d stand-still again renewed.
It was then Sir John, for the first time, produced the warrant he had
extracted from Lord Godolphin, to lay before the Treasury; adding,
however, a memorandum, to prevent any misconception, that the duke was
to be considered as the paymaster, the debts incurred devolving on the
crown. This part of our secret history requires more development than I
am enabled to afford: as my information is drawn from "the Case" of the
Duke of Marlborough in reply to Sir John's depositions, it is possible
Vanbrugh may suffer more than he ought in this narration; which,
however, incidentally notices his own statements.

A new scene opens! Vanbrugh not obtaining his claims from the Treasury,
and the workmen becoming more clamorous, the architect suddenly turns
round on the duke, at once to charge him with the whole debt.

The pitiable history of this magnificent monument of public gratitude,
from its beginnings, is given by Vanbrugh in his deposition. The great
architect represents himself as being comptroller of her majesty's
works; and as such was appointed to prepare a model, which model of
Blenheim House her majesty kept in her palace, and gave her commands to
issue money according to the direction of Mr. Travers, the queen's
surveyor-general; that the lord treasurer appointed her majesty's own
officers to supervise these works; that it was upon defect of money from
the Treasury that the workmen grew uneasy; that the work was stopped,
till further orders of money from the Treasury; that the queen then
ordered enough to secure it from winter weather; that afterwards she
ordered more for payment of the workmen; that they were paid in part;
and upon Sir John's telling them the queen's resolution to grant them a
further supply (_after a stop put to it by the duchess's order_), they
went on and incurred the present debt; that this was afterwards brought
into the House of Commons as the debt of the crown, not owing from the
queen to the Duke of Marlborough, but to the workmen, and this by the
queen's officers.

During the uncertain progress of the building, and while the workmen
were often in deep arrears, it would seem that the architect often
designed to involve the Marlboroughs in its fate and his own; he
probably thought that some of their round million might bear to be
chipped, to finish his great work, with which, too, their glory was so
intimately connected. The famous duchess had evidently put the duke