at the Hague: he proposed to
this minister, that the negotiation should be renewed; and demanded
passes, by virtue of which the French plenipotentiaries might repair in
safety to Holland. In the meantime, the French king withdrew his troops
from Spain, on pretence of demonstrating his readiness to oblige
the allies in that particular; though this measure was the effect of
necessity, which obliged him to recall those troops for the defence of
his own dominions. The states-general refused to grant passes to
the French ministers; but they allowed Petkum to make a journey to
Versailles. In the interim king Philip published a manifesto, protesting
against all that should be transacted at the Hague to his prejudice. Far
from yielding Spain and the Indies to his competitor, he declared his
intention of driving Charles from those places that were now in his
possession. He named the duke of Alba and count Bergheyck for his
plenipotentiaries, and ordered them to notify their credentials to the
maritime powers; but no regard was paid to their intimation. Philip
tampered likewise with the duke of Marlborough; and the marquis de Torcy
renewed his attempts upon that general; but all his application and
address proved ineffectual. Petkum brought back from Versailles a kind
of memorial, importing, that those motives which influenced the French
before the campaign was opened, no longer subsisted; that the winter
season naturally produced a cessation of arms, during which he would
treat of a general and reasonable peace, without restricting himself to
the form of the preliminaries which the allies had pretended to impose;
that, nevertheless, he would still treat on the foundation of those
conditions to which he had consented, and send plenipotentiaries to
begin the conference with those of the allies on the first day of
January. The states-general inveighed against this memorial, as a proof
of the French king's insincerity; though he certainly had a right
to retract those offers they had formerly rejected. They came to a
resolution, that it was absolutely necessary to prosecute the war with
rigour; and they wrote pressing letters on the subject to all their
allies.

{ANNE, 1701--1714}

ACCOUNT OF DE SACHEVEREL.

The parliament of Great Britain being assembled on the fifteenth day of
November, the queen in her speech told both houses that the enemy had
endeavoured, by false appearances and deceitful insinuations of a desire
afte