to the clergy,
and promised to use his endeavours for reviving the edict of Nantes,
which had been guaranteed by the kings of England. These offers,
however, produced little effect; and the Germans ravaged the whole
country in revenge for the cruelties which the French had committed
in the Palatinate. The allied army advanced from Ambrun to Gap, on the
frontiers of Provence, and this place submitted without opposition. The
inhabitants of Grenoble, the capital of Dauphine, and even of Lyons,
were overwhelmed with consternation; and a fairer opportunity of
humbling France could never occur, as that part of the kingdom had been
left almost quite defenceless; but this was fatally neglected, either
from the spirit of dissension which began to prevail in the allied army,
or from the indisposition of the duke of Savoy, who was seized with the
small-pox in the midst of this expedition; or, lastly, from his want of
sincerity, which was shrewdly suspected. He is said to have maintained a
constant correspondence with the court of Versailles, in complaisance to
which he retarded the operations of the confederates. Certain it is, he
evacuated all his conquests, and about the middle of September quitted
the French territories, after having pillaged and laid waste the country
through which he had penetrated.* In Catalonia the French attempted
nothing of importance during this campaign, and the Spaniards were
wholly inactive in that province.

* At this period queen Mary, understanding that the
protestant Vaudois were destitute of ministers to preach or
teach the gospel, established a fund from her own privy
purse to maintain ten preachers, and as many schoolmasters,
in the valleys of Piedmont.

THE DUKE OF HANOVER CREATED AN ELECTOR OF THE EMPIRE.

The protestant interest in Germany acquired an accession of strength by
the creation of a ninth electorate in favour of Ernest Augustus, duke of
Hanover. He had by this time renounced all his connexions with France,
and engaged to enter heartily into the interest of the allies, in
consideration of his obtaining the electoral dignity. King William
exerted himself so vigorously in his behalf at the court of Vienna, that
the emperor agreed to the proposal, in case the consent of the other
electors could be procured. This assent, however, was extorted by the
importunities of the king of England, whom he durst not disoblige.
Leopold was blindly bigotted to the