days later, Marshal Belle-Isle, whilst passing through
Hanover in the character of negotiator, was arrested by order of George
II., and carried to England a prisoner of war, in defiance of the law of
nations and the protests of France. The moment was not propitious for
obtaining the release of a marshal of France and an able general. The
Emperor Charles VII., who but lately returned to his hereditary
dominions, and recovered possession of his capital, after fifteen months
of Austrian occupation, died suddenly on the 20th of January, 1745, at
forty-seven years of age. The face of affairs changed all at once; the
honor of France was no longer concerned in the struggle; the Grand-duke
of Tuscany had no longer any competitor for the empire; the eldest son of
Charles VII. was only seventeen; the Queen of Hungary was disposed for
peace. "The English ministry, which laid down the law for all, because
it laid down the money, and which had in its pay, all at one time, the
Queen of Hungary, the King of Poland, and the King of Sardinia,
considered that there was everything to lose by a treaty with France, and
everything to gain by arms. War continued, because it had commenced."
[Voltaire, _Siecle de Louis XV_.]

The King of France henceforth maintained it almost alone by himself. The
young Elector of Bavaria had already found himself driven out of Munich,
and forced by his exhausted subjects to demand peace of Maria Theresa.
The election to the empire was imminent; Maximilian-Joseph promised his
votes to the Grand-duke of Tuscany; at that price he was re-established
in his hereditary dominions. The King of Poland had rejected the
advances of France, who offered him the title of emperor, beneath which
Charles VII. had succumbed. Marshal Saxe bore all the brunt of the war.
A foreigner and a Protestant, for a long while under suspicion with Louis
XV., and blackened in character by the French generals, Maurice of Saxony
had won authority as well as glory by the splendor of his bravery and of
his military genius. Combining with quite a French vivacity the
far-sightedness and the perseverance of the races of the north, he had
been toiling for more than a year to bring about amongst his army a
spirit of discipline, a powerful organization, a contempt for fatigue as
well as for danger. "At Dettingen the success of the allies was due to
their surprising order, for they were not seasoned to war," he used to
say. Order did not as