the English ambassador remonstrated against
their compliance, and represented it as a breach of the neutrality
their high mightinesses declared they would observe, yet, after some
hesitation, the demand was granted; and their inability to prevent the
passage of the French troops, should it be attempted by force, pleaded
in excuse of their conduct.

Scarce had the French army, commanded by the prince de Soubise, set foot
in the territories of Juliers and Cologn, when they found themselves in
possession of the duchy of Cloves and the country of Marck, where all
things were left open to them, the Prussians, who evacuated their
posts, taking their route along the river Lippe, in order to join some
regiments from Magdeburgh, who were sent to facilitate their retreat.
The distressed inhabitants, thus exposed to the calamities of war from
an unprovoked enemy, were instantly ordered to furnish contributions,
forage, and provisions for the use of their invaders; and what was still
more terrifying to them, the partisan Fischer, whose cruelties the last
war they still remembered with horror, was again let loose upon them by
the inhumanity of the empress-queen. Wesel was immediately occupied by
the French; Emmerick and Maseyk soon shared the same fate; and the city
of Gueldres was besieged, the Prussians seeming resolved to defend this
last place; to which end they opened the sluices, and laid the country
under water. Those who retreated, filing off to the north-west of
Paderborn, entered the county of Ritberg, the property of count Caunitz
Ritberg, great chancellor to the empress-queen. After taking his castle,
in which they found thirty pieces of cannon, they raised contributions
in the district to the amount of forty thousand crowns. As the Prussians
retired, the French took possession of the country they quitted in
the name of the empress-queen, whose commissary attended them for that
purpose. The general rendezvous of these troops, under prince Soubise,
was appointed at Neuss, in the electorate of Cologn, where a large body
of French was assembled by the first of April. The Austrians, in their
turn, were not idle. Mareschal Brown visited the fortifications of Brinn
and Koninsgratz; reviewed the army of the late prince Picolomini, now
under the command of general Serbelloni; and put his own army in
march for Kostlitz on the Elbe, where he proposed to establish his
headquarters.

DECLARATION OF THE CZARINA AGAINST THE KIN