A Popular History of France from the Earliest Times Volume VI Part 6

A few weeks had sufficed to crown the success; less time sufficed to undo it. On flying from Vienna, Maria Theresa had sought refuge in Hungary; the a.s.sembly of the Estates held a meeting at Presburg; there she appeared, dressed in mourning, holding in her arms her son, scarce six months old. Already she had known how to attach the magnates to her by the confidence she had shown them; she held out to them her child; "I am abandoned of my friends," said she in Latin, a language still in use in Hungary amongst the upper cla.s.ses; "I am pursued by my enemies, attacked by my relatives; I have no hope but in your fidelity and courage; we--my son and I--look to you for our safety."

The palatines scarcely gave the queen time to finish; already the sabres were out of the sheaths and flas.h.i.+ng above their heads. Count Bathyany was the first to shout, "_Moriamur pro rege nostro Maria Theresa!" The same shout was repeated everywhere; Maria Theresa, restraining her tears, thanked her defenders with gesture and voice; she was expecting a second child before long. "I know not," she wrote to her mother-in-law, the d.u.c.h.ess of Lorraine, "if I shall have a town left to be confined in."

[Ill.u.s.tration: "Moriamur pro rege nostro."----142]

Hungary rose, like one man, to protect her sovereign against the excess of her misfortunes; the same spirit spread before long through the Austrian provinces; bodies of irregulars, savage and cruel, formed at all points, attacking and ma.s.sacring the French detachments they encountered,--and giving to the war a character of ferocity which displayed itself with special excess against Bavaria. Count Segur, besieged in Lintz, was obliged to capitulate on the 26th of January, and the day after the Elector of Bavaria had received the imperial crown at Frankfurt, February 12, 1742--the Austrians, under the orders of General Khevenhuller, obtained possession of Munich, which was given up to pillage. Jokes then began to fly about in Paris at the expense of the emperor who had just been made after an interregnum of more than a year.

"The thing in the world which it is perceived that one can most easily do without," said Voltaire, "is an emperor." "As Paris is always crammed with a number of Austrians in heart who are charmed at the sad events,"

writes the advocate Barbier, "they have put in the Bastille some indiscreet individuals who said in open cafe that the emperor was John Lackland, and that a room would have to be fitted up for him at Vincennes. In point of fact, he remains at Frankfurt, and it would be very hard for him to go elsewhere in safety."

Meanwhile England had renounced her neutrality; the general feeling of the nation prevailed over the prudent and farsighted ability of Robert Walpole; he succ.u.mbed, after his long ministry, full of honors and riches; the government had pa.s.sed into warlike hands. The women of society, headed by the d.u.c.h.ess of Marlborough, raised a subscription of one hundred thousand pounds, which they offered unsuccessfully to the haughty Maria Theresa. Parliament voted more effectual aid, and English diplomacy adroitly detached the King of Sardinia from the allies whom success appeared to be abandoning. The King of Prussia had just gained at Czezlaw an important victory; next day, he was negotiating with the Queen of Hungary. On the 11th of June the treaty which abandoned Silesia to Frederick II. was secretly concluded; when the signatures were exchanged at Berlin in the following month, the withdrawal of Prussia was everywhere known in Europe. "This is the method introduced and accepted amongst the allies: to separate and do a better stroke of business by being the first to make terms," writes M. d'Argenson on 30th June; "it used not to be so. The English were the first to separate from the great alliance in 1711, and they derive great advantages from it; we followed this terrible example in 1735, and got Lorraine by it; lastly, here is the King of Prussia, but under much more odious circ.u.mstances, since he leaves us in a terrible sc.r.a.pe, our armies, in the middle of Germany, beaten and famine-stricken; the emperor, despoiled of his hereditary dominions and his estates likewise in danger. All is at the mercy of the maritime powers, who have pushed things to the extremity we see; and we, France, who were alone capable of resisting such a torrent at this date-- here be we exhausted, and not in a condition to check these rogueries and this power, even by uniting ourselves the most closely with Spain. Let be, let us meddle no more; it is the greatest service we can render at this date to our allies of Germany."

Cardinal Fleury had not waited for confirmation of the King of Prussia's defection to seek likewise to negotiate; Marshal Belle-Isle had been intrusted with this business, and, at the same time with a letter addressed by the cardinal--to Field-Marshal Konigseck. The minister was old, timid, displeased, disquieted at the war which he had been surprised into; he made his excuses to the Austrian negotiator and delivered his plenipotentiary into his hands at the very outset. "Many people know,"

said he, "how opposed I was to the resolutions we adopted, and that I was in some sort compelled to agree to them. Your Excellency is too well informed of all that pa.s.ses not to divine who it was who set everything in motion for deciding the king to enter into a league which was so contrary to my inclinations and to my principles."

For sole answer, Maria Theresa had the cardinal's letter published. At Utrecht, after the unparalleled disasters which were overwhelming the kingdom, and in spite of the concessions they had been ordered to offer, the tone of Louis XIV.'s plenipotentiaries was more dignified and prouder than that of the enfeebled old man who had so long governed France by dint of moderation, discretion, and patient inertness. The allies of France were disquieted and her foes emboldened. Marshal Belle-Isle, shut up in Prague, and Marshal Broglie, encamped near the town, remaining isolated in a hostile country, hemmed in on all sides by a savage foe, maintaining order with difficulty within the fortress itself.

"Marshal Broglie is encamped under the guns of Prague," says Barbier's journal: "his camp is spoken of as a masterpiece. As there is reason to be shy of the inhabitants, who are for the Queen of Hungary, a battery has been trained upon Prague, the garrison camps upon the ramparts, and Marshal Belle-Isle patrols every night."

Marshal Maillebois was at Dusseldorf, commissioned to observe the Hollanders and protect Westphalia; he received orders to join Marshals Broglie and Belle-Isle. "It is the army of redemption for the captives,"

was the saying at Paris. At the same time that the marshal was setting out for Prague, Cardinal Fleury sent him the following instructions: "Engage in no battle of which the issue may be doubtful." All the defiles of Bohemia were carefully guarded; Maillebois first retired on Egra, then he carried his arms into Bavaria, where Marshal Broglie came to relieve him of his command. Marshal Belle-Isle remained with the sole charge of the defence of Prague; he was frequently hara.s.sed by the Austrians; his troops were exhausted with cold and privation. During the night between the 16th and 17th of December, 1742, the marshal sallied from the town. "I stole a march of twenty-four hours good on Prince Lobkowitz, who was only five leagues from me," wrote Belle-Isle, on accomplis.h.i.+ng his retreat; "I pierced his quarters, and I traversed ten leagues of plain, having to plod along with eleven thousand foot and three thousand two hundred and fifty worn-out horses, M. de Lobkowitz having eight thousand good horses and twelve thousand infantry. I made such despatch that I arrived at the defiles before he could come up with me. I concealed from him the road I had resolved to take, for he had ordered the occupation of all the defiles and the destruction of all the bridges there are on the two main roads leading from Prague to Egra. I took one which pierces between the two others, where I found no obstacles but those of nature, and, at last, I arrived on the tenth day, without a check, though continually hara.s.sed by hussars in front, rear, and flank."

The hospitals at Egra were choke full of sick soldiers; twelve nights pa.s.sed on the snow without blankets or cloaks had cost the lives of many men; a great number never recovered more than a lingering existence.

Amongst them there was, in the king's regiment of infantry, a young officer, M. de Vauvenargues, who expired at thirty-two years of age, soon after his return to his country, leaving amongst those who had known him a feeling that a great loss had been suffered by France and human intellect.

Chevert still occupied Prague, with six thousand sick or wounded; the Prince of Lorraine had invested the place and summoned it to surrender at discretion. "Tell your general;" replied Chevert to the Austrian sent to parley, "that, if he will not grant me the honors of war, I will fire the four corners of Prague, and bury myself under its ruins." He obtained what he asked for, and went to rejoin Marshal Belle-Isle at Egra. People compared the retreat from Prague to the Retreat of the Ten Thousand; but the truth came out for all the fictions of flattery and national pride.

A hundred thousand Frenchmen had entered Germany at the outset of the war; at the commencement of the year 1743, thirty-five thousand soldiers, mustered in Bavaria, were nearly all that remained to withstand the increasing efforts of the Austrians.

Marshal Belle-Isle was coldly received at Paris. "He is much inconvenienced by a sciatica," writes the advocate Barbier, "and cannot walk but with the a.s.sistance of two men. He comes back with grand decorations: prince of the empire, knight of the Golden Fleece, blue riband, marshal of France, and duke. He is held accountable, however, for all the misfortunes that have happened to us; it was spread about at Paris that he was disgraced and even exiled to his estate at Vernon, near Gisors. It is true, nevertheless, that he has several times done business with the king, whether in M. Amelot's presence, on foreign affairs, or M. d'Aguesseau's, on military; but this restless and ambitious spirit is feared by the ministers."

Almost at the very moment when the Austrians were occupying Prague and Bohemia, Cardinal Fleury was expiring, at Versailles, at the age of ninety. Madame Marshal Noailles, mother of the present marshal, who is at least eighty-seven, but is all alive, runs about Paris and writes all day, sent to inquire after him. He sent answer to her, "that she was cleverer than he--she managed to live; as for him, he was ceasing to exist. In fact, it is the case of a candle going out, and being a long while about it. Many people are awaiting this result, and all the court will be starting at his very ghost, a week after he has been buried."

[_Journal de Barbier,_ t. ii. p. 348.]

Cardinal Fleury had lived too long: the trials of the last years of his life had been beyond the bodily and mental strength of an old man elevated for the first time to power at an age when it is generally seen slipping from the hands of the most energetic. Naturally gentle, moderate, discreet, though stubborn and persevering in his views, he had not an idea of conceiving and practising a great policy. France was indebted to him for a long period of mediocre and dull prosperity, which was preferable to the evils that had for so long oppressed her, but as for which she was to cherish no remembrance and no grat.i.tude, when new misfortunes came bursting upon her.

Both court and nation hurled the same reproach at Cardinal Fleury; he alone prevented the king from governing, and turned his attention from affairs, partly from jealousy, and partly from the old habit acquired as a preceptor, who can never see a man in one who has been his pupil. When the old man died at last, as M. d'Argenson cruelly puts it, France turned her eyes towards Louis XV. "The cardinal is dead: hurrah! for the king!"

was the cry amongst the people. The monarch himself felt as if he were emanc.i.p.ated. "Gentlemen, here am I--premier minister!" said he to his most intimate courtiers. "When MM. de Maurepas and Amelot went to announce to him this death, it is said that he was at first overcome, and that when he had recovered himself, he told them that hitherto he had availed himself of Cardinal Fleury's counsels; but he relied upon it that they would so act, that they would not need to place any one between them and him. If this answer is faithfully reported," adds the advocate Barbier, "it is sufficiently in the high style to let it be understood that there will be no more any premier minister, or at any rate any body exercising the functions thereof."

For some time previously, in view of the great age and rapid enfeeblement of Cardinal Fleury, Marshal Noailles, ever able and far-sighted, had been pressing Louis XV. to take into his own hands the direction of his affairs. Having the command on the frontier of the Low Countries, he had adopted the practice of writing directly to the king. "Until it may please your Majesty to let me know your intentions and your will," said the marshal at the outset of his correspondence, "confining myself solely to what relates to the frontier on which you have given me the command, I shall speak with frankness and freedom about the object confided to my care, and shall hold my peace as regards the rest. If you, Sir, desire the silence to be broken, it is for you to order it." For the first time Louis XV. seemed to awake from the midst of that life of intellectual lethargy and physical activity which he allowed to glide along, without a thought, between the pleasures of the chase and the amus.e.m.e.nts invented by his favorite; a remembrance of Louis XIV. came across his mind, naturally acute and judicious as it was. "The late king, my great- grandfather," he writes to Marshal Noailles on the 26th of November, 1743, "whom I desire to imitate as much as I can, recommended me, on his death-bed, to take counsel in all things, and to seek out the best, so as always to follow it. I shall be charmed, then, if you will give me some; thus do I open your mouth, as the pope does the cardinals, and I permit you to say to me what your zeal and your affection for me and my kingdom prompt you." The first fruit of this correspondence was the entrance of Marshal Noailles into the Council.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Louis XV. and his Councillors----148]

"One day as he was, in the capacity of simple courtier, escorting the king, who was on his way to the Council, his Majesty said to him, "Marshal, come in; we are going to hold a council," and pointed to a place at his left, Cardinal Tencin being on his right. "This new minister does not please our secretaries of state. He is a troublesome inspector set over them, who meddles in everything, though master of nothing." The renewal of active hostilities was about to deliver the ministers from Marshal Noailles.

The prudent hesitation and backwardness of Holland had at last yielded to the pressure of England. The States-general had sent twenty thousand men to join the army which George II. had just sent into Germany. It was only on the 15th of March, 1744, that Louis XV. formally declared war against the King of England and Maria Theresa, no longer as an auxiliary of the 'emperor, but in his own name and on behalf of France. Charles VII., a fugitive, driven from his hereditary dominions, which had been evacuated by Marshal Broglie, had transported to Frankfurt his ill fortune and his empty t.i.tles. France alone supported in Germany a quarrel the weight of which she had imprudently taken upon herself.

The effort was too much for the resources; the king's counsellors felt that it was; the battle of Dettingen, skilfully commenced on the 27th of June, 1743, by Marshal Noailles, and lost by the imprudence of his nephew, the Duke of Gramont, had completely shaken the confidence of the armies; the emperor had treated with the Austrians for an armistice; establis.h.i.+ng the neutrality of his troops, as belonging to the empire.

Noailles wrote to the king on the 8th of July, "It is necessary to uphold this phantom, in order to restrain Germany, which would league against us, and furnish the English with all the troops therein, the moment the emperor was abandoned." It was necessary, at the same time, to look out elsewhere for more effectual support. The King of Prussia had been resting for the last two years, a curious and an interested spectator of the contests which were bathing Europe in blood, and which answered his purpose by enfeebling his rivals. He frankly and coolly flaunted his selfishness. "In a previous war with France," he says in his memoirs, "I abandoned the French at Prague, because I gained Silesia by that step.

If I had escorted them to Vienna, they would never have given me so much." In turn the successes of the Queen of Hungary were beginning to disquiet him; on the 5th of June, 1744, he signed a new treaty with France; for the first time Louis XV. was about to quit Versailles and place himself at the head of an army. "If my country is to be devoured,"

said the king, with a levity far different from the solemn tone of Louis XIV., "it will be very hard on me to see it swallowed without personally doing my best to prevent it."

He had, however, hesitated a long while before he started. There was a shortness of money. For all his having been head of the council of finance, Noailles had not been able to rid himself of ideas of arbitrary power. "When the late king, your great-grandfather, considered any outlay necessary," he wrote to Louis XV., "the funds had to be found, because it was his will. The case in question is one in which your Majesty ought to speak as master, and lay down the law to your ministers.

Your comptroller-general ought, for the future, to be obliged to furnish the needful funds without daring to ask the reasons for which they are demanded of him, and still less to decide upon them. It was thus that the late king behaved towards M. Colbert and all who succeeded him in that office; he would never have done anything great in the whole course of his reign, if he had behaved otherwise." It was the king's common sense which replied to this counsel, "We are still paying all those debts that the late king incurred for extraordinary occasions, fifty millions a year and more, which we must begin by paying off first of all." Later on, he adds, gayly, "As for me, I can do without any equipage, and, if needful, the shoulder of mutton of the lieutenants of infantry will do perfectly well for me." "There is nothing talked off here but the doings of the king, who is in extraordinary spirits," writes the advocate Barbier; "he has visited the places near Valenciennes, the magazines, the hospitals; he has tasted the broth of the sick, and the soldiers' bread.

The amba.s.sador of Holland came, before his departure, to propose a truce in order to put us off yet longer. The king, when he was presented, merely said, 'I know what you are going to say to me, and what it is all about. I will give you my answer in Flanders.' This answer is a proud one, and fit for a king of France."

[Ill.u.s.tration: Louis XV. and the Amba.s.sador of Holland----151]

The hopes of the nation were aroused. "Have we, then, a king?" said M. d'Argenson. Credit was given to the d.u.c.h.ess of Chateauroux, Louis XV.'s new favorite, for having excited this warlike ardor in the king.

Ypres and Menin had already surrendered after a few days' open trenches; siege had just been laid to Furnes. Marshal Noailles had proposed to move up the king's household troops in order to make an impression upon the enemy. "If they must needs be marched up," replied Louis XV., "I do not wish to separate from my household: _verb.u.m sap_."

[Ill.u.s.tration: YPRES----151]

The news which arrived from the army of Italy was equally encouraging; the Prince of Conde, seconded by Chevert, had forced the pa.s.sage of the Alps. "There will come some occasion when we shall do as well as the French have done," wrote Count Campo-Santo, who, under Don Philip, commanded the Spanish detachment; "it is impossible to do better."

Madame de Chateauroux had just arrived at Lille; there were already complaints in the army of the frequent absence of the king on his visits to her, when alarming news came to cause forgetfulness of court intrigues and dissatisfaction; the Austrians had effected the pa.s.sage of the Rhine by surprise near Philipsburg; Elsa.s.s was invaded. Marshal Coigny, who was under orders to defend it, had been enticed in the direction of Worms, by false moves on the part of Prince Charles of Lorraine, and had found great difficulty in recrossing the frontier. "Here we are on the eve of a great crisis," writes Louis XV. on the 7th of July. It was at once decided that the king must move on Elsa.s.s to defend his threatened provinces. The King of Prussia promised to enter Bohemia immediately with twenty thousand men, as the diversion was sure to be useful to France. Louis XV. had already arrived at Metz, and Marshal Noailles pushed forward in order to unite all the corps. On the 8th of August the king awoke in pain, prostrated by a violent headache; a few days later, all France was in consternation; the king was said to have been given over.

"The king's danger was noised abroad throughout Paris in the middle of the night," writes Voltaire [_Siecle de Louis XV.,_ p. 103]: "everybody gets up, runs about, in confusion, not knowing whither to go. The churches open at dead of night; n.o.body takes any more note of time, bed-time, or day-time, or meal-time. Paris was beside itself; all the houses of officials were besieged by a continual crowd; knots collected, at all the cross-roads. The people cried, 'If he should die, it will be for having marched to our aid.' People accosted one another, questioned one another in the churches, without being the least acquainted. There were many churches where the priest who p.r.o.nounced the prayer for the king's health interrupted the intoning with his tears, and the people responded with nothing but sobs and cries. The courier, who, on the 19th, brought to Paris the news of his convalescence, was embraced and almost stifled by the people; they kissed his horse, they escorted him in triumph. All the streets resounded with a shout of joy. 'The king is well!' When the monarch was told of the unparalleled transports of joy which had succeeded those of despair, he was affected to tears, and, raising himself up in a thrill of emotion which gave him strength, 'Ah!'

he exclaimed, 'how sweet it is to be so loved! What have I done to deserve it?'"

What had he done, indeed! And what was he destined to do? France had just experienced the last gush of that monarchical pa.s.sion and fidelity which had so long distinguished her, and which were at last used up and worn out through the faults of the princes as well as through the blindness and errors of the nation itself.

Confronted with death, the king had once more felt the religious terrors which were constantly intermingled with the irregularity of his life; he had sent for the queen, and had dismissed the d.u.c.h.ess of Chateauroux.

On recovering his health, he found himself threatened by new perils, aggravated by his illness and by the troubled state into which it had thrown the public mind. After having ravaged and wasted Elsa.s.s, without Marshals Coigny and Noailles having been able to prevent it, Prince Charles had, without being hara.s.sed, struck again into the road towards Bohemia, which was being threatened by the King of Prussia. "This prince," wrote Marshal Belle-Isle on the 13th of September, "has written a very strong letter to the king, complaining of the quiet way in which Prince Charles was allowed to cross the Rhine; he attributes it all to his Majesty's illness, and complains bitterly of Marshal Noailles." And, on the 25th, to Count Clermont, "Here we are, decided at last; the king is to start on Tuesday the 27th for Lundville, and on the 5th of October will be at Strasbourg. n.o.body knows as yet any further than that, and it is a question whether he will go to Fribourg or not. The ministers are off back to Paris. Marshal Noailles, who has sent for his equipage hither, asked whether he should attend his Majesty, who replied, 'As you please,' rather curtly. Your Highness cannot have a doubt about his doing so, after such a gracious permission."

Louis XV. went to the siege of Fribourg, which was a long and a difficult one. He returned to Paris on the 13th of November, to the great joy of the people. A few days later, Marshal Belle-Isle, whilst pa.s.sing through Hanover in the character of negotiator, was arrested by order of George II., and carried to England a prisoner of war, in defiance of the law of nations and the protests of France. The moment was not propitious for obtaining the release of a marshal of France and an able general. The Emperor Charles VII., who but lately returned to his hereditary dominions, and recovered possession of his capital, after fifteen months of Austrian occupation, died suddenly on the 20th of January, 1745, at forty-seven years of age. The face of affairs changed all at once; the honor of France was no longer concerned in the struggle; the Grand-duke of Tuscany had no longer any compet.i.tor for the empire; the eldest son of Charles VII. was only seventeen; the Queen of Hungary was disposed for peace. "The English ministry, which laid down the law for all, because it laid down the money, and which had in its pay, all at one time, the Queen of Hungary, the King of Poland, and the King of Sardinia, considered that there was everything to lose by a treaty with France, and everything to gain by arms. War continued, because it had commenced."

[Voltaire, _Siecle de Louis XV_.]

The King of France henceforth maintained it almost alone by himself. The young Elector of Bavaria had already found himself driven out of Munich, and forced by his exhausted subjects to demand peace of Maria Theresa.

The election to the empire was imminent; Maximilian-Joseph promised his votes to the Grand-duke of Tuscany; at that price he was re-established in his hereditary dominions. The King of Poland had rejected the advances of France, who offered him the t.i.tle of emperor, beneath which Charles VII. had succ.u.mbed. Marshal Saxe bore all the brunt of the war.

A foreigner and a Protestant, for a long while under suspicion with Louis XV., and blackened in character by the French generals, Maurice of Saxony had won authority as well as glory by the splendor of his bravery and of his military genius. Combining with quite a French vivacity the far-sightedness and the perseverance of the races of the north, he had been toiling for more than a year to bring about amongst his army a spirit of discipline, a powerful organization, a contempt for fatigue as well as for danger. "At Dettingen the success of the allies was due to their surprising order, for they were not seasoned to war," he used to say. Order did not as yet reign in the army of Marshal Saxe. In 1745, the situation was grave; the marshal was attacked with dropsy; his life appeared to be in danger. He nevertheless commanded his preparations to be made for the campaign, and, when Voltaire, who was one of his friends, was astounded at it, "It is no question of living, but of setting out,"

was his reply.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Marshal Saxe 154]

The king was preparing to set out, like Marshal Saxe; he had just married the dauphin to the eldest daughter of the King of Spain; the young prince accompanied his father to the front before Tournai, which the French army was besieging. On the 8th of May Louis XV. visited the outskirts; an attack from the enemy was expected, the field of battle was known beforehand. The village of Fontenoy had already been occupied by Marshal Noailles, who had asked to serve as aide-de-camp to Marshal Saxe, to whom he was attached by sincere friends.h.i.+p, and whom he had very much contributed to advance in the king's good graces.

"Never did Louis XV. show more gayety than on the eve of the fight," says Voltaire. "The conversation was of battles at which kings had been present in person. The king said that since the battle of Poitiers no king of France had fought with his son beside him, that since St. Louis none had gained any signal victory over the English, and that he hoped to be the first. He was the first up on the day of action; he himself at four o'clock awoke Count d'Argenson, minister of war, who on the instant sent to ask Marshal Saxe for his final orders. The marshal was found in a carriage of osier-work, which served him for a bed, and in which he had himself drawn about when his exhausted powers no longer allowed him to sit his horse." The king and the dauphin had already taken up their positions of battle; the two villages of Fontenoy and Antoin, and the wood of Barri, were occupied by French troops. Two armies of fifty thousand men each were about to engage in the lists as at Dettingen.

Austria had sent but eight thousand soldiers, under the orders of the old and famous General Konigseck; the English and the Hollanders were about to bear all the burden and heat of the day.

It was not five in the morning, and already there was a thunder of cannon. The Hollanders attacked the village of Antoin, the English that of Fontenoy. The two posts were covered by a redoubt which belched forth flames; the Hollanders refused to deliver the a.s.sault. An attack made by the English on the wood of Barri had been repulsed. "Forward, my lord, right to your front," said old Konigseck to the Duke of c.u.mberland, George II.'s son, who commanded the English; "the ravine in front of Fontenoy must be carried." The English advanced; they formed a deep and serried column, preceded and supported by artillery. The French batteries mowed them down right and left, whole ranks fell dead; they were at once filled up; the cannon which they dragged along by hand, pointed towards Fontenoy and the redoubts, replied to the French artillery. An attempt of some officers of the French guards to carry off the cannon of the English was unsuccessful. The two corps found themselves at last face to face.

The English officers took off their hats; Count Chabannes and the Duke of Biron, who had moved forward, returned their salute. "Gentlemen of the French guard, fire!" exclaimed Lord Charles Hay. "Fire yourselves, gentlemen of England," immediately replied Count d'Auteroche; "we never fire first." [All fiction, it is said.] The volley of the English laid low the foremost ranks of the French guards. This regiment had been effeminated by a long residence in Paris and at Versailles; its colonel, the Duke of Gramont, had been killed in the morning, at the commencement of the action; it gave way, and the English cleared the ravine which defended Fontenoy. They advanced as if on parade; the majors [?sergeant-majors], small cane in hand, rested it lightly on the soldiers' muskets to direct their fire. Several regiments successively opposed to the English column found themselves repulsed and forced to beat a retreat; the English still advanced.

Marshal Saxe, carried about everywhere in his osier-litter, saw the danger with a calm eye; he sent the Marquis of Meuse to the king. "I beg your Majesty," he told him to say, "to go back with the dauphin over the bridge of Calonne; I will do what I can to restore the battle." "Ah! I know well enough that he will do what is necessary," answered the king, "but I stay where I am." Marshal Saxe mounted his horse.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Battle of Fontenoy----157]

In its turn, the cavalry had been repulsed by the English; their fire swept away rank after rank of the regiment of Vaisseaux, which would not be denied. "How is it that such troops are not victorious?" cried Marshal Saxe, who was moving about at a foot's pace in the middle of the fire, without his cuira.s.s, which his weakness did not admit of his wearing. He advanced towards Fontenoy; the batteries had just fallen short of ball. The English column had ceased marching; arrested by the successive efforts of the French regiments, it remained motionless, and seemed to receive no more orders, but it preserved a proud front, and appeared to be masters of the field of battle. Marshal Saxe was preparing for the retreat of the army; he had relinquished his proposal for that of the king, from the time that the English had come up and pressed him closely. "It was my advice, before the danger was so great,"

he said; "now there is no falling back."

A disorderly council was being held around Louis XV. With the fine judgment and sense which he often displayed when he took the trouble to have an opinion on his affairs, the king had been wise enough to encourage his troops by his presence without in any way interfering with the orders of Marshal Saxe. The Duke of Richelieu vented an opinion more worthy of the name he bore than had been his wont in his life of courtiers.h.i.+p and debauchery. "Throw forward the artillery against the column," he said, "and let the king's household, with all the disposable regiments, attack them at the same time; they must be fallen upon like so many foragers."