Part 39 (1/2)

It is said of him, that he ”never committed a rash act, and never missed an opportunity for striking an effective blow.” _Eugene_, on his father's side, sprang from the house of Savoy. His mother was a niece of _Mazarin_. He was brought up at the court of _Louis XIV_.; but when the king repeatedly refused him a commission in the army, he entered the service of Austria, was employed in campaigns against the Turks, and rose to the highest distinction. Flattering offers from _Louis XIV_. he indignantly rejected. His career as a soldier was long and brilliant. The personal sympathy of _Eugene_ and _Marlborough_ with each other was one important cause of their success. _Eugene_ was first sent to Italy. There he drove _Catinat_, the French general, back on _Milan_, and captured his successor in command, _Villeroi_ (1702). After a drawn battle between _Eugene_ and _Vendome_ (1702), a commander of much more skill than his predecessor, the French had the advantage in Italy. In 1703, _Eugene_ came to Germany, and _Marlborough_ invaded the Spanish Netherlands. In 1704 Marlborough carried out the plan of a grand campaign which he had devised. He crossed the Rhine at Cologne, moved southward, captured _Donauworth_, and drove the Bavarians across the Danube. The united forces of _Marlborough_ and _Eugene_ defeated the French and Bavarian armies at _Blenheim_ (or _Hochstadt_), on the left bank of the river, with great slaughter. There were captured fifteen thousand French soldiers, with their general _Tallard_. This victory raised _Marlborough's_ reputation, already great on account of his masterly conduct of his army, to the highest point. He was made a duke by Queen _Anne_, and a prince of the Empire by _Leopold_. In Spain, the English captured _Gibraltar_. _Charles_ of Austria (who had a.s.sumed the t.i.tle of _Charles III._ of Spain) conquered Madrid (1706), but held it for only a short time. The country generally favored _Philip_; the arms of _Vendome_ were triumphant; and _Aragon_, _Catalonia_, and _Valencia_ had to submit to Castilian laws as the penalty of their adhesion to the Austrian cause. In 1706 _Marlborough_ vanquished _Villeroi_ at _Ramillies_, a village in the Netherlands, in a great battle in which the French army was routed, and their banners and war material captured. The Netherlands submitted to Austria. At _Turin_, _Eugene_ gained a victory over an army of eighty thousand men; and the fame of this modest and unpretending, but brave and skillful leader was now on a level with that of the English general. Lombardy submitted to _Charles III_., and the French were excluded from Italy. Another victory of the two commanders at _Oudenarde_ (1708) over _Vendome_ and the _Duke of Burgundy_, broke down the hopes of _Louis_, and moved him to offer the largest concessions, which embraced the giving up of _Strasburg_ and of _Spain_. But the allies, flushed with success, went so far as to demand that he should aid in driving his grandson out of Spain. This roused France, as well as _Louis_ himself, to another grand effort. At _Malplaquet_, in a b.l.o.o.d.y conflict, the French were again defeated by _Marlborough_ and _Eugene_.

TO THE PEACE OF UTRECHT.--Circ.u.mstances now favored the vanquished and humbled king of France. The Whig ministry in England, which the victories of _Marlborough_ had kept in office, fell from power (1710); and its enemies, and the enemies of _Marlborough_, were anxious to weaken him. _Anne_ dismissed from her service the d.u.c.h.ess of Marlborough, a haughty woman of a violent temper. _Harley_, Earl of Oxford, and _St. John_, afterwards Viscount _Bolingbroke_, became the queen's princ.i.p.al ministers.

They wished to end the war. The Emperor _Joseph_ (1705-1711), who had succeeded _Leopold I._, died; so that _Charles_, if he had acquired Spain, would have restored the vast monarchy of _Charles V_., and brought in a new source of jealousy and alarm. Negotiations for peace began. _Marlborough_, who had been guilty of traitorous conduct, was removed from his command, and deprived of all his offices (1712). In 1713 the Peace of _Utrecht_ was concluded between England and France, in which Holland, Prussia, Savoy, and Portugal soon joined. It was followed by the Peace of _Rastadt_ and _Baden_ with the emperor (1714). Spain and Spanish America were left to _Philip V_., the Bourbon king, with the proviso that the crowns of France and Spain should never be united. France ceded to England _Newfoundland_, _Nova Scotia_, and the _Hudson Bay Territory_. Spain ceded to England _Gibraltar_ and _Minorca_. The _Elector of Brandenburg_ was recognized as _King of Prussia_. Savoy received the island of _Sicily_, which was exchanged seven years later for _Sardinia_, and for the t.i.tle of king for the duke. Holland gained certain ”barrier” fortresses on its border. Austria received the appanages of the Spanish monarchy,--the _Spanish Netherlands_, _Naples_, _Sardinia_, and _Milan_, but not _Sicily_. The emperor did not recognize the Bourbons in Spain.

LAST DAYS OF LOUIS XIV.--In the next year after the peace, _Louis XIV_. died. Within two years (1710-1712) he had lost his son, his grandson the _Duke of Burgundy_ (whom the pious _Fenelon_ had trained), his wife, and his eldest great-grandson, and, two years later (1714), his third grandson, the _Duke of Berry_. He left France overwhelmed with debt, its resources exhausted, its credit gone, its maritime power prostrate; a land covered with poverty and wretchedness. This was the reward of lawless pride and ambition in a monarch who owed his strength, however, to the sympathy and subservience of the nation.

LAW'S BANK.--During the minority of _Louis XV_. (1715-1774) _Philip, Duke of Orleans_, was regent, a man of extraordinary talents, but addicted to shameful debauchery. The opportunity for effective reform was neglected. The most influential minister was Cardinal _Dubois_, likewise a man of unprincipled character. The state was really bankrupt, when a Scottish adventurer and gambler, _John Law_, possessed of unusual financial talents, but infected with the economical errors of the time, offered to rescue the national finances by means of a _bank_, which he was allowed to found, the notes of which were to serve as currency. Almost all the coined money flowed into its coffers; its notes went everywhere in the kingdom, and were taken for government dues; it combined with its business ”the Mississippi scheme,” or the control of the trade, and almost the sovereignty, in the _Mississippi_ region; it absorbed the privileges of the different companies for trading with the East; finally it took charge of the national mint and the issue of coin, and of the taxation of the kingdom, and it a.s.sumed the national debt. The temporary success of the gigantic financial scheme turned the heads of the people, and a fever of speculation ran through all ranks. The crash came, the shares in the bank sunk in value, the notes depreciated; and, in the wrath which ensued upon the general bankruptcy, _Law_, who had been honored and courted by the high and the low, fled from the kingdom. He died in poverty at _Venice_. The state alone was a gainer by having escaped from a great part of its indebtedness.

ITALY.--Before the middle of the eighteenth century, the Spanish Bourbons again had possession of _Naples_ and _Sicily_, besides other smaller Italian states. Austria, besides holding _Milan_, was the virtual ruler of _Tuscany_.

SPAIN IN ITALY.--_Philip V_. was afflicted with a mental derangement peculiar to his family. The government was managed by the ambitious queen, _Elizabeth_ of Parma, and the intriguing Italian, _Alberoni_, the minister in whom she confided. He sought to get back the Italian states lost by the Peace of _Utrecht_. But _Sardinia_ and _Sicily_ were restored when he was overthrown, through the fear excited by the _Quadruple Alliance_ of France, England, Austria, and Holland (1718). Later, the queen succeeded in obtaining the kingdom of _Naples_ and _Sicily_ for her oldest son, _Don Carlos_, under the name of _Charles III. Parma, Piacenza_, and _Guastalla_, she gained for her second son, _Philip_ (1735). When _Charles_ succeeded to the Spanish throne (1759-1788), he left _Naples_ and _Sicily_ to his third son, _Ferdinand_.

AUSTRIA IN ITALY.--The house of Savoy steadily advanced in power. By the Peace of Ryswick, Victor _Amadeus II_. (1675-1730), secured important places previously gained. He became ”King of Sardinia”

(1720). By him the University of Turin was founded, and the administration of justice much improved. His next two successors carried forward this good work. _Venice_ lost _Morea_ to the Turks, but retained _Corfu_ and her conquests in _Dalmatia_ (1718). Liberty was gone, and there was decay and conscious weakness in the once powerful republic. _Genoa_ was coveted by Savoy, Austria, and France. The consequent struggles are the material of Genoese history for a long period. _Corsica_ was oppressed, and _Genoa_ called on France to lend help in suppressing its revolt (1736). The Corsicans especially, under _Paoli_, defended themselves with such energy that France found its work of subjugation hard and slow (1755). The island was ceded to France by Genoa(1768). _Milan_, with Mantua, was Austrian, after the Peace of Utrecht (1713). _Tuscany_ under _Ferdinand II_. (1628-1670) bestowed its treasure on Austria and Spain, and fell under the sway of ecclesiastics. Under _Cosmo III_. (1670-1723), the process of decline went on. After the death of the last of the Medici, _John Gasto_ (1737), Tuscany was practically under the power of Austria, notwithstanding the stipulation that both states should not have the same ruler. It was governed by _Francis Stephen_ (1738-1765), Duke of Lorraine, husband of the Empress _Maria Theresa_; and, when he became emperor (_Francis I_.), by his second son, _Leopold_ (1765-1790). At Rome, Pope _Innocent XI_. (1676-1689) had many conflicts with _Louis XVI_. which came to an end under the well-meaning _Innocent XII_. (1691-1700). Contests arose on the part of Rome against the Bourbon courts respecting the Jesuit order, and with the forces adverse to the Church and the Papacy, in the closing part of the eighteenth century. In 1735, the Emperor _Charles VI_. allowed that Naples and Sicily should be handed over, as a kingdom, to _Don Carlos_, the son of the Spanish Bourbon king, under the name of _Charles III_., by whom it was granted to his son _Ferdinand IV_. (1759).

CLOSE OF ANNE'S REIGN.--_Anne's_ husband, Prince _George of Denmark_, had no influence, and deserved none. One of the important events of her reign was the Union of England and Scotland in 1707 (p. 461). After the Tories came into power, the two leaders, _Oxford_ and _Bolingbroke_, were rivals. An angry dispute between them hastened the queen's death (1714). One of the Tory measures, prompted by hostility to Dissenters, was a law forbidding any one to keep a school without a license from a bishop.

GEORGE I, 1714-1727, _m._ Sophia Dorothea of Zell.

| +--GEORGE II, 1727-1760, _m._ Caroline, daughter of John Frederick, Margrave of Ans.p.a.ch.

| +--Frederick, Prince of Wales, _d._ 1751, _m._ Augusta of Saxe Gotha.

| +--Augusta _m._ | Charles William Ferdinand, Duke of Brunswick.

| | | +--Caroline | _m._ | +--GEORGE IV, 1820-1830.

| | +--GEORGE III, 1760-1820, _m._ Charlotte of Mecklenburg-Strelitz.

| +--WILLIAM IV, 1830-1837.

| +--Edward, Duke of Kent, _d._ 1820, _m._ Victoria of Saxe Coburg.

| +--VICTORIA, succeeded 1837, _m._ Albert of Saxe Coburg.

REIGN OF GEORGE I.--_George I_., the first king of the house of _Hanover_, could not speak English. His private life was immoral.

His first ministers were Whigs. _Bolingbroke_ and _Oxford_ were impeached, and fled the country. The ”_Pretender_,” _James Edward_ (son of _James II_.), with the aid of Tory partisans, endeavored to recover the English crown. His standard was raised in the Highlands and in North England (1715), but this Jacobite rebellion was crushed. After the rebellion of 1715, a law was pa.s.sed, which is still in force, allowing a Parliament to continue for the term of seven years. A second conspiracy in 1717 had the same fate. England had an experience a.n.a.logous to that of France with _Law_, with the _South Sea_ Company, which had a monopoly of trade with the Spanish coasts of South America. A rage for speculation was followed by a panic. The estates of the directors of the company were confiscated by Parliament for the benefit of the losers. _Robert Walpole_ was made first minister, a place which he held under _George I._ and _George II._ for twenty-one years. _William_ and _Anne_ had attended the meetings of the Cabinet. _George I._, who could not speak English, staid away. From this time, one of the ministers was called the ”prime minister.”

THE REIGN OF GEORGE II.--George II. was systematic in his ways, frugal, willful, and fond of war. In his private life, he followed the evil ways of his father. _Walpole's_ influence was predominant. The clever Queen _Caroline_ lent him her support. Walpole reluctantly entered into war with _Spain_ (1739), on account of the measures adopted by that power to prevent English s.h.i.+ps from carrying goods, in violation of the treaty of _Utrecht_, to her South American colonies. The princ.i.p.al success of England was the taking of _Porto Bello_ by _Admiral Vernon_.

When the war was declared, the people expressed their joy by the ringing of bells. ”They are ringing the bells now,” said _Walpole:_ ”they will be wringing their hands soon.” The blame for the want of better success in the war was laid on the prime minister, and he was driven to resign. Then followed the ministry of the _Pelhams_, Henry Pelham and the Duke of Newcastle, who, like Walpole, managed Parliament by bribing the members through the gift of offices.

In the war of the Austrian succession (1740), England took part with Austria, and the king in person fought in Germany. In 1745 _Prince Charles Edward Stuart_, the young _Pretender_ (whose father, the old Pretender, styled himself _James III_.), landed in the Highlands. The Highlanders defeated the English at _Preston Pans_, near Edinburgh. The Pretender marched into England as far as Derby, at the head of the Jacobite force, but had to turn back and retreat to Scotland. The contest was decided by the victory of the English under the _Duke of c.u.mberland_, at Culloden (1746), which was attended by an atrocious slaughter of the wounded. _Culloden_ was the last battle fought in behalf of the Stuarts. Nearly eighty Jacobite conspirators, one of whom was an octogenarian, _Lord Lovat_, were executed as traitors. These Jacobites were the last persons who were beheaded in England. The Pretender wandered in the Highlands and Western Islands for five months, under different disguises. He was concealed and aided by a Scottish lady, _Flora Macdonald_. Then he escaped to the Continent, where he led a miserable and dissipated life, and died in 1788. His brother Henry, Cardinal York, the last of the Stuarts in the male line, died in 1807.

CHAPTER III. THE GREAT NORTHERN WAR: THE FALL OP SWEDEN: GROWTH OF THE POWER OF RUSSIA.

SWEDEN.--The eventful epoch in the history of Sweden, in this period, is the reign of Charles XII. (1697-1718). At his accession, when he was only sixteen years old, Sweden ruled the Baltic. Its army was strong and well disciplined. What is now St. Petersburg was a patch of swampy ground in Swedish territory, where a few fishermen lived in their huts. The youth of Charles was prophetic of his career. In doors, he read the exploits of Alexander the Great; out of doors, gymnastic sports and the hunting of the bear were his favorite diversions. He became an adventurous warrior after, the type of Alexander. His rashness and obstinacy occasioned at last the downfall of his country. Three great powers, _Russia, Poland_, and _Denmark,_ with the support of _Patkul_, a disaffected Livonian subject of Sweden, joined in an attack on the youthful monarch (1699). _Patkul_, who was a patriot, unable to secure the rights of Livonia, and condemned as a rebel, had entered the service of the Elector Augustus of Saxony, who was king of Poland. There were territories belonging to Sweden which each of the confederates coveted. _Frederick IV._ of Denmark expected to incorporate Sweden itself in his dominions.

RUSSIA: PETER THE GREAT.--The first ruler of the house of Romanoff, which has raised Russia to its present rank, was _Michael_ (1613-1645). Under _Alexis,_ his son (1645-1676), important conquests were made from the Poles, and the _Cossacks_ acknowledged the sovereignty of the Czar. The princ.i.p.al founder of Russian civilization was _Peter the Great_ (1682-1725). Through the machinations of his half-sister _Sophia_, who contrived to get the armed aid of the streltzi,--the native militia,--he had to share the throne with a half-brother, _Ivan_, who was older than himself, and lived until 1696. _Sophia_ pushed aside Peter's mother, and grasped the reins of power. Peter learned Latin, German, and Dutch, and acquired much knowledge of various sorts. As he grew older, his life was in danger; but at the age of seventeen, he was able to crush his enemies (1689). _Sophia_, who was at their head, he shut up in a monastery for the remainder of her days. From _Lefort_, a Swiss, and other foreigners, Peter derived information about foreign lands, and was led to visit them in order to instruct himself, and to introduce into his own country the arts and inventions of civilized peoples. He invited into Russia artisans, seamen, and officers from abroad. He traveled through _Germany _and _Holland _to _England_, and with his own hands worked at s.h.i.+p-building at the dock-yards of _Zaandam_ (near Amsterdam) and _Deptford_. On his way to Venice, he was called home by a revolt of the streltzi, which he put down. He was unsparing in his vengeance, and, despite his veneer of culture, never got rid of his innate barbarism. _Azoff _he conquered, and it was ceded to him by the Turks in the Peace of _Carlowitz_ (1699). Then his ambitious thoughts turned to the Baltic, for he was bent on making Russia a naval power. He formed a secret alliance with Denmark and Poland against Sweden.