THE FRENCH WORSTED AT WALCOURT.
The affairs of France wore but a gloomy aspect on the continent, where all the powers of Europe seemed to have conspired her destruction. King William had engaged in a new league with the states-general, in which former treaties of peace and commerce were confirmed. It was stipulated, that in case the king of Great Britain should be attacked, the Dutch should assist him with six thousand infantry, and twenty ships of the line; and that, provided hostilities should be committed against the states-general, England should supply them with ten thousand infantry, and twenty ships of war. This treaty was no sooner ratified, than king William dispatched the lord Churchill, whom he had by this time created earl of Marlborough, to Holland, in order to command the British auxiliaries in that service to the number of eleven thousand, the greater part of which had been in the army of king James when the prince of Orange landed in England. The earl forthwith joined the Dutch army, under the command of prince Waldeck, who had fixed his rendezvous in the county of Liege, with a view to act against the French army commanded by the mareschal D’Humieres; while the prince of Vaudemont headed a little army of observation, consisting of Spaniards, Dutch, and Germans, to watch the motions of Calvo in another part of the Low-Countries. The city of Liege was compelled to renounce the neutrality, and declare for the allies. Mareschal D’Humieres attacked the foragers belonging to the army of the states at Walcourt, in the month of August; an obstinate engagement ensued, and the French were obliged to retreat in confusion, with the loss of two thousand men, and some pieces of artillery. The army of observation levelled part of the French lines on the side of Courtray, and raised contributions on the territories of the enemy.
SUCCESS OF THE CONFEDERATES IN GERMANY.
The French were almost entire masters of the three ecclesiastical electorates of Germany. They possessed Mentz, Triers, Bonne, Keiserswaert, Philipsburgh, and Landau. They had blown up the castle of Heildelberg, in the Palatinate, and destroyed Manheim. They had reduced Worms and Spiers to ashes; and demolished Frankendahl, together with several other fortresses. These conquests, the fruits of sudden invasion, were covered with a numerous army, commanded by the mareschal de Duras; and all his inferior generals were officers of distinguished courage and ability. Nevertheless, he found it difficult to maintain his ground against the different princes of the empire. The duke of Lorraine, who commanded the imperial troops, invested Mentz, and took it by capitulation; the elector of Brandenburgh, having reduced Keiserswaert, undertook the siege of Bonne, which the garrison surrendered after having made a long and vigorous defence. Nothing contributed more to the union of the German princes than their resentment of the shocking barbarity with which the French had plundered, wasted, and depopulated their country. Louis having, by his intrigues in Poland and at Constantinople, prevented a pacification between the emperor and the Ottoman Porte, the campaign was opened in Croatia, where five thousand Turks were defeated by a body of Croates between Vihitz and Novi. The prince of Baden, who commanded the imperialists on that side, having thrown a bridge over the Morava at Passarowitz, crossed that river, and marched in quest of a Turkish army amounting to fifty thousand men, headed by a seraskier. On the thirteenth day of August he attacked the enemy in their intrenchments near Patochin, and forced their lines, routed them with great slaughter, and took possession of their camp, baggage, and artillery. They returned to Nissa, where the general finding them still more numerous than the imperialists, resolved to make a stand, and encamped in a situation that was inaccessible in every part except the rear, which he left open for the convenience of a retreat. Through this avenue he was, on the twenty-fourth day of September, attacked by the prince of Baden, who, after a desperate resistance, obtained another complete victory, enriched his troops with the spoil of the enemy, and entered Nissa without opposition. There he found above three thousand horses and a vast quantity of provisions. Having reposed his army for a few days in this place, he resumed his march against the Turks, who had chosen an advantageous post at Widen, and seemed ambitious of retrieving the honour they had lost in the two former engagements. The Germans attacked their lines without hesitation; and though the Musselmen fought with incredible fury, they were a third time defeated with great slaughter. This defeat was attended with the loss of Widen, which being surrendered to the victor, he distributed his troops in winter quarters, and returned to Vienna covered with laurels.
DEATH OF POPE INNOCENT XI.
The French were likewise baffled in their attempt upon Catalonia, where the duke de Noailles had taken Campredon in the month of May. Leaving a garrison in this place, he retreated to the frontiers of France, while the duke de Villa Hermosa, at the head of a Spanish army, blocked up the place and laid Rousillon under contribution. He afterwards undertook the siege in form, and Noailles marched to its relief; but he was so hard pressed by the Spaniards that he withdrew the garrison, dismantled the place, and retreated with great precipitation. The French king hoped to derive some considerable advantage from the death of Pope Innocent XL which happened on the twelfth day of August. That pontiff had been an inveterate enemy to Louis ever since the affair of the franchises, and the seizure of Avignon. [016] [See note F, at the end of this Vol.] Cabals were immediately formed at Eome by the French faction against the Spanish and Imperial interest. The French cardinals, de Bouillon and Bonzi, accompanied by Furstemberg, repaired to Eome with a large sum of money. Peter Ottoboni, a Venetian, was elected pope, and assumed the name of Alexander VIII. The duke de Chaulnes, ambassador from France, immediately signified in the name of his master, that Avignon should be restored to the patrimony of the church; and Louis renounced the franchises in a letter written by his own hand to the pontiff. Alexander received these marks of respect with the warmest acknowledgments; but when the ambassador and Furstemberg besought him to re-examine the election of the bishop of Cologne, which had been the source of so much calamity to the empire, he lent a deaf ear to their solicitations. He even confirmed the dispensations granted by his predecessor to the prince of Bavaria, who was thus empowered to take possession of the electorate, though he had not yet attained the age required by the canons. Furstemberg retired in disgust to Paris, where Louis immediately gratified him with the abbey of St. Germains.
WILLIAM AND MARY, 1688—1701.