f for bringing about with so much
tact. What a change in a few months!

The war continued this year, but without bringing any great success to
our arms. Villars, at Circk, outmanoeuvred Marlborough in a manner that
would have done credit to the greatest general. Marlborough, compelled
to change the plan of campaign he had determined on, returned into
Flanders, where the Marechal de Villeroy was stationed with his forces.
Nothing of importance occurred during the campaign, and the two armies
went into winter quarters at the end of October.

I cannot quit Flanders without relating another instance of the pleasant
malignity of M. de Lauzun. In marrying a daughter of the Marechal de
Lorges, he had hoped, as I have already said, to return into the
confidence of the King by means of the Marechal, and so be again
entrusted with military command. Finding these hopes frustrated, he
thought of another means of reinstating himself in favour. He determined
to go to the waters of Aix-la-Chapelle, not, as may be believed, for his
health, but in order to ingratiate himself with the important foreigners
whom he thought to find there, learn some of the enemy's plans, and come
back with an account of them to the King, who would, no doubt, reward him
for his zeal. But he was deceived in his calculation. Aix-la-Chapelle,
generally so full of foreigners of rank, was this year, owing to the war,
almost empty. M. de Lauzun found, therefore, nobody of consequence from
whom he could obtain any useful information. Before his return, he
visited the Marechal de Villeroy, who received him with all military
honours, and conducted him all over the army, pointing out to him the
enemy's post; for the two armies were then quite close to each other.
His extreme anxiety, however, to get information, and the multitude of
his questions, irritated the officers who were ordered to do the honours
to him; and, in going about, they actually, at their own risk, exposed
him often to be shot or taken. They did not know that his courage was
extreme; and were quite taken aback by his calmness, and, his evident
readiness to push on even farther than they chose to venture.

On returning to Court, M. de Lauzun was of course pressed by everybody to
relate all he knew of the position of the two armies. But he held
himself aloof from all questioners, and would not answer. On the day
after his arrival he went to pay his court to Monseigneur, who did not
like him, but who