certain at prefenr, than that this was the time for making peace; though the interefts of the Generals, and the bitterness of their principles, precluded all poffibility of an accommodation.

When a ftate is ruined, a change of minifters seldom produces fudden falvation. Chamillard, the favourite of Mad. de Maintenon and Louis, was removed: but it was too late to. produce great effects. Louis Seize changed his minifters to little. purpose, previously to the late revolution.

To the fcourge of war, the famine which was added during this calamitous year rendered a return of plenty hopeless. The extreme severity of the winter had deftroyed the germ of vegetation. Mifery reigned throughout the kingdom; and luxury, (fay thefe authors,) the last thing that is facrificed, dared not thew its face. All unneceffary expences were fuppreffed; yet clamour was increafed, and fatires, libels, epigrams, lampoons, and hand bills were multiplied. The Dauphin dared not go to Paris, left hungry mobs fhould demand bread which he was unable to give.

In September this year the battle of Malplaquet was loft. Villars and Boufflers were the unfortunate Generals fent against the allies, who were preparing for the fiege of Mons. The present writers make the allied army amount to about 80,000, and the French to 70,000. The difpofitions of these armies are defcribed. There have been few battles more obftinately disputed, or more bloody: 30,000 combatants, dead and dying, were left on the field of battle. Of thefe the French, according to this account, only loft 8000. The allies, however, kept the field, and Mons was taken. The pompous Villars was wounded: but, when he returned to Paris after this defeat, he was created a duke and peer of France, and affumed more fate and importance than ever.

In September 1710, things took a more favourable turn in Spain, after having been in as hopeless a ftate as in France. Philip the Vth had been obliged to quit Madrid a fecond time; and all Europe believed that the Arch duke Charles, brother to the Emperor Jofeph, would reign in that kingdom, without a competitor: but a battle gained by the French General Vendôme, at Villaviciofa, afcertained the throne of Spain to the grandfon of Lewis.

In 1711, the Dauphin died of the fmall pox. He was an indolent frivolous character, and was lamented by none even of his whole family. We have formerly given an account of this prince from the Memoirs of Madame de Baviere, mother of the regent Duke of Orleans *.

* See our Review enlarged, vol. ii. p. 113.

The Emperor Jofeph died a few days after the Dauphin, which produced a political revolution in the minds of the belligerent powers. The union of the monarchies of France and Spain was dreaded before this event: but now, the probability of that of Auftria and Spain in the Arch-duke Charles, elected emperor, occafioned equal alarms; and thefe apprehenfions facilitated the negotiations between the courts of France and England.

In 1712, the Duke of Marlborough and his adherents were fuperfeded; a Tory administration took place, and preliminaries of peace between France and England were figned in London; Queen Anne having detached herfelf from the allies. The editors of this work have related the intrigues in our court, the difgrace of the Duchefs of Marlborough, and the advancement to favour of Lady Mafham, &c. Our readers must be too well acquainted with thefe events to need information from foreigners. However men were divided in England about the goodness and expedience of this peace, France heard of it with joy and gratitude:

A bumper let us drink, dear friends,
To that benignant Queen who fends
The olive-branch to Gaul;
O may the be with faints enfhrin'd,
And, for the good of human kind,
May Dutchmen perish all!'

We should be inclined to believe that the work before us was neither printed nor published at Paris fo late as the last year, if we were to judge from the candour of the following paffage. After having spoken of the contemptuous manner with which Lewis and his minifters were treated at Utrecht in difcuffions concerning a general peace, the writers say:

This is the place to do juftice to the magnanimity of Lewis XIV., after having expofed all his faults. In the midst of his mif fortunes, the outcry of all France, the infults of his enemies and the fatires which daily events feemed to juftify, he alone fupported his courage. He had been intoxicated by profperity: but he merits the title of great, more for his unfhaken firmnefs in adverfity, than for forty years of victory. The lofs of almost his whole family, of whom death had bereaved him at an untimely period of their lives, feemed more to afflict him than to daunt his courage. "You fee in what a fituation we are," faid he to Marefchal Villars, when the latter took leave of him to go to the army in Flanders, "feek the enemy and give them battle." Sir, it is your last army.' It does not fignify! I do not infift on your beating, but on your attacking them. If the battle be loft, write the news only to me. I fhall mount my horfe, and ride through Paris with your letter in my hand. I know the French. I will bring you 200,000 men, and bury myself with them under the ruins of the monarchy."

The lofs of the battle of Denain by Prince Eugene, after the defection of the English, so revived the affairs and fpirits of the French, that they obtained a glorious peace, fince the object of the war was accomplished, by all Europe acknowleging the grandfon of Lewis as King of Spain.'

In 1713 the general peace was concluded and ratified at Utrecht. We have here the principal conditions, which feem more favourable to all parties than to Lewis, who was obliged to make facrifices to all the combined powers. However, the fettlement of his grandfon on the throne of Spain, and the attainment of that peace for his own fubjects for which the national diftrefs had made them fo long languifh, fmoothed and gilded his laft days, after a life of war, to which wanton ambition feems to have generally been the chief motive. His reign was long, and for the first 40 years profperous and fplendid; during which time. he certainly improved and embellished his kingdom in ways that were adopted by all the rest of Europe. Letters, arts, sciences, and manufactures, were fucceffively cultivated and encouraged more than elsewhere at any period of time; except, as Voltaire has observed, in the ages of Auguftus and Leo the Tenth.

In 1715 Lewis breathed his laft. The fatirical and farcaftic verfes which were handed about during his last fickness, and immediately after his decease, were innumerable. Nearly 30 copies of them, containing pofthumous abufe, have been inferted by the editors of the prefent work. Among these, the moft moderate is the following:

If France, O Lewis, now thy foul is fled,
Weeps not, but feems of feeling quite bereft,
So many tears throughout thy reign the fhed,

That, quite exhaufted, not another's left.'

We shall here terminate our account of the third volume of this work, to which we have paid the more attention, and from which we have tranflated more extracts than ufual, on account of its being unlikely that an entire tranflation hould foon appear; as fome of the poetry would not be easily transfufed into English, without aukwardness or evaporation :-but, befides the poetry, there is a peculiar merit in the notes to this book. Voltaire, in his Siecle de Louis XIV., declines defcribing fieges and battles. The progrefs of civilization and manners is his chief object :—but the authors before us, without fatiguing the lovers of peace with minute details of Lewis's campaigns, have contrived, in the notes and obfervations on the poetical compofitions which they have inferted as text, to furnish their readers with short military descriptions, which are both inftructive and entertaining;

Rr 4

taining; thefe will be the more acceptable as the towns befieged by Lewis, and the general feat of his wars, are the same as thofe which occupy the attention of all Europe at present.

The fourth and laft volume of this work is divided into the following fections: Of the Amours of Lewis XIV. and the princes and princeffes of the royal family: of illustrious men during this reign: ecclefiaftical affairs: Quietism: Janfenifm: literary anecdotes and difputes concerning the antients and moderns. The first article is little more than a fcandalous chronicle of Lewis and his family. In the fubfequent fections, however, there are frequently ingenious and piquant flashes of wit and humour, which, in French, have peculiar merit. Of these we shall endeavour to give our English readers fome idea, by as close an adherence to the original as the different genius of the two languages will admit.

Bontems, first groom of the bed-chamber to Lewis XIV., was regarded as a phenomenon in that court, and would perhaps be thought fo in any court; for it is faid that, though he never refufed to folicit favours for a friend or worthy person, he never afked nor obtained any thing for himfelf:

EPITAPH.

At length poor Bontems heaves his ultimate groan,
While his lofs all men feel and deplore,

From the dignified monarch who fits on the throne,
To the beggar who ftands at each door. :

Let those whofe employments afford them the pow'r
Of ferving their country and friends,

By directing their prince on the worthy to fhow'r
His favours, without felfish ends:

And whofe adamant hearts never beat to the calls
Of true merit which envy conceals,

To each bleffing which now on his memory falls
Be attentive, for much it reveals.

The regret of the public fpeaks loudly and plain;

To yourfelves make it deeply indebted;

That when death fhall your foul from your body unchain,
You may all, like Bontems, be regretted.'

On Moliere dying on the stage, in La Malade imaginaire:

Here lies the matchlefs man, who on the stage

The ape appear'd of every rank and age;
Who, ftriving death as well as life to act,
Transform'd theatric fiction into fact.
Th' ingenious copy fo delighted Death,
To realize the fraud-he ftopt his breath.'

Оп

On his being refufed Chriftian burial:

Since at Paris they deny
Rites funereal to fupply,

To the bard of happy vein,
Who could vice and folly feign,

Thinking it a deadly fin

Comic actor to have been-
Why on dunghills are not laid

Bigots of the felf-same trade ?'

On the fecond marriage of Moliere's wife:
The Loves and the Graces all play in her face,
Her foul is all fire, and her motion's all grace;
For a husband all spirit of love she'd no store,
So fhe takes one of flesh-whom the feems to love more.”
Epitaph on Ninon de l'Enclos.

All things time at length fubdues,
Nor would Ninon's felf excufe;
Who almoft a cent'ry reign'd,
And each male fhe faw enchain'd..
Lovely Ninon! favour'd name,
Her fex's pride as well as fhame!
Open both in love and hate,
In her pleasures delicate;
Sage and faithful to her friends,
Tho' capricious were her ends.
Through her devious wild career,
Mixt with modesty auftere,
To love unfeign'd she gave admission
In her heart without contrition;
Coupling what are feldom join'd,
Venus' face-an angel's mind.'

On Benferade.

In three fev'ral ways did that bard fhew his sense;
He cou'd laugh at the great without giving offence;
He was old and gallant, yet escap'd ridicule;
Though a poet, grew rich, in despite of all rule.'

On Queen Mary, daughter of James II.
In female charms though Mary shines,
Poffeffing all that life refines,

Or bounteous Providence can send us ;
Though bleft with knowlege, goodness, wit,
And all a princess can befit,

From fuch a daughter, God defend us !'

Among the ferious pieces, the characteristic epitaph of Madame de Cornuel is admirable; as are fome of her bon mots, of which we have only room for the following: 'A lady

in

1