nce since Agincourt was not foreseen.

In November 1701 Parliament was dissolved, and a majority was returned
prepared for war, prepared to support the policy of the Grand
Alliance. What made it formidable was that the Tories themselves were
warlike. The Whigs were warlike because it was their nature, since
France had declared itself for the Stuarts; also because they and
their friends were interested in pushing trade with the oceanic world,
which was mainly Spanish. But it was not, at first, a Whig war. On
9th March, 1702 they obtained the majority. They were 235 to 221.

William III was dying. He had borne the accident well by which he
broke his collar-bone. He sat at dinner that evening, and was
expected to recover in a few weeks. But he fell asleep one day near
an open window. Nobody had the courage to shut it, and he caught a
chill, of which, in five days, he died. His prestige was lost to the
cause of the allies. At the same time, William was a Dutch king,
working with Dutchmen only, Heinsius, Bentinck, Keppel, for Dutch as
much as for English objects. While he lived there was no danger that
the interests of his own countrymen would be made subordinate to those
of England. There was no sign of Holland taking the second place, of
Holland being sacrificed to England. That security was now over. The
leadership passed to England. In the field, the Dutch were far ahead.
The understanding was that the English were to be 40,000, the
Austrians 90,000, and the Dutch 102,000. But whereas the Dutch
ultimately put 160,000 men into line, the English, in the greatest
battle of the war, at Malplaquet, were under 8000, or less than
one-twelfth of the whole force engaged.

What gave to this country the advantage in the war of the Spanish
Succession was the genius and the overwhelming personal ascendency of
Marlborough. One of the Dutch deputies, who did not love him, who was
not even quite convinced as to his qualities as a soldier, describes
him as perfectly irresistible, not so much by energy and visible
power, as by his dexterity and charm. And this in spite of defects
that were notorious and grotesque. Everybody knows, and perhaps
nobody believes, the story of his blowing out the candle when he found
that his visitor had no papers to read. Many years later the story
was told, when an officer present stated that he was the visitor whom
the duke had treated so parsimoniously. It is due to him that England