LETTER LXX.

Queen Anne to the Duke of Marlborough, after the Victory of Oudenarde.

I Want Words to exprefs the Joy I have that you are well after your glorious Succefs, for which, next to Almighty God, my Thanks are due to you. And indeed I can never say enough for all the great and faithful Services you have ever done me. But be so just as to believe, I am as truly fenfible of them as a grateful Heart can be, and shall be ready to fhew it upon all Occafions. I hope you cannot doubt of my Efteem and Friendship for you; nor think, because I differ with you in fome things, it is for want of either no, I do affure you. If you were here, I am fure you would not think me fo much in in fome things, as I fear wrong do now. you I am afraid my Letter fhould come too late to London; and therefore dare fay no more, but that I pray God Almighty to continue his Protection over you, and fend you fafe home again : and be affured I fhall ever be fincerely, &c.

the

LETTER

LXXI.

Duke of Marlborough to Queen Anne.

Madam,

Have the Honour of your Majefty's Letter of the 6th, and am very thankful for all your Goodness to me; and I am fure it will always be VOL. II.

F

my

my Intention as well as Duty, to be ready to venture my Life for your Service.

As I have formerly told your Majefty, that I am defirous to ferve you in the Army, but not as a Minifter, I am every Day more and more confirmed in that Opinion. And I think myself obliged upon all Accounts on this Occafion to fpeak my Mind freely to you. The Circumftances in this last Battle, I think, fhew the Hand of God; for we were obliged, hot only to march five Leagues that Morning, but to pass a River before the Enemy, and to engage them before the whole Army was paffed, which was a visible Mark of the Favour of Heaven to you and your Arms.

Your Majefty fhall be convinced from this Time, that I have no Ambition nor any thing to afk for myfelf or Family; but I will end the few Years which I have to live, in endeavouring to ferve you, and to give God Almighty Thanks for his infinite Goodnefs to me. But as I have taken this Refolution to myself, give me leave to fay, That I think you are obliged in Confcience, and as a good Chriftian, to forgive, and to have no more Refentments to any particular Perfon or Party, but to make ufe of fuch as will carry on this juft War with Vigour, which is the only way to preferve our Religion and Liberties, and the Crown on your Head. Which, that you may long enjoy, and be a Bleffing to your People, fhall be the conftant With and Prayer of him, that is with the greatest Truth and Duty,

July 23, 1708,

Madam, &c.

LET

LETTER LXXII.

Duke of Marlborough to Queen Anne.

Madam,

BY

Y what I hear from London, I find your Majefty is pleafed to think, that when I have reflected, I must be of Opinion, that you are in the right in giving Mr. Hill the Earl of Effex's Regiment. I beg your Majesty will be fo juft to me, as not to think I can be fo unreafonable, as to be mortified to the Degree that I am, if it proceeded only from this one Things for I fhall always be ready and glad to do every thing that is agreeable to you, after I have reprefented what may be a Prejudice to your Service. But this is only one of a great many Mortifications, that I have met with. And as I may not have many Opportunities of writing to you, let me beg of your Majefty to reflect what your own People, and the reft of the World muft think, who have been Witneffes of the Love, Zeal and Duty, with which I have ferved you, when they fhall fee that after all I have done, it has not been able to protect me againft the Malice of a Bed-chamber Woman. Your Majefty will allow me on this Occafion to remind you of what I writ to you the laft Campaign, of the certain Knowledge I had of Mrs. Maham's having affured Mr. Harley, that I fhould receive fuch conftant Mortifications, as fhould make it impoffible for me to continue in your Service. God Almighty and the whole World are my Witneffes, with what Care and

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Pains

Pains I have ferved you more than twenty Years, and I was refolved if poffible, to have struggled with Difficulties to the End of this War. But the many Instances I have had of your Majesty's great Change to me, has fo broke my Spirits, that I muft beg as the greatest and last Favour, that you will approve of my retiring, fo that I may employ the little Time I have to live, in making my juft Acknowledgments to God, for the Protection he has been pleafed to give me. And your Majefty may be affured that my Zeal for you and my Country is fo great, that in my Retirement I fhall daily pray for your Profperity, and that those who fhall ferve you as faithfully as I have done, may never feel the hard Return that I have met with.

LETTER

LXXIII.

Lord Treasurer Godolphin to Queen Anne.

Have the Honour of your Majefty's Letter of the 13th, by which I have the Grief to find that what you are pleased to call Spleen in my former Letter, was only a true Impulfe and Conviction of Mind, that your Majefty is fuffering yourself to be guided to your own Ruin and Destruction as faft as it is poffible for them to compass it, to whom you feem so much to hearken.

I am not therefore fo much furprised, as concerned at the Refolution which your Majesty fays you have taken, of bringing in the Duke of Shrewsbury. For when People began to be fenfible it would be difficult to perfuade your

Majefty

Majefty to diffolve a Parliament, which, for two Winters together, had given you above fix Millions a Year for the Support of a War upon which your Crown depends; even while that War is still fubfifting, they have had the Cunning to contrive this Propofal to your Majesty, which in its Confequence will certainly put you under a Neceffity of breaking the Parliament, though contrary (I yet believe) to your Mind and Intention.

I beg your Majefty to be perfuaded, I do not fay this out of the least Prejudice to the Duke of Shrewsbury. There is no Man of whose Capacity I have had a better Impreffion, nor with whom I have lived more eafily and freely for above twenty Years. Your Majefty may please to remember, that at your first coming to the Crown, I was defirous he should have had one of the chief Pofts in your Service; and it would have been happy for your Majefty and the Kingdom if he had accepted that Offer but he thought fit to decline it, and the Reafons generally given at that time for his doing fo, do not much recommend him to your Majefty's Service. But I muft endeavour to let your Majefty fee Things as they really are. And to bring him into your Service and into your Business at this time, juft after his being in a public open Conjunction in every Vote with the whole Body of the Tories, and in a private, conftant Correfpondence, and caballing with Mr. Harley in every thing; what Confequnce can this poffibly have, but to make every Man that is now in your Cabinet Council, except

to run from it as they would from the Plague? And I leave it to your

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Majesty