REIGN OF WILLIAM III. (concluded).

William Meets his Parliament—Reduction of the Standing Army—Visit of Peter the Great—Schemes of Louis—The East India Company—Spanish Partition Scheme—Its Inception and Progress—Somers's Hesitation—The Treaty is Signed—New Parliament—Tory Reaction—Dismissal of the Dutch Guards—William forms an Intention of Quitting England—Attack on the late Ministry—Jobbery in the Admiralty—Paterson's Darien Scheme—Douglas's Reasons against It—Enthusiasm of the Scots—Departure of the First Expedition and its Miserable Failure—The Untimely End of the Second Expedition—Second Partition Scheme—Double-dealing of the French—New Parliament—Attack on Somers—Report on the Irish Grants—Resumption Bill passed—William's Unpopularity—Death of the Duke of Gloucester—Conclusion of the New Partition Treaty and its Results—Charles makes over his Dominions to the French Candidate—His Death—Disgust of William at Louis's Duplicity—Tory Temper of the House—The Succession Question—Debates on Foreign Policy—The Succession Act passed—New Negotiations with France—Attack on the Whig Ministers—Acknowledgment of the Spanish King—Impeachment of the Whigs—The Kentish Petition—Its Reception by the House—The Legion Memorial—Panic in the House—Violent Struggle between the two Houses—The Impeachments dropped—William goes Abroad—The Grand Alliance and its Objects—Beginning of the War—Death of James II.—Louis acknowledges the Pretender—Reaction in England—New Parliament and Ministry—The King's Speech—British Patriotism is Roused—Voting of Supplies—The Bills of Attainder and Abjuration—Illness and Death of William—His Character.

William met his Parliament on the 3rd of December. He congratulated it on the achievement of a peace in which the Confederates had accomplished all they had fought for—the repression of the ambitious attempts of France to bring under its yoke the rest of the kingdoms on the Continent. She had been compelled to yield up everything which she had seized from the commencement of the war. But he reminded them that this had not been accomplished except at a heavy cost. They had supported him nobly in furnishing that cost, and he trusted they would not now be less prompt to discharge the remaining unpaid claims, and in taking measures to liquidate by degrees the debts incurred. He expressed his hope that they would provide him for life with a sufficient Civil List to maintain the necessary dignity of the Crown. Though the war was over, he reminded them that there were many reasons why the army and navy should yet be maintained on a respectable footing.

The Commons voted him an address, in which they united in the congratulations on the restoration of peace, but passed over the subject of the army. William noticed the omission, and felt it deeply. Nobody was more aware than himself that, though they had bound France by the treaty of Ryswick, no bonds of that kind ever held Louis XIV. any longer than it suited his necessities or his schemes of aggrandisement. He observed that Louis still kept on foot his large armies, and that he still retained James and his Court at St. Germains, in open violation of the treaty; and the circumstances of Spain, whose king was gradually dying childless, with Louis intently watching to pounce on his dominions, filled him, as it did every far-seeing man, with deep anxiety. Though no king ever less sought to infringe the liberties of his subjects, yet William, naturally fond of an army and of military affairs, was especially anxious at this crisis for the retention of a respectable force. He knew that Europe, though freed from actual war, was, through the restless ambition of Louis, still living only in an armed peace.

The Commons did not leave him long in suspense. In a few days they went into the subject of the proposal to keep up the army. The spirit of the House was high against a standing army. All the old arguments were produced—that a standing army was totally inconsistent with the liberties of the people; that the moment you put the sword into the hands of mercenaries, the king became the master of the rights of the nation, and a despot. They asked, "If a standing army were to be maintained, what should they have gained by the revolution?" The Tories, who were anxious to damage the Whigs, and the Jacobites, who were anxious to damage William's government altogether, were particularly eloquent on these topics. The true patriots, and they were few, were eloquent from principle. It was in vain that the friends of William represented that it was a very different thing to maintain an army in particular circumstances which depended on the will of Parliament, from maintaining one at the sole pleasure of the king. The opponents of a standing army contended that a militia was the natural force for internal defence, which could be brought to nearly as much perfection as regular troops, and could be called out when wanted; and that the navy was our proper army, and that if kept in due efficiency it was able, not only to protect us and our trade, but to render all such assistance to other nations as became a generous and Christian nation. By a division of a hundred and eighty-five votes against a hundred and forty-eight, the House resolved that all the forces raised since 1686 should be disbanded.

PETER THE GREAT AT DEPTFORD DOCKYARD.

From the Painting by Daniel Maclise, R.A.
in the Royal Holloway College, Egham.

[[See larger version]]

This fell with an appalling shock on William. All his army of brave mercenaries, his Dutch guards, his Huguenot cavalry, must be sent away. He would, it was found, be left only with about eight thousand regular troops. Never was there such a stripping of a martial monarch, who had figured at the head of upwards of a hundred thousand men against the greatest military power of Europe. He made little remark publicly, but he poured out his grief to his great correspondent the Dutch Grand Pensionary, Heinsius, and to Burnet. To them he said that it would make his alliance of so little value, his state so contemptible, that he did not see how he was to carry on the government; that he never could have imagined, after what he had done for the nation, that they would treat him thus; and that, had he imagined it, he would never have meddled with the affairs of England; that he was weary of governing a country which had rather lay itself open to its enemies than trust him, who had acted all his life so faithfully for them. But it was useless complaining; the country was resolved on having no standing army, and every attempt of Ministers to modify or enlarge the resolution was disregarded. They proposed that the Bill should be committed, because it would leave the king in the hands of the old Tory regiments; and, again, that five hundred thousand pounds per annum should be granted for the maintenance of Guards and garrisons. Both motions were negatived. There was a strong feeling excited against Sunderland, on the supposition that he had encouraged the king in his desire for a large army, because he warmly argued for it; and that minister, equally odious to both parties, felt it safest to retire. He therefore resigned his post of Lord Chamberlain, though William did all he could to dissuade him from doing so, and sought the seclusion of his princely abode of Althorp.