t all his previous
calculations were upset. He was not a man to remain long dumfounded by
any change in the state of affairs. It would have been quite consistent
with his character and his general course of action if, when he saw the
meaning of the crisis, he had at once resolved to make the best of it and
to try to keep himself still at the head of affairs. In that spirit
nothing is more likely than that he should have pushed himself to the
front once more, and proposed, as Lord High Treasurer, the man whom, but
for the sudden and overwhelming pressure brought to bear upon him, he
would have tried to keep out of all influence and power at such a moment.

The appointment of the Duke of Shrewsbury settled the question. The
crisis was virtually over. The Whig statesmen at once sent out summonses
to all the members of the Privy Council living anywhere near London.
That same afternoon another meeting of the council was held. Somers
himself, the great Whig leader whose {47} services had made the party
illustrious in former reigns, and whose fame sheds a lustre on them even
to this hour--Somers, aged, infirm, decaying as he was in body and in
mind--hastened to attend the summons, and to lend his strength and his
authority to the measures on which his colleagues had determined. The
council ordered the concentration of several regiments in and near
London. They recalled troops from Ostend, and sent a fleet to sea.
General Stanhope, a soldier and statesman of whom we shall hear more, was
prepared, if necessary, to take possession of the Tower and clap the
leading Jacobites into it, to obtain possession of all the outports, and,
in short, to act as military dictator, authorized to anticipate
revolution and to keep the succession safe. In a word, the fate of the
Stuarts was sealed. Bolingbroke was checkmated; the Chevalier de St.
George would have put to sea in vain. Marlborough was on his way to
England, and there was nothing to do but to wait till the breath was out
of Queen Anne's body, and proclaim George the Elector King of England.

The time of waiting was not long. Anne sank into death on August 1,
1714, and the heralds proclaimed that "the high and mighty Prince George,
Elector of Brunswick and Luneburg, is, by the death of Queen Anne of
blessed memory, become our lawful and rightful liege lord, King of Great
Britain, France, and Ireland, Defender of the Faith." This "King of
France" was lucky enough not to co