Besides these the Commons sent up various other bills, which were nearly all rejected by the Lords. There was a Bill for reducing the rate of interest on money; a Bill investing in the king the forfeited estates in both England and Ireland as a fund for the war; a Bill to proportion the pay in the army to the real complement of men; for there was a practice, in which Marlborough was especially engaged, of returning regiments as complete which were far from being so, and of pocketing the pay of the men wanting. There was a Bill to continue the commissioners of public accounts, most unreasonably rejected by the Lords, whilst they allowed to pass a Bill which has always been regarded with hostility in England—a poll tax, levying on all persons, except servants, children, and paupers, a shilling a quarter; on every peer of Parliament, ten pounds a year; on every income of three hundred pounds a year, ten shillings per annum; and on all gentlemen of three hundred pounds a year income from real property, and on all clergymen or teachers with incomes of eighty pounds, one pound each a year.

On the 29th of February William prorogued Parliament, and made active preparations for his departure for the Continent. Before he took his leave, however, he made various changes in his Cabinet and Ministry, which showed that the Whigs were still losing ground with him, and the Tories, or the "Trimmers," who veered, according to circumstances, to one party or the other, acquiring favour. The Earl of Rochester, younger brother of Lord Clarendon, one of Mary's uncles; Lord Ranelagh, Lord Cornwallis, and Sir Edward Seymour, who had all along hitherto opposed the king, were made members of the Privy Council, and the Earl of Pembroke Privy Seal. Charles Montague was made a Commissioner of the Treasury, and Sidney Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland. But the circumstance which occasioned the greatest sensation, and wonder, and mystery was the sudden dismissal of Lord Marlborough from all his offices under the king, both in the Court and the army. As Marlborough had been manifestly rising in William's estimation from the successful display of his military talents, this abrupt dismissal excited the keenest curiosity of both Court and country, which William took no means to gratify. But from what we now know of the causes of this striking expression of William's displeasure, we can well understand that there was more in it than William could, without implicating the Princess Anne, make known.

We have seen that Marlborough all along, whilst courting the favour of William, was endeavouring to recover that of James. He had been one of the very first to abandon that monarch when trusted by him, but he had written letters expressing the bitterest repentance and remorse for that treason, whilst he was thus prepared, if necessary, to perpetrate a new one. But Marlborough, as he had a genius capable of the very highest achievements, had one also capable of the most complicated treacheries in politics. It was not enough for him to be serving William and vowing secretly to James that he was only watching his opportunity to serve him, but he had a third and more alluring treason. He and his wife had the ductile and yet obstinate princess Anne completely in their hands. They lived with her at Whitehall, they drew largely from her income, they selected her friends, they moulded her likings and her antipathies; she was a complete puppet in their keeping. From his lucrative station as keeper of Anne's purse, person, and conscience, through his clever and unprincipled wife, Marlborough watched intently the temper of the nation. He saw that there was an intense jealousy of the Dutch, not only amongst the people on account of trade and national rivalry, but in the Parliament and aristocracy, on account of William's preference for his Dutch friends. Bentinck, Ginkell, Overkirk, and Zulestein were the only men in whom he reposed entire confidence. On them he heaped wealth, estates, and honours. Ginkell was just now elevated to an earldom, and a large grant of lands was contemplated for him in Ireland. On Portland rich grants had been bestowed, and more were anticipated. William's continual absences on the Continent, his cold reserve whilst in England, the large expenditure of men and money for the prosecution of the Continental war, though really for the liberties of Europe, were represented by the discontented as a wholesale draft upon the country for the aggrandisement of Holland.

These were the things Marlborough saw which gave vitality to the intrigues of the Jacobites; and the only causes which prevented the revulsion from becoming general in favour of James were his incurable despotism, his imbecility as a monarch, and the certain return of Popery in his train. But there was another person to whom none of these objections applied—the Princess Anne—the person already in his guidance or power. Anne was at once English and a Protestant. The former fact gave her a mighty advantage over William—the latter over James. Would it not, therefore, be possible to substitute Anne for her father? To do this it was only necessary to inflame the prejudice in Parliament and among the people against the Dutch influence, to inoculate the army with the same feeling, already well-disposed to it by jealousy of the Dutch troops, and to obviate the objections of those who repelled the idea of bringing back James by turning their attention on one nearer home. The absence of William on the Continent, and the disaffection of most of the admirals, would afford an opportunity of resisting his return to both army and navy. And with Anne queen, Marlborough would become the pillar of her throne, commander of her army, and dispenser of her patronage.

That this was no mere dream is clear enough now. It was, indeed, one of the various rumours of the time. Evelyn says that it was one of these that Marlborough "was endeavouring to breed division in the army, and to make himself the more necessary by making an ill correspondence betwixt the princess and the Court." But James himself as plainly asserts the fact of this charge against Marlborough. "It was the plan," he says, "of my friends to recall me through the Parliament. My Lord Churchill was to propose in Parliament to drive away all the foreigners from the councils and the army of the kingdom. If the Prince of Orange consented to this, he would have been in their hands. If he refused, Parliament would have declared against him, and Lord Churchill was, at the same time, to cause the army to declare for the Parliament, the fleet the same, and then to recall me. Already this plan was in agitation, and a large party was already gained over, when some faithful but indiscreet subjects, thinking to serve me, and imagining that Lord Churchill was not acting for me, but really for the Princess of Denmark, discovered all to Bentinck, and thus destroyed the whole scheme."

The proof that William was satisfied that Marlborough's grand plan was real, was that he at once dismissed him from all his employments. That Marlborough had long intrigued with James, William was quite aware, but on that account he never troubled him; this, however, was by far a more dangerous treachery, and he resented it accordingly. The Marlboroughs, notwithstanding, continued at Whitehall with Anne, and might probably never have been molested, had not the imperious Lady Marlborough in her anger determined to set the king and queen at defiance. She, therefore, had the assurance to accompany the princess to the Drawing-Room at Kensington Palace a few evenings after, and the next day brought an expostulatory letter from the queen to her sister, informing her that after such an outrage Lady Marlborough must quit Whitehall. Anne sent to entreat Mary to pass the matter over, declaring that there was no misery that she would not suffer rather than be deprived of Lady Marlborough. The only answer was an order from the Lord Chamberlain, commanding her ladyship to quit the palace. Anne, determined not to lose the society of her favourite, left Whitehall with the Marlboroughs, and betook herself to Sion House, which was lent to her by the Duke of Somerset, and soon after she removed to Berkeley House, standing on the present site of Devonshire House, in Piccadilly, which became her permanent residence. There all the Marlborough faction assembled, and there Anne vented her indignation without restraint or delicacy against William, calling him a "Dutch abortion," a "monster," a "Caliban." A fresh stimulus was given to the malice of that clique; every means was used to excite hatred of the Government of William, and to increase the partisans of James. With such a termagant spirit as Lady Marlborough, and such a plotting spirit as that of her husband, a strong feeling was excited against the queen, who was represented as totally without heart, as having usurped the throne of her father, and sought to strip her sister of her most valued friendships. Amidst such an atmosphere of malice and detraction William was compelled to leave the queen.

LADY MARLBOROUGH AND THE PRINCESS ANNE AT THE QUEEN'S DRAWING-ROOM. (See p. [452].)

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