Part 2

In the list of prisoners to be exchanged on both sides, Luxembourg observed that the name of Berwick was wanting. He learned for what fate he was reserved; he seized the duke of Ormond one of his own prisoners, and sent William word that whatever measure was meted out to Berwick, should be measured again to Ormond. Ormond was a favorite of William, and Berwick was exchanged for him.[2]

In all this dreadful fighting the best soldier in Europe remains nearly inactive; not that he was sulky like our old friend Achilles; but his sovereign feared and hated him, and was reluctant to employ him. It is true that William had sent Marlborough into Ireland to quell the Irish who were fighting the Saxon whenever there was Saxon there to fight, and when there was none, were fighting each other for the mere love of the sport. It was a task that had already baffled William and his Dutch generals, and which perhaps he hoped would baffle Marlborough; but John Churchill was not born to be baffled. He knocked the heads together so smartly of Pat and Mike that those gentlemen made up their minds to be _aisy_; and he finished his errand so promptly that William himself felt bound to say that considering my lord Marlborough had seen so little of war, he had done very well.

In 1702, William was returning one day from a ride which he was taking for his dyspepsia, when his horse slipped and fell. The jolt shook out of him what little of life he had left; and Anne succeeded to the throne. Mary had died some years before. The day of Marlborough was now come. The theatre of his glory and chiefly that of Berwick’s, was the war of the Spanish succession.

Charles II. of Spain was the fifth of the Spanish Hapsburgs; he was also the fifth in descent from the great emperor Charles V. who was Charles I. of Spain. Charles II. having no children, the next heir was the dauphin of France, son of Louis XIV. and of Maria Teresa the oldest sister of Charles; but in order to prevent the two crowns from falling upon one head, the dauphin assigned his right to his second son Philip. The other claimants were the archduke Charles afterwards Emperor, and a young prince of the house of Bavaria, both grand-children of younger sisters of Maria. The Bourbon claim was therefore the best.

English historians lay great stress upon the fact that Louis and Maria at their marriage, formally renounced all claim to the crown of Spain both for themselves and their posterity; but those historians take care not to tell the whole story. The renunciation in question was not a compact with England or with the Empire: it was a compact with Spain alone; and if Spain chose to waive it, it was nobody else’s business. To avoid war however Louis and the Emperor agreed to withdraw their claim, and leave it to the little Bavarian; but just then that prince in an untimely manner died. Soon after his demise, the king of Spain died after having, at the request of his nobles and by the advice of the pope, made a will bequeathing the crown to the legitimate heir, the house of Bourbon. It is noteworthy that the dying king was a Hapsburg, and had expressed his preference for a Hapsburg successor; but the pope who was also moribund warned him not to die with the sin upon his conscience of having diverted the succession from the lawful channel. Where did the renunciation stand in the opinion of these two potentates?

Philip of Bourbon now king of Spain entered Madrid accompanied by his wife and a singular personage whom Louis had sent with them. This was the Princess of Orsini of the house of La Trémoille in France, and widow of the duke of Bracciano, prince of Orsini in Italy. She ruled Philip, ruled his wife, ruled Spain, and was an indispensable agent there of Louis XIV.

The Spaniards received Philip with open arms; but war was none the less declared by the Empire, England and Holland for the purpose of driving Philip out and putting the archduke in his place, which would have been nearly to reëstablish the empire of Charles-the-Fifth. But the English thought of nothing but of fighting the French, and of taking revenge for Steinkerk and Landen.

Marlborough took command of the English and Dutch. The Emperor’s troops were led by another great soldier, the Prince Eugene. I have already alluded to a pretty Italian girl, Olympia Mancini niece of Cardinal Mazarin, who won the heart of Louis XIV. in his youth, and was prevented by her uncle from marrying him. She got over that disappointment by which she missed being queen of France, and married the Count of Soissons of the house of Savoy, and gave birth at Paris to the Prince Eugene. He was educated for the Church; but he resolved to be a soldier and applied to the king for a commission. Louis told him to go back to his beads and his breviary; so he offered his services to the Emperor, and spent his life fighting alternately against the Turks and against his own countrymen. It was he who two years after the close of the war, commanded the imperial forces at Petervaradin, and struck the first irreparable blow to the Ottoman power.

I cannot follow the brilliant career of those two captains. Brilliant as it was however, it came to nought, and chiefly by the soldiership which the duke of Berwick displayed in Spain itself. The English had landed an army there to which was added a contingent of Portuguese. Louis sent Berwick to oppose them with what few troops he could spare. It was now that Berwick showed himself to be a past master of defensive warfare--a true Fabius. The English, superior in numbers, could advance nowhere against this adroit and sleepless adversary. He relates that on one occasion the enemy who had long tried to cross a river, posted themselves at last on a tongue of land formed by a sharp bend in the stream, so they could attempt the passage either at the right or the left. This reduced him to the dangerous necessity of dividing his forces so as to defend both fords. An accident of the ground saved him. The bank on his side, was an interrupted series of bluffs which half the time hid his men from the enemy. He kept transferring them from one ford to the other, making them form ranks and march slowly when visible, and run helter skelter when out of sight. The English who kept counting the same men twice, did not risk the crossing.

While thus disputing the passage of the river, Berwick received an order from King Philip to return to Madrid in order to defend that capital. He replied that the true place to defend Madrid, was on the banks of that stream, and he refused to quit. Afterwards when the English had retired, he learnt that Philip and his queen had sent such a remonstrance to their grandfather that he had recalled him, and sent the Marshal de Tessin to take his place. Tessin was a friend of Berwick, and he asked Philip and his wife how they could make up their minds to spare so able a soldier. They were silent; there was a pause; at last the queen broke out with:--What can we do with a great, lank devil of an Englishman who will have his own way?

Berwick reported himself at Versailles. Louis asked him why Philip had demanded his recall. Has he made any charges against me, inquired the duke. None whatever replied the king. Then said Berwick I have nothing to say.

During his absence everything went wrong. Madrid was taken by the Imperialists, and the archduke crowned with the title of Charles III. and Spain enjoyed the advantage of two kings at a time: a Hapsburg at one end of the land, and a Bourbon at the other.

In this confused state of things Louis sent Berwick back, having first conferred upon him the rank of Marshal of France so that Philip might treat him with more respect. Inferior in force he was obliged to resort to the same defensive tactics which had succeeded before. At the same time he implored Louis to send him more troops, pleading that any unforeseen accident might be the loss of Spain. The king, hard pressed as he was by Marlborough and Eugene, contrived to send him a few more regiments, and now for the first time he found himself equal to the enemy.

The decisive encounter took place at Almanza. This battle is unique among battles in that a Frenchman commanded the English, and an Englishman the French. The general of the English was the ex-count of Ruvigny a Huguenot who had been driven from France by the revocation of the edict of Nantes. He had been created Earl of Galway in Ireland. He was a good soldier and was now fighting with bitter animosity against the king who had persecuted him.

But to the battle. Berwick led his own right wing. He threw into some disorder the English left; then instead of following up his advantage in that direction, he wheeled suddenly to the left, fell upon the enemy’s centre and crushed it. The victory was complete. An English account says that out of the thirty thousand men which Galway led into the field, seventeen thousand either fell or were taken prisoner; and that they lost all their artillery and baggage.

Philip was restored to his throne. He now sought to make amends to the devil of an Englishman who would have his own way, by creating him duke of Liria and Xerica with ample estates. Berwick refused them for himself, but accepted them for his son who thus became a Spanish grandee. Philip also offered, if Berwick would leave the service of his grandfather and enter his, to make him generalissimo of all Spain. He answered that Louis XIV. was his best friend, and that he would never serve any other monarch.

Berwick returned to France and joined the army of the duke of Vendôme who was another of his cousins. Vendôme was grandson and Berwick great-grandson of Henry IV. They were unlike however: Berwick was without vices; Vendôme was drunken and debauched. He was a good general nevertheless, and the year before had kept at bay Marlborough and Eugene during a whole campaign. Now he listened to a council of officers, and, Berwick dissenting, risked Oudenarde and was beaten. The next year Louis sent Berwick to the frontier of Savoy, to practise his old game of making one battalion appear two to the enemy; and to keep in check an army which threatened to invade France.

The English landed another army in Spain under General Stanhope, and the Emperor one under Count Staremberg. Philip called loudly for Berwick, but Louis could not spare him: he was holding the wolf by the ears and it would not do to call him off.

Macaulay says the fate of Spain was decided at Almanza: that that was a disaster Marlborough and Eugene could hardly have repaired, much less Stanhope and Staremberg. To oppose those two captains, Louis sent Vendôme. Vendôme had contracted the habit of getting sober whenever great issues were at stake, and he was in that abnormal state on the present occasion. By a dexterous movement he caught Stanhope napping at Brihuaga, and simply bagged him and his army. He then turned upon Staremberg. The encounter took place at Villa-Viciosa where the Imperialists after a stout resistance, withdrew leaving the victory to the French. This battle rid Philip of foreign enemies, and the crown sat steady on his head; and it still sits on the head of his descendant.

Villa-Viciosa was Vendôme’s last fight: the sober fit proved fatal; he died in Spain soon after the battle. Philip who was his cousin one degree further removed than Berwick, caused his remains to be laid in the royal sepulchre of the Escurial, and they repose there still.

A change of ministry at this time in England, led to one of those acts that have purchased for her the name of Perfidious Albion. Legend says a glass of water did it. Sarah duchess of Marlborough was mistress of the household of Queen Anne. The two ladies were so affectionate that they gave each other pet names: Anne was Mrs. Morley, Sarah was Mrs. Freeman, and the more affectionate they grew the more they quarrelled. One day during a skirmish, Mrs. Morley asked Mrs. Freeman to bring her a glass of water. She obeyed, but instead of presenting it with proper grace, she pushed the salver into the queen’s face and upset the glass in her lap. The queen ordered her to quit her presence, and directly sent and demanded of her the gold key which was her emblem of office.

Now this is all true except perhaps the glass of water. It is true that a quarrel with the duchess did determine Anne to abandon Marlborough and the Whigs and go over to Bolingbroke and the Tories. Marlborough was recalled from his command, and the allies left to shift for themselves, with the aid however of the English and Dutch contingents which remained to them under the Duke of Albemarle who, in the absence of Eugene, was in chief command. Albemarle was an Englishman that William had made out of a Dutchman named Yost Van Keppel. William himself had taught him the art of war and he was a bad general; Villars who commanded the French, was a good one, and the battle of Denain ended in accordance with those conditions.

It was the last of the war. The peace of Utrecht was signed to which England acceded, abandoning all she had fought for.

The queen of Spain died, and as there was no fighting for Berwick to do, Louis sent him with a message of condolence for Philip. But peaceful embassies were not for the like of him: he never reached Madrid. An envoy from Philip stopped him on the way and informed him that Barcelona had revolted, and that it was for him to go there and restore order. He flew thither and laid siege to the town. Discovering that the citizens were receiving aid from Majorca he ordered the Spanish fleet to blockade the port, and having made a breach with his cannon he led his men to the assault. They had fought their way to the middle of the town when the garrison offered to surrender. The point then was to save the town from pillage and from those awful scenes which occur when a city is taken by storm. He directed the commander of the garrison not to let his surrender be known, and still to man the barricades. He then ordered a retreat, on the pretence that it was night-fall, and that they must prepare for a more vigorous attack on the morrow. The next morning Barcelona was peacefully theirs. He says it was the first town taken by assault that ever escaped pillage, and in his pious way he attributes it to the grace of God, and says that human skill alone could not have compassed it.

During the siege Philip to lose no time, had wooed and won another bride, Elizabeth Farnese daughter of the duke of Parma; and Berwick received one day an order from the king to send the fleet to Genoa to fetch the new queen. He replied that the blockade of the port was essential to the capture of the place, and that not a ship could be spared. The great, lank devil of an Englishman had not improved, and Philip and Elizabeth had to wait.

The name Farnese brings up another family which stands out in relief in the tableau of history. You have all been to Rome. You remember in the church of Saint Peter, near the chair in which Peter himself sat when he was pope, a sepulchral monument the finest in the church. It is that of Alexander Farnese, Paul III. Near the banks of the Tiber you remember that vast edifice the Palace Farnese, and on the other side of the river the Farnesina, or little Farnese. You remember the Farnese gardens where they have dug out the foundations of the palace of the Caesars. All these demesnes, except the monument, belonged till recently to the kings of Naples descendants of Philip and Elizabeth.

It was the princess of Orsini herself who had chosen a scion of that famous race for Philip’s second wife; and the princess did not fail to repent of it. She had been deceived by one of the greatest scamps in Europe, the Cardinal Alberoni who had assured her that Elizabeth Farnese was a placid little maiden who would show her all the deference the late queen had shown.

Kings, you know, don’t get married like common folks: they don’t do their own courting nor even their own marrying: they _send_. A deputy woos the maiden by power of attorney. He puts the ring on her finger; the priest pronounces them man and wife; and then she is the spouse not of that man but of another one whom she has never seen. Etiquette then requires not that the bridegroom go forth to meet the bride, but that she come to him. But mark the often result:--Henry VIII. married Anne of Cleves on the faith of a portrait by Holbein which flattered her. She was brought to England. When Henry came to lay eyes on her he swore they had sent him a big Flanders mare. George IV. while Regent married Caroline of Brunswick. He sent Harris Earl of Malmsbury to stand in his place at the altar, and to bring her to England. Malmsbury in his memoirs, says he foresaw trouble from the beginning. The princess was good looking and good tempered, but her want of personal neatness was beyond belief. When he presented her to the Regent she kneeled. He raised her up and kissed her; and then turning to Malmsbury, whispered: Harris for God’s sake get me some brandy!

Barcelona taken, Berwick sent the fleet to Genoa, and Elizabeth was brought to Spain. As she approached Madrid, Philip and the Princess of Orsini went out together to meet her. She greeted her husband with marks of affection, but looked askance at his companion. Not long after, the Princess was suddenly seized, thrown into a carriage, and conveyed to the French frontier and dismissed with the injunction never again to set foot in Spain. Louis XIV. was incensed at this treatment of his faithful agent; but that Farnese girl was no subject of his, and she snapped her fingers at him.

Philip and Elizabeth managed to live together; but whenever he desired to say his soul was his own, he took care to say it privately to his confessor. Alberoni was rewarded by being made prime minister of Spain.

In 1715 Louis XIV. died after the longest reign in history. He was king at five and died at seventy-seven. He outlived his oldest son and his oldest grandson and was succeeded by his great-grandson Louis XV. another boy of five.

Louis had made a will leaving in effect the regency during the minority, to the Duke du Maine his son by Madame de Montespan and the best beloved of his children; but Du Maine was immediately confronted by a spirit more potent than his own, in the person of Philip of Orleans, Louis’ nephew, a prince whom Louis had feared more than he had loved. It was this Philip who had led the household troops at Neerwinden. He had married Du Maine’s sister, but he pushed him aside and seized the regency as his birthright. Though his private morals were deplorable he governed France with vigor and ability till the majority of Louis XV.

This change of rulers worked no prejudice to Berwick. The Regent Philip offered him the government of Guienne one of the finest of the provinces; and he accepted it. When the patent was made out, he was surprised to find it made to Du Maine under whom he was to act as lieutenant. He refused to do so. The Regent sent for him and explained to him how necessary he found it to flatter and conciliate his brother Du Maine. My Lord Duke, said Berwick, nobody knows better than I the difference between a genuine prince of the blood like you, and a spurious one like myself and like Du Maine; and I will not take civil service under one of the latter sort. Philip knew what an obstinate fellow he was dealing with, and he yielded. The patent was made out direct to Berwick.

One would think that Philip V. owing his crown to his French relations, would have kept at peace with them; and he would have done so but for that Farnese creature. He and the Regent fell into a dispute and then into a quarrel and then into hostile array; and Berwick took the field. In the Spanish army was his son the duke of Liria, and it might happen that father and son should meet face to face in battle. Berwick wrote to his son to sink all filial regard for him, and to serve his king as if he were a born Spaniard. The two Philips however became reconciled before much mischief was done.

In 1716 Marlborough died. The British idea seems to be that his career of victory did not end at that sad event. In the Tower of London some years ago, I was shown a cannon which the warden who spoke by the authority of the three kingdoms, declared was taken by Marlborough at the battle of Dettingen. When I let fall a timid doubt, he repeated the statement with an indignant emphasis which silenced cavil. History does indeed record one other case of the sort. You remember at Rome, near the Cloaca Maxima, a spring where women were washing. It is there that Castor and Pollux watered their horses after the battle of Lake Regillus. Those two warriors had already been dead many years, and placed in the firmament where we still behold them.

Eugene had retired from active life, and Berwick now shared with Villars the reputation of being the foremost of living generals. The war of the Polish succession came in the following manner:--Early in the eighteenth century Charles XII. of Sweden--that name at which Doctor Johnson said the world grew pale--burst into central Europe and turned everything upside down. He drove Augustus-the-strong from the throne of Poland, and put in his place Stanislas Leczinski; not that he thought Stanislas a better man than Augustus, it was merely his propensity to upset things. But he tried to upset one man who was too square-built for him; and that was Peter Romanoff, Peter-the-great. Peter beat him at Pultowa, and put things back in their places. Stanislas, driven from the throne upon which he had been so suddenly set, fled to Wissenbourg in Alsace, and was living there with his wife and daughter Maria on a small pension granted by the French court. They were poor but pious, and morning and evening they knelt and thanked God that although they no longer had a throne to sit upon, they still had a roof over their heads.

One day there was a knock at the door; a stately official entered and bowing to the floor, gave Stanislas a letter. It was a portentous missive, a foot square and sealed with half a pound of wax. What was it? Were they troublesome at Wissenbourg? Was it a mandate to quit? Where should they go? Mother and daughter gathered at the side of the father as he opened it. It was a despatch from the duke of Bourbon prime minister of France, asking the hand of Maria for the young king.

Louis XV. and Maria Leczinska were soon married; and a few years later Louis undertook to restore his father-in-law to the Polish throne. Villars and Berwick took command of the French armies; but the crown of Poland was not recovered. The Emperor and Louis compromised the matter by the former giving to Stanislas the duchy of Lorraine a fief of the Empire; and that is the way Lorraine became French.

Peace was not the normal state of things between France and the Empire; and Villars and Berwick were not long permitted to be idle. In 1734 as Berwick was reconnoitring the enemy’s position at Philipsbourg, he was struck by a cannon ball and instantly killed. This was that second wound which he does not mention in his autobiography. His death was similar to that of Turenne who had fallen sixty years before at Salsbach.

Berwick was in his sixty-fifth year. Villars who was eighty-two, only lived long enough to learn the death of his brother in arms. Berwick said he, has always been lucky; and now he has died as a soldier would wish to die.

Bolingbroke who was associated with Berwick in furthering the pretentions of his half brother James III., says that the duke of Berwick was the best great man he ever knew.