hope, "would depend the fate of the campaign." At first there seemed every reason to expect it. Philip had called to his own camp, and for his own more immediate objects, his body of troops from the Portugal frontier. At first then, and until Philip's forces moved down upon the Tagus, nothing interposed between the Portugal army and Madrid. There was the prospect also of that army being well commanded. The Earl of Galway had been recalled as soon as his Whig patrons had gone out of office in England, and in his place was named the Earl of Portmore, an officer of reputation. Although the tidings had not yet reached Madrid, it was believed that the new chief had already landed. Before the second week in October, Stanhope had sent off in succession five expresses, urging his advance. "I believe," thus he writes to Craggs, through life his intimate friend, "few men have taken so much pains as I am doing to get a Viceroy over himself;" since, after the junction, Lord Portmore as the senior officer would command in Stanhope's place. In that event, however, it was Stanhope's wish to return on leave to England. He had already written to Lord Dartmouth to solicit that permission, if the prospects of the army should admit. Thus again to Craggs : "I am impatient to hear from you from England, where I think everybody is run mad, if half what I hear be true. But be it as it will, I pray you to get me home. If my Lord Portmore joins us, I shall have no longer any business here." And in another letter, "I am impatient to know whether you have got me leave. Without it you will easily believe that I shall not venture, nor trust Mr. Harley with my head. I am the more desirous because my Lord Duke desires it; and he is not mistaken in believing that I am his faithful servant." To the Great Duke himself, at the same time, Stanhope wrote, "I can assure your Grace that I desire nothing with so much impatience as to be in England, for many reasons; but especially, that I may have an opportunity of making good what I have often promised, to be faithful to your Grace in all events." Unhappily, however, Lord Portmore had delayed his departure from England, and had not yet arrived in Portugal. In his absence the command had fallen on the Conde de Villa Verde, who as a Grandee ranked in the first class but as a General in the very lowest. He was not to be urged forward even by the plainest considerations of public policy. The letters of Stanhope, the words of Mr. Lefevre the English Resident, assailed the Court of Lisbon equally in vain. From Madrid the Allies as we have seen sent out in succession five expresses; in return to them not one soldier came. Nor was there anything to cheer them in the tidings from Philip's camp. The enthusiasm of the Castillians had already in great measure revived his drooping cause. It had quickened his own sluggish though courageous temper. It had brought to his ranks numerous and zealous though but half-trained volunteers. By these, and by the troops he drew from Galicia and Biscay as well as from the Portugal frontier, he was enabled to muster an army equal to that which had fought at Zaragoza. A General of established reputation was still wanting. Philip had long been aware that his own service could not afford him any such, and he had earnestly pressed his grandfather that the Duke of Vendome might be permitted to come and command the Spanish troops. Louis however had steadily re Letters dated October 4, November 6 and 18, 1710 (MS.) fused so long as the negotiations at Gertruydenberg were pending, and while there was yet the prospect that he might be called upon wholly to renounce as well as disavow the Bourbon cause in Spain. But as the hope of peace receded the reason of refusal ceased; and Vendome himself, conscious that he had been censured for remissness in his campaign with the Duke of Burgundy, was eager to retrieve his reputation and signalise his prowess in another sphere. On reaching head-quarters at Valladolid, the new chief took at once a bold and vigorous measure. The chief danger as he saw was in the long deferred but still possible junction of the Portugal army with Charles's. To anticipate this, Vendome set his own army in motion, and crossing the mountain chain of Guadarrama took post upon the Tagus at the bridge of Almaraz. Here, at the head before long of four and twenty thousand men, he greatly out-numbered either force of the Allies and effectually prevented any future combination between them. Nor was this his only enterprise. He had detached some light cavalry to harass the Allies at Madrid. And as Stanhope in consequence complains, "the enemies have had two bodies of horse continually hovering within a day's march of us, and have made our communication with Aragon impracticable, otherwise than by sending of strong parties thither, which we have been obliged to do to get up some money." Still however, in spite of these discouragements Stanhope proposed, and he carried through, a measure of great energy. "We are come to a bold resolution, which is to winter in the heart of Castille. To this end we are fortifying Toledo, where will be the left of our quarters. We shall put the Tagus before us, and stretch our right to the mountains of Aragon, by which we shall have communication, though troublesome, with Catalonia." 998 In pursuance of this resolution the Allied chiefs fixed their head-quarters at Ciempozuelos, a village five hours' march to the south of Madrid, while they sent forward a strong division under Count Atalaya to hold and intrench Toledo. Madrid itself was relinquished, though as it were kept in view. As the troops marched from the gates, they had the mortification to hear behind them a joyful peal resounding from all the innumerable church bells of the city. Scarcely moreover had the Allies taken post at Ciempozuelos, before ill news came pouring in upon them from divers quarters. First they had accounts that the Portuguese had been so far disheartened by Vendome's advance, that they had relinquished all idea of further operations even upon their own frontier, and had withdrawn at once to winter-quarters. As Stanhope wrote to the Secretary of State in England: "I cannot help repeating to your Lordship that Her Majesty's troops in Portugal are of no manner of service, nor ever will be of any so long as a Portuguese General shall govern the operations of their army." Nearly at the same time the tidings came from Catalonia that the province was exposed to some danger from the Duke de Noailles, who had been concerting measures with the Duke de Vendome, and threatened an invasion from the Roussillon side. Charles eagerly laid hold of this plea for his own departure, and set off from Ciempozuelos with an escort of 2,000 cavalry. As Stanhope explains it: "The King has this day left this 8 To Lord Dartmouth, Nov. 6, 1710 (MS.). army, so that we shall have one difficulty less to struggle with, I mean his impatience to rejoin his Queen, which has made him for some time very uneasy, and pressing to break up." 9 Charles's General was almost as unquiet as Charles himself. On the very day after the Prince's exit, Staremberg gave in a paper of several articles to the other chiefs. "Whether" says Stanhope "it arises from a dissatisfaction of this Court or of the several Generals here, or whether only from the motive therein alleged, the want of health, I will not determine . ; but if one may give credit to his protestations, he is fully determined to leave this country so soon as the army shall be settled in quarters. And I am so much persuaded that he is in earnest that I think no time ought to be lost in fixing upon another General for the next year. He will be very little regretted by the troops, and yet to do him justice I believe it will not be easy to substitute one in his room; for which reason I have endeavoured, and will endeavour, to keep him here, but as I have already told your Lordship he seems, as far as I can judge, to be determined.” 1 Other cares, and more pressing, were at hand. Inferior as were the Allies already to Vendome in the essential arm of cavalry, it was no light thing that two thousand of the number should depart as Charles's escort. That event and the defection of the Portuguese induced them to reconsider their plans. Nor was there much time to lose, since a speedy advance might be expected from Vendome. Stanhope still desired to abide by the former resolution and to winter in Castille. But in the Council of War all the other chiefs were • To Lord Dartmouth, Nov. 18, 1710 (MS.) |