I

sent to all peers, and instead of that he demanded the writ even without the Electress's commands. would do nothing to annoy the Queen to whom we owe so many obligations.' My speaking to him and the answers he made took up something above an hour.

"Then I had audience of the Electoral Prince and of Duke Ernest, the Elector's brother, in the same room, and then of the Electoral Princess. After that I had the honour to dine with them all, and after dinner, here in the town, I had audience of the Electoral Princess's son and three daughters. At dinner the Elector seemed to be in very good humour, talked to me several times, asked many questions about England, and seemed very willing to be informed. It is very plain that he knows very little of our Constitution, and seems to be sensible that he has been imposed upon. The Electoral Prince told me he thought himself very happy that the Queen had him in her thoughts, that he should be very glad if it were in his power to convince the Queen how grateful a sense he had of all her favours. Duke Ernest said the Queen did him a great deal of honour to remember him, that he most heartily wished the continuance of her Majesty's health, and hoped no one of his family would ever be so ungrateful as to forget the very great obligations they all had to her. The Electoral Princess said she was very glad to hear the Queen was well, she hoped she would enjoy good health many years, that her kindness to this family was so

very great that they could never make sufficient acknowledgments for it. Thus I have acquainted you with all that passed at the first audience." 1

We find Clarendon writing again a few days later: "The Elector has said to some person here that I have spoken very plain, and he can understand me, and indeed I have spoken plain language on all occasions. I hope that will not be found a fault in England." "

Clarendon soon had reason to regret his speaking so "very plain," for at the very hour when the English envoy was haranguing the Elector, Queen Anne was dead. The sword so long suspended had fallen at last. The Queen had frequently declared in the course of the last month that the perpetual contentions of her Ministers would cause her death. She had striven to end the bitter strife between Oxford and Bolingbroke by compelling the former to give up the Treasurer's staff, which he did on Tuesday, July 27th. Thus Oxford had fallen; Bolingbroke had triumphed, but his triumph was not to last long. The same night a council was called at nine o'clock in the evening, over which the Queen presided; but the removal of Oxford seemed only to add fuel to the flames. The partisans of the displaced Minister and those of Bolingbroke, regardless of the presence of the Queen, her weakness, the consideration due to her as a woman, and

1 Clarendon's Despatch, Hanover, 7th August, 1714. The Elector's words are translated from the French.

'Clarendon's Despatch, Hanover, 10th August, 1714.

the respect due to her office, violently raged at one another until two o'clock in the morning, and the scene was only closed by the tears and anguish of the Queen, who at last swooned and had to be carried out of the council chamber. Another council was called for the next day; the recriminations were as fierce as before, nothing was settled, and the council was again suspended by the alarming illness of the Queen.

A third council was summoned for the Friday. The Queen wept, and said, "I shall never survive it". And so it proved, for when the hour appointed for the council drew nigh, the royal victim, worn out with sickness of mind and body, and dreading the strife, was seized with an apoplectic fit. She was carried to bed, and her state was soon seen to be hopeless. The news of the Queen's illness got known to Bolingbroke and his friends first, probably through Lady Masham, and they hurried to the palace. Lady Masham burst in upon them from the royal chamber in the utmost disorder, crying:

Alas! my lords, we are undone, entirely ruined— the Queen is a dead woman; all the world cannot save her". The suddenness of this blow stunned the Jacobites; they had been so eager to grasp at power that they had killed their best friend. All was confusion and distracted counsel. The Duke of Ormonde declared that if the Queen were conscious, and would name her brother her successor, he would answer for the soldiers. But the Queen was not conscious, and they hesitated to take a