ss of Orange King and Queen of England. The Declaration was
presented to William and Mary on the 13th of February by the two Houses
in the Banqueting Room at Whitehall, and at the close of its recital
Halifax, in the name of the Estates of the Realm, prayed them to receive
the crown. William accepted the offer in his own name and in that of
his wife and declared in a few words the resolve of both to maintain the
laws and to govern by advice of Parliament.

[Sidenote: Lewis and the Revolution.]

But William's eyes were fixed less on England than on Europe. His
expedition had had in his own eyes a European rather than an English
aim, and in his acceptance of the crown he had been moved not so much by
personal ambition as by the prospect which offered itself of firmly
knitting together England and Holland, the two great Protestant powers
whose fleets held the mastery of the sea. But the advance from such a
union to the formation of the European alliance against France on which
he was bent was a step that still had to be made. Already indeed his
action in England had told decisively on the contest. The blunder of
Lewis in choosing Germany instead of Holland for his point of attack had
been all but atoned for by the brilliant successes with which he opened
the war. The whole country west of the Rhine fell at once into his
hands; his armies made themselves masters of the Palatinate, and
penetrated even to Wuertemberg. The hopes of the French king indeed had
never been higher than at the moment when the arrival of James at St.
Germain dashed all hope to the ground. Lewis was at once thrown back on
a war of defence, and the brutal ravages which marked the retreat of his
armies from the Rhine revealed the bitterness with which his pride
stooped to the necessity.

[Sidenote: The Grand Alliance.]

But his reception of James at St. Germain as still king of England gave
fresh force to William's efforts. It was yet doubtful whether William
would be able to bring England to a hearty co-operation in the struggle
against French ambition. But whatever reluctance there might have been
to follow him in an attack on France with the view of saving the
liberties of Europe, the stoutest Tory had none in following him in such
an attack when it meant simply self-defence against a French restoration
of the Stuart king at the cost of English freedom. It was with universal
approval that the English Government declared war against Lewis. It was