support of the Crown at a moment when Anne's
personal popularity gave the Crown a new weight with the nation. In
England indeed party feeling for the moment died away. The Parliament
called on the new accession was strongly Tory; but all save the extreme
Tories were won over to the war now that it was waged on behalf of a
Tory queen by a Tory general, while the most extreme of the Whigs were
ready to back even a Tory general in waging a Whig war.

[Sidenote: Marlborough and the Allies.]

Abroad however William's death shook the Alliance to its base; and even
Holland wavered in dread of being deserted by England in the coming
struggle. But the decision of Marlborough soon did away with this
distrust. Anne was made to declare from the throne her resolve to pursue
with energy the policy of her predecessor. The Parliament was brought to
sanction vigorous measures for the prosecution of the war. The new
general hastened to the Hague, received the command of the Dutch as well
as of the English forces, and drew the German powers into the
Confederacy with a skill and adroitness which even William might have
envied. Never indeed was greatness more quickly recognised than in the
case of Marlborough. In a few months he was regarded by all as the
guiding spirit of the Alliance, and princes whose jealousy had worn out
the patience of the king yielded without a struggle to the counsels of
his successor. His temper fitted him in an especial way to be the head
of a great confederacy. Like William, he owed little of his power to any
early training. The trace of his neglected education was seen to the
last in his reluctance to write. "Of all things," he said to his wife,
"I do not love writing." To pen a despatch indeed was a far greater
trouble to Marlborough than to plan a campaign. But nature had given him
qualities which in other men spring specially from culture. His capacity
for business was immense. During the next ten years he assumed the
general direction of the war in Flanders and in Spain. He managed every
negotiation with the courts of the allies. He watched over the shifting
phases of English politics. He crossed the Channel to win over Anne to a
change in the cabinet, or hurried to Berlin to secure the due contingent
of Electoral troops from Brandenburg. At one and the same moment men saw
him reconciling the Emperor with the Protestants of Hungary, stirring
the Calvinists of the Cevennes into revolt, arranging the affairs o