French refugee, while of the French commanders Marshal Saxe was by birth a German, and Lowendahl a Dane.

In the meantime the Pelham Government, though unsuccessful abroad, had acquired a complete ascendancy at home. The martial enthusiasm of the country had gone down, and public opinion being gratified by the successive deposition of Walpole and of Carteret, and being no longer stimulated by a powerful Opposition, acquiesced languidly in the course of events. The King for a time chafed bitterly against the yoke. He had been thwarted in his favourite German policy, deprived of the minister who was beyond comparison the most pleasing to him, and compelled to accept others in whom he had no confidence. He despised and disliked Newcastle. He hated Chesterfield, whom he was compelled to admit to office, and he was especially indignant with Pitt, who had described Hanover as a beggarly Electorate' and accused its soldiers of cowardice, and whose claims to office Pelham was continually urging. At length, in February 1745-46, while the rebellion was still raging, the perplexed monarch tried to extricate himself from his embarrassments by holding private communications with Bath and Granville. The ministers were apprised of it and at once resigned. The impotence of their rivals was speedily shown, and in forty-eight hours they were obliged to acknowledge themselves incapable of forming a Government. The Pelhams returned to power, but their position was immeasurably strengthened. The few remaining adherents of Bath were driven from office. The King acknowledged with great irritation that it was impossible for him to resist. He refused, indeed, to make Pitt Secretary of War, but sanctioned his appointment to the lucrative office of Joint Vice-Treasurer of Ireland, and soon after to the still more important position of Paymaster of the Forces.

Russia

The great work of the Government was the pacification of Europe by the Peace of Aix-la-Chapelle. Another campaign had actually begun when the preliminaries were signed. had at last been brought into the war, and 30,000 Russian soldiers subsidised by the maritime Powers were on the march to rescue the Netherlands. It was not impossible that this powerful reinforcement might have given a new course to the

war.

In Italy the balance of success was on the whole in

favour of the Austrians. The commerce of France had been almost annihilated by the English; her resources were nearly exhausted by the extraordinary exertions she had made, and the returning prosperity produced by the long pacific government of Fleury had been completely overcast. On the other hand, Nice and Savoy were still occupied by the French and Spaniards. The French were almost absolute masters of the Austrian Netherlands; the capture of Bergen-op-Zoom and the subsequent investment of Maestricht had rendered the condition of the Dutch Republic almost desperate, and it would probably have been crushed before any succour could arrive. Maria Theresa, it is true, ardently desired the continuance of the war, hoping to obtain in Italy some compensation for the loss of Silesia, and the Duke of Newcastle was inclined, in opposition to his brother, to support her; but she waged war chiefly by the assistance of the subsidies of England, and her ambition was clearly contrary to the general interests of Europe. Like many absolute sovereigns she appears to have been completely indifferent to the misery and desolation she caused, provided only she could leave her empire as extended as she had received it. She was resolved also to throw the defence of the Austrian Netherlands almost exclusively on the maritime Powers, employing the subsidies, which she received on the express condition of keeping a large army in those provinces, mainly in a war of aggression in Italy; and she was bitterly aggrieved because the English, under these circumstances, diminished her remittances. With the exception of the King of Sardinia, however, who saw prospects of pushing his fortunes in Italy, and who was determined, if possible, to avoid restoring the Duchy of Finale, she found little support in her hostility to peace. Spain was now governed by a perfectly unambitious sovereign, who wished for nothing but repose. Holland was reduced to such a condition that peace was her first necessity. England was ruled by an eminently pacific minister; and there was hardly any Opposition to impede his policy. The enormous subsidies which England had been for years scattering through Europe were rapidly adding to her debt and impairing her prosperity, and it was not clear what object she had to gain. The quarter in which the French arms were most successful was precisely that most dangerous to Eng

land; and except the capture of Cape Breton, and of a number of prizes, she had obtained little or nothing as a compensation for her sacrifices. Even in India, where the small settlements of France appeared almost at the mercy of England, she had encountered reverses. Two Frenchmen of great abilities and enterprise, but separated from each other by a bitter jealousy, then presided over French interests in India. Dupleix, after a brilliant industrial career upon the Ganges, had been made Governor of the French settlement of Pondicherry, while La Bourdonnais, one of the bravest and most skilful seamen France has ever produced, directed affairs in the islands of Bourbon and Mauritius. La Bourdonnais succeeded, in the course of 1746, in repelling an English squadron under Admiral Barnet, and in besieging and taking Madras. As express orders from the ministry at home prohibited him from occupying permanently any conquests that might be made in India, a capitulation was signed by which the town was to be restored on the payment of a specified ransom. It passed, however, under the dominion of Dupleix, who shamefully broke the capitulation and subjected the English to scandalous outrages, while La Bourdonnais returned to France and was soon after, on false charges, flung into the Bastille, where he remained for nearly three years. In 1748 the English made a formidable attempt to retaliate upon the French, and a large force of English and Sepoy troops, under the command of Admiral Boscawen and of Major Lawrence, besieged Pondicherry. It was defended, however, by Dupleix with great energy and genius. The rainy season came on, sickness decimated the besiegers, and the enterprise was at last abandoned.

It was plain that the time for peace had arrived. France had already made overtures, and she showed much moderation, and at this period much disinterestedness in her demands, and the influence of England and Holland at length forced the peace upon Austria and Sardinia, though both were bitterly aggrieved by its conditions. France agreed to restore every conquest she had made during the war, to abandon the cause of the Stuarts, and expel the Pretender from her soil, to demolish, in accordance with earlier treaties, the fortifications of Dunkirk on the side of the sea, while retaining those on the side of the land, and to retire from the contest without acquiring any fresh terri

tory or any pecuniary compensation. England in like manner restored the few conquests she had made, and submitted to the somewhat humiliating condition of sending hostages to Paris as a security for the restoration of Cape Breton. The right of search, in opposition to which she had originally drawn the sword against Spain, and the debt of 95,000l., which the Convention of 1739 acknowledged to be owing to her by Spain, were not even mentioned in the peace. The disputed boundary between Canada and Nova Scotia, which had been a source of constant difficulty with France, was left altogether undefined. The Assiento treaty for trade with the Spanish colonies was confirmed for the four years it had still to run, but no real compensation was obtained for a war expenditure which is said to have exceeded sixty-four millions,' and which had raised the funded and unfunded debt to more than seventy-eight millions. Of the other Powers, Holland, Genoa, and the little State of Modena retained their territory as before the war, and Genoa remained mistress of the Duchy of Finale, which had been ceded to the King of Sardinia by the Treaty of Worms, and which it had been a main object of his later policy to secure. Austria obtained a recognition of the election of the Emperor, a general guarantee of the Pragmatic Sanction, and the restoration of everything she had lost in the Netherlands, but she gained no additional territory. She was compelled to confirm the cession of Silesia and Glatz to Prussia, to abandon her Italian conquests, and even to cede a considerable part of her former Italian dominions. To the bitter indignation of Maria Theresa, the Duchies of Parma, Placentia, and Guastalla passed to Don Philip of Spain, to revert, however, to their former possessors if Don Philip mounted the Spanish throne, or died without male issue. The King of Sardinia also obtained from Austria the territorial cessions enumerated in the Treaty of Worms, with the important exceptions of Placentia, which passed to Don Philip, and of Finale, which remained with the Genoese. For the loss of these he obtained no compensation. Frederick obtained a general guarantee for the possession of his newly-acquired territory, and a long list of old treaties was formally confirmed.3

1 Chalmers' Estimate, p. 105. 2 Coxe's Pelham, ii. 77.

• See on this war Frederick, Mémoires de mon Temps, the Mémoires

Thus small were the changes effected in Europe by so much bloodshed and treachery, by nearly nine years of wasteful and desolating war. The design of the dismemberment of Austria had failed, but no vexed question had been set at rest. International antipathies and jealousies had been immeasurably increased, and the fearful sufferings and injuries that had been inflicted on the most civilised nations had not even purchased the blessing of an assured peace. Of all the ambitious projects that had been conceived during the war, that of Frederick alone was substantially realised, and France, while endeavouring to weaken one rival, had contributed largely to lay the foundation of the greatness of another.

The definitive peace between England and Holland, and France was signed on October 18, 1748, and the other Powers acceded to it before the close of the year. From this time till the death of Pelham in March 1754, political rivalry in England almost ceased. The Tories were gratified by a few places, and almost every politician of talent and influence was connected with the Government. The Prince of Wales, who kept up some faint semblance of opposition, died in March 1750. Even Lord Granville, sated with ambition and broken by excessive drinking, joined the ministry in 1751, accepting the dignified but uninfluential post of President of the Council. During this period the leading ideas of the policy of Walpole were steadily pursued. Europe being at peace, and the dynasty firmly established by the suppression of the rebellion, the army and navy were both rigorously reduced; 20,000 soldiers and 34,000 sailors and marines were discharged, and some serious distress having in consequence arisen, it was met by the bold and novel expedient of a system of emigration, organised and directed by the Government. As early as 1735 Captain Coram, in a memorial to the Privy Council, had called attention to the deserted and unprotected state of Nova Scotia, to the ease with which the French carried their encroachments into that province, and to the insufficiency of the small British garrison which was collected at Annapolis for its protection. Nova Scotia was justly regarded as the key to North America, equally important in time of war for attacking Canada and Ranke, Martin, and Lord Stanhope.

de Valori, Voltaire, Louis XV., and the histories of Smollett, Coxe, Carlyle,