thought only of retreat. Tallard drew up the squadrons of horse that he had
left, in a line extended toward Blenheim, and sent orders to the infantry
in that village to leave it and join him without delay. But long ere his
orders could be obeyed the conquering squadrons of Marlborough had wheeled
to the left and thundered down on the feeble array of the French marshal.
Part of the force which Tallard had drawn up for this last effort was
driven into the Danube; part fled with their general to the village of
Sonderheim, where they were soon surrounded by the victorious allies and
compelled to surrender. Meanwhile Eugene had renewed his attack upon the
Gallo-Bavarian left, and Marsin, finding his colleague utterly routed, and
his own right flank uncovered, prepared to retreat. He and the Elector
succeeded in withdrawing a considerable part of their troops in tolerable
order to Dillingen; but the krge body of French who garrisoned Blenheim
were left exposed to certain destruction.
Marlborough speedily occupied all the outlets from the village with
his victorious troops, and then, collecting his artillery round it, he
commenced a cannonade that speedily would have destroyed Blenheim itself
and all who were in it. After several gallant but unsuccessful attempts to
cut their way through the allies, the French in Blenheim were at length
compelled to surrender at discretion; and twenty-four battalions and twelve
squadrons, with all their officers, laid down their arms and became the
captives of Marlborough.
"Such," says Voltaire, "was the celebrated battle which the French called
the battle of Hoechstaedt, the Germans Blindheim, and the English Blenheim.
The conquerors had about five thousand killed and eight thousand wounded,
the greater part being on the side of Prince Eugene. The French army was
almost entirely destroyed: of sixty thousand men, so long victorious,
there never reassembled more than twenty thousand effective. About twelve
thousand killed, fourteen thousand prisoners, all the cannon, a prodigious
number of colors and standards, all the tents and equipages, the general of
the army, and one thousand two hundred officers of mark in the power of the
conqueror, signalized that day!"
Ulm, Landau, Treves, and Traerbach surrendered to the allies before the
close of the year. Bavaria submitted to the Emperor, and the Hungarians
laid down their arms. Germany was completely delivered from France, and the
military ascendency of the arms of the allies was completely established.
Throughout the rest of the war Louis fought only in defence. Blenheim had
dissipated forever his once proud visions of almost universal conquest.
%UNION OF ENGLAND AND SCOTLAND%
A.D. 1707
JOHN HILL BURTON
Although not one of the longest, the reign of Queen Anne was one of the
most glorious, in English history. Not only was it signalized by the
victorious deeds of Marlborough in the War of the Spanish Succession, but
also by the union of the two kingdoms of England and Scotland, one of the
principal events in British annals.
Before the union England and Scotland had no political partnership save
that derived through the person of the sovereign by inheritance of both
crowns. From the completion of the union in 1707 both countries have been
not only under one royal head, but also represented in a single Parliament.
At the beginning of Anne's reign the attitude of Scotland toward England
was hostile, old antagonisms surviving in memory to intensify fresh
irritations. Although William III, predecessor of Anne, had urged a union
of the kingdoms, all negotiations to that end had failed. In 1703, and
again in 1704, the Scottish Parliament had passed an act of security
declaring in favor of the abrogation of the union of the crowns which had
existed for a century. The English Parliament resorted to retaliatory
measures.
By this time, however, the wiser statesmen in both countries saw that open
hostilities could be averted only by a complete political union of the two
kingdoms, and they used all their influence to bring it about. How this
great historic reconciliation was accomplished, Burton, the eminent
Scottish historian and jurist, shows with equal learning and impartiality.
The English statute, responding by precautions and threats to the Scots Act
of Security, contained clauses for furthering an incorporating union as the
only conclusive settlement of accumulating difficulties. It provided that
commissioners for England appointed by the Queen under the great seal shall
have power "to treat and consult" with commissioners for the same purpose
"authorized by authority of the Parliament of Scotland." The statute of the
Parliament of Scotland completing the adjustment, with the short title "Act
for a treaty with England," authorizes such persons "as shall be nominated
and appointed by her majesty under the great seal of this kingdom" to treat
and consult with "the commissioners for England."
The next great step was the appointment of the two commissions, thirty-one
on either side. On the English were the two archbishops; for Scotland there
was no clerical element. It was noticed that for England all the members
not official were from the peerage, while in Scotland there seemed to be a
desire to represent the peerage, the landed commoners, and the burgesses
or city interest, in just proportions. At an early stage in the daily
business, the English brought up a proposition about the reception of which
they had considerable apprehension: that there should be "the same customs,
excise, and all other taxes" throughout the United Kingdom--virtually a
resolution that Scotland should be taxed on the English scale. This was
easily passed by means of a solvent--due, no doubt, to the financial
genius of Godolphin--that, on an accounting and proof of local or personal
hardships arising from the adoption of uniformity, compensation in money
should be made from the English treasury. But a more critical point was
reached when, on April 24th, the chancellor of Scotland brought forward,
among certain preliminary articles, one "that there be free communication,
and intercourse of trade and navigation, between the two kingdoms and
plantations thereunto belonging, under such regulations as in the progress
of this treaty shall be found most for the advantage of both kingdoms."
This was frankly accepted on the part of England, and faithfully adjusted
in detail. It was felt to be a mighty sacrifice made to exercise indefinite
but formidable calamities in another shape.
At this point in the progress of the union all interest resting on the
excitements of political victory and defeat, or the chances of a bitter
war, came to an end. There were a few small incidents in Scotland; but
England was placidly indifferent. She had cheerfully paid a heavy stake as
loser in the great game, and it would trouble her no more. The statesmen
of the two countries knew that the union must pass unless the Jacobites of
Scotland were joined by an invading French army; and that was not a likely
casualty while Marlborough was hovering on the frontiers of France. There
was a touch of the native haughtiness in this placid indifference of
England. No doubt it helped in clearing the way to the great conclusion;
but for many years after the fusing of the two nations into one, disturbing
events showed that it had been better had the English known something about
the national institutions and the temper of the people who had now a right
to call themselves their fellow-countrymen.
It was expected that Scotland would be quietly absorbed into
England--absorptions much more difficult in the first aspect were in
continuous progress in Asia and America. The Englishman had great
difficulty in reconciling himself to political and social conditions not
his own, and his pride prompted him to demand that, if he left England, any
part of the world honored by his presence should make an England for his
reception. When expecting this on the other side of the border, he forgot
that the Scot had too much of his own independence and obstinacy. True, the
Scot, among the sweet uses of adversity, had imbibed more of the vagrant,
and could adapt himself more easily to the usages and temper of other
nations. But on the question of yielding up his own national usages and
prejudices in his own country he was as obstinate as his mighty partner.
There was stills world of business to be transacted in details of the
unattractive kind that belong to accountants' reports. These may be objects
of vital and intense interest--as in the realizing of the assets in
bankruptcies, where persons immediately interested in frantic excitement
hunt out the array of small figures--two, three, four, or five--that tells
them whether they are safe or ruined. But the interest is not of a kind to
hold its intensity through after generations. On some items of the present
accounting, however, there was, in the principle adopted, a fund of
personal and political interest. The heavy debts of England had to be
considered--and here, as in all pecuniary arrangements, England was
freehanded. The Scots made an effort to retain their African Company, but
they fortunately offered the alternative of purchasing the stock from the
holders. On the alternative of retention the English commissioners were
resolute in refusal and resistance, but they were ready to entertain the
other; and they accepted it in a literal shape. To have bought the stock at
its market value would have been a farce, after the ruin that had overcome
the company. But if it could not be even said that England had ruined
the company, the sacrifice had been made in the prevalence of English
interests, and while there was yet a hold on England it should be kept.
There was no difficulty in coming to a settlement satisfactory to the
Scots, and willingly offered by the English. It was substantially payment
of the loss on each share, as calculated from an examination of the
company's books.
The adjustment of the several pecuniary claims thus created in favor of
Scotland was simply the collective summation of the losses incurred by all
the stockholders; and when the summation was completed the total was passed
into a capital sum, called the "Equivalent." This sum total of the various
items, with all their fractions, making up a fractional sum less than four
hundred thousand pounds, might be otherwise described as a capital stock
held by the shareholders of the old company trading to Africa and the
Indies, each to the extent of his loss. Odious suspicions were, down to
the present generation, propagated about an item or group of items in the
Equivalent. A sum amounting to twenty thousand five hundred forty pounds
seventeen shillings sevenpence had been made over by the English treasury,
to be paid to influential Scotsmen as the price of their votes or influence
in favor of England.
Fortunately this affair was closely investigated by the celebrated
committee of inquiry that brought on Marlborough's dismissal and Walpole's
imprisonment. It was found that the Scots treasury had been drained; and
the crisis of the union was not a suitable time either for levying money
or for leaving debts--the salaries of public offices especially--unpaid.
England, therefore, lent money to clear away this difficulty. The
transaction was irregular, and had not passed through the proper treasury
forms. It was ascertained, however, that the money so lent had been repaid.
In discussions of the affair, before those concerned were fully cleared
of the odium of bribery, taunting remarks had been made on the oddity and
sordid specialties of the items of payment. Thus the allowance to the Lord
Banff was, in sterling money, eleven pounds two shillings. It would have
had a richer sound, and perhaps resolved itself into round numbers, in
Scots money; but as it is, there is no more to be said against it than
that, as a debt in some way due to the Lord Banff, the exact English
book-keeper had entered it down to its fraction.
There remained a few matters of adjustment of uniformities between the two
countries for the advantage of both--such as a fixed standard for rating
money in account. The Scots grumbled, rather than complained, about the
English standard being always made the rule, and no reciprocity being
offered. But the Scots were left considerable facilities for the use of
their own customs for home purposes in pecuniary matters, and in weights
and measures. If, for the general convenience of commerce and taxation,
any uniformity was necessary, and the practice of the greater nation was a
suitable standard for the other, it was the smaller sacrifice, and to both
parties the easier arrangement, that those who were only an eighth part of
the inhabitants of the island should yield to the overwhelming majority.
It was in keeping with the wisdom and tolerance prevailing throughout on
the English side of the treaty that it should be first discussed in the
Parliament of Scotland. If this was felt as a courtesy to Scotland it was
an expediency for England. All opposition would be in Scotland, and it was
well to know it at once, that disputes might be cleared off and a simple
affirmative or negative presented to the Parliament of Scotland.
The Parliament of England has ever restrained vague oratory by a rule that
there must always be a question of yes or no, fitted for a division as the
text of a debate. In Scotland on this occasion, as on many others, there
was at first a discussion of the general question; and when this, along
with other sources of information, had given the servants of the Crown
some assurance of the fate of the measure, there was a separate debate
and division on the first article, understood on all hands to be a final
decision. The debate was decorated by a work of oratorical art long admired
in Scotland, and indeed worthy of admiration anywhere for its brilliancy
and power. It was a great philippic--taking that term in its usual
acceptation--as expressing a vehement torrent of bitter epigram and
denunciatory climax.
The speech of John Hamilton, Lord Belhaven, "On the subject-matter of a
union betwixt the two kingdoms of England and Scotland," was so amply
dispersed in its day that if a collector of pamphlets on the union buys
them in volumes he will generally find this speech in each volume. It is,
no doubt, an effort of genius; but what will confer more interest on the
following specimens selected from it is that it was an attempt to rouse the
nation to action at this perilous and momentous crisis, and succeeded only
in drawing attention and admiration as a fine specimen of rhetorical art:
"I think I see the present peers of Scotland, whose noble ancestors
conquered provinces, overran countries, reduced and subjected towns and
fortified places, exacted tribute through the greater part of England, now
walking in the court of requests like so many English attorneys, laying
aside their walking-swords when in company with the English peers, lest
their self-defence should be found murder.
"I think I see the royal state of boroughs walking their desolate streets,
hanging down their heads under disappointments, wormed out of all the
branches of their old trade, uncertain what hand to turn to, necessitate
to become 'prentices to their unkind neighbors, and yet after all finding
their trade so fortified by companies and secured by prescriptions that
they despair of any success therein. But above all, my lord, I think I see
our ancient mother, Caledonia, like Caesar, sitting in the midst of our
senate, ruefully looking round her, covering herself with her royal
garment, attending the fatal blow, and breathing out her last with a _'et
tu quoque mi fili,'_"
The great remedy for all is an end of rancorous feuds and hatreds dividing
Scotland; and this calls from him a glowing picture of the land that by
union and industry has made itself too powerful to be a safe partner for
humiliated Scotland:
"They are not under the afflicting hand of Providence as we are; their
circumstances are great and glorious; their treaties are prudently managed
both at home and abroad; their generals brave and valorous; their armies
successful and victorious; their trophies and laurels memorable and
surprising; their enemies subdued and routed. Their royal navy is the
terror of Europe; their trade and commerce extended through the universe,
encircling the whole world, and rendering their own capital city the
emporium for the whole inhabitants of the earth."
The speech was for the country, not for the House. The great points about
trade and virtual independence had been conceded by England, and a union
was looked to rather as a refuge and a gain than as oppression and plunder.
It has even been said that there was some inclination to receive the speech
with irony; and Defoe, who seems to have been present on the occasion,
gives this account of what followed:
"Mr. Seton, who made the first speech, stood up to answer the Lord
Belhaven; but as he had already spoken, the order of the House--viz., 'that
the same member could not speak twice in the same cause'--was urged against
his speaking, and the Earl of Marchmont standing up at the same time, the
lord chancellor gave place to him, who indeed made a short return to so
long a speech, and which answer occasioned some laughter in the House. The
Earl of Marchmont's speech was to this purpose, viz.: He had heard a long
speech, and a very terrible one; but he was of opinion it required a short
answer, which he gave in these terms: 'Behold he dreamed, but, lo! when
he awoke, he found it was a dream.' This answer, some said, was as
satisfactory to the members, who understood the design of that speech as if
it had been answered vision by vision."
In the debates on the union, some Scots statesmen found a tactic,
infinitely valuable to them in the united Parliament, of voting in a group.
They were called the "New party," and nicknamed the "_Squadrone volante_."
In the correspondence already referred to, it was good news at St.
Stephen's when it was announced that the New party had adopted the union.
On the critical division the numbers stood one hundred eighteen for the
article and eighty-three against it. The remainder of the clauses passed
without division, a ready acceptance being given to amendments, that were
virtually improvements, in giving effect to the spirit of details in the
treaty; as where it was adjusted that, for trading purposes, vessels bought
abroad for trade from the Scots harbors should be counted equivalent to
vessels of Scottish build.
There was a considerable noisy excitement through the country, the
Jacobites ever striving to rouse the people in the great towns to riot
and sedition, and, when they found that impossible, spreading exaggerated
accounts of the effects of their efforts. A mob was raised in Edinburgh,
but it was appeased without the loss of life and with no other casualty
save the frightening of the provost's wife. There were some eccentric
movements among the Cameronians, rendered all the more grotesque by the
Jacobites taking the leadership in them; and some of the more vehement
clergy betook themselves to their own special weapons in the holding of a
day of humiliation and prayer.
Ere the whole came to a conclusion, a point was yielded to the Presbyterian
Church of Scotland. It was passed as a separate act before the Act of Union
was passed--the separate act stipulating its repetition in any act adopting
the Treaty of Union. It provided for the preservation of the discipline,
worship, and ecclesiastical government of the establishment. It was further
provided that every sovereign of the United Kingdom, on accession to the
throne, should make oath in terms of this act. Hence it happens that this
oath is taken immediately on the accession, the other oaths, including
that for the protection of the Church of England, being postponed till the
ceremony of the coronation. On October 16, 1706, there came a vote on the
passing of the "Act ratifying and approving the Treaty of Union." This was
carried in the Scots Parliament by one hundred ten to sixty-nine.
It was the determination of the Queen's ministers for England to carry the
treaty as it came from Scotland, word for word; and they employed all their
strength to do so. It was the policy of the English government and their
supporters in the matter of the union, to avoid a Parliamentary debate upon
it clause by clause at St. Stephen's.
To this end there was an endeavor to give it, as much as in the peculiar
conditions could be given, the character of a treaty between two
independent powers, each acting through its executive, that executive
acknowledging the full power of Parliament to examine, criticise, and
virtually judge the act done as a whole, but not admitting Parliamentary
interference with the progress of the details. If there were an
illogicality in the essence of a treaty where the executive--the Queen--was
the common sovereign of both realms, the difficulty could be discarded as
a pedantry, in a constitutional community where the sovereign acts through
responsible advisers. Some slight touches of apprehension were felt in
England when it was seen that the Scots Estates were not only voting the
separate articles, but in some measure remodelling them.
The Estates were taking the privilege naturally claimed by the weaker party
to a bargain in protecting themselves while it was yet time. When all was
adjusted, England, as the vast majority, could correct whatever had been
done amiss in the preliminary adjustment of her interests, but poor
Scotland would be entirely helpless. There was another reason for
tolerating the alterations, in their being directed to the safety and
completeness of the legal institutions left in the hands of Scotland
untouched, as matters of entire indifference to England; still it weakened
the hands of those who desired to evade a Parliamentary discussion on the
several articles in England that this had been permitted in Scotland, and
had become effective in the shape of amendments. John Johnston, who had
been for some time secretary of state for Scotland--a son of the celebrated
covenanting hero Archibald Johnston of Warriston--was then in London
carefully looking at the signs of the times. He wrote to Scotland, saying:
"You may, I think, depend on it that the alterations you have hitherto
made will not break the union; but if you go on altering, it's like your
alterations will be altered here, which will make a new session with you
necessary, and in that case no man knows what may happen." All is well as
yet (January 4th), and if there be no more serious alterations the English
ministers will be able to give effect to their resolution "to pass the
union here without making any alterations at all."
By what had been usually called a message from the throne, the attention of
Parliament was directed to the treaty as it had come from Scotland, but the
matter being of supreme importance the Queen was her own messenger. From
the Commons she had to ask for a supply to meet the equivalent. To both
Houses she said: "You have now an opportunity before you of putting the
last hand to a happy union of the two kingdoms, which I hope will be a
lasting blessing to the whole island, a great addition to its wealth and
power, and a firm security to the Protestant religion. The advantages that
will accrue to us all from a union are so apparent that I will add no more,
but that I shall look upon it as a particular happiness if this great
work, which has been so often attempted without success, can be brought to
perfection in my reign."
The opportunity was taken to imitate the Scots in a separate preliminary
act "for securing the Church of England as by law established." There was a
desultory discussion in both Houses, with a result showing the overwhelming
strength of the supporters of the union. In the House of Lords there were
some divisions, and among these the largest number of votes mustered by
the opposition was twenty-three, bringing out a majority of forty-seven by
seventy votes for the ministry. The conclusion of the discussion was a vote
of approval by each House.