in danger And these Considerations made the Allies less inclinable to a Peace which they might have had cheaper the following Winter than ever it fell afterwards to their share by Revolutions that were not foreseen but yet such as were suspected at this time by those that knew the weakness of the Spaniards and divisions of the Imperial Court While I stay'd in England which was about six weeks the News came of a great Insurrection in Bretanny which with the Numbers and Rage it began might have prov'd of ill consequence to the French Affairs if it had met with a Head answerable to the Body but being compos'd of a scum of the mean People that hated and spoil'd the Nobles of the Province it was by fair means partly and by foul in a little time appeas'd The Blow which was much more considerable to France than the loss of Provinces would have been was the death of Monsieur Turenne the News whereof came to Court about the same time This great Captain had for three months together kept the Imperial Army at a bay on t'other side the Rhine resolv'd not to fight unless with the greatest advantage his Point being to hinder the German Forces from besieging Philipsburgh from posting themselves in the Towns of Alsace but chiefly from entring into Lorain or the County of Burgundy All these he perform'd but being press'd by the Imperialists and straitned in his Quarters he suffered much by want of Provisions and found his Army diminish'd by Sickness and Desertion which use to follow that condition At last being necessitated for want of Forage to force a Post of the Enemies that straitned him most a warm Skirmish began and with loss to the French that were gall'd with two Pieces of Cannon rais'd upon an Eminence and playing upon them with advantage Monsieur Turenne resolv'd to raise a Battery to dismount them and going with Saint Hilaire a Lieutenant General to chuse a place the most convenient for it the two small Pieces from the Imperial side fir'd at them almost together one of the Bullets wounded Saint Hilaire in the Shoulder and t'other after two or three bounds upon the ground struck Monsieur Turenne upon the Breast and without any apparent Wound more than the Contusion laid him Dead upon the place and by such a Death as Caesar us'd to wish for unexpected sudden and without pain The astonishment was unspeakable in the French Camp upon the loss of such a General the presumption as great in That of the Imperialists who reckon'd upon themselves as Masters of the whole French Army that was straitned between Them and the Rhine in want diseas'd and above all discourag'd by the loss of their Captain All