Fortune likewise favoured his brother Don Philip in Savoy and Piedmont. He was, early in the season, joined at Antibes by the French army under the conduct of the prince of Conti. In the latter end of March, the combined forces passed the Var, reduced the castle of Aspremont, and entered the city of Nice without opposition. In April, they attacked the king of Sardinia, who, with twenty thousand men, was strongly intrenched among the mountains of Villa-Franca. The action was obstinate and bloody; but their numbers and perseverance prevailed. He was obliged to abandon his posts, and embark on board of the British squadron, which transported him and his troops to Vado. The intention of Don Philip was to penetrate through the territories of Genoa into the Milanese; but admiral Matthews, who hovered with a strong squadron on that coast, sent a message to the republic, declaring, that should the combined army be suffered to pass through her dominions, the king of Great Britain would consider such a step as a breach of their neutrality. The senate, intimidated by this intimation, entreated the princes to desist from their design, and they resolved to choose another route. They defiled towards Piedmont, and assaulted the strong post of Chateau-Dauphiné, defended by the king of Sardinia in person. After a desperate attack, in which they lost four thousand men, the place was taken; the garrison of Demont surrendered at discretion, and the whole country of Piedmont was laid under contribution. His Sardinian majesty was not in a condition to hazard a battle; and, therefore, posted himself at Saluzzes, in order to cover his capital. The combined army advanced to the strong and important town of Coni, which was invested in the beginning of September, Baron Leutrum, the governor, made an obstinate defence, and the situation of the place was such as rendered the siege difficult, tedious, and bloody. The king of Sardinia being reinforced by ten thousand Austrians, under general Pallavicini, advanced to its relief, and a battle ensued. The action was maintained with great vigour on both sides till night, when his majesty finding it impracticable to force the enemy’s intrenchments, retired in good order to his camp at Murasso, He afterwards found means to throw a reinforcement and supply of provisions into Coni; and the heavy rains that fell at this period, not only retarded but even dispirited the besiegers. Nevertheless, the princes persisted in their design, notwithstanding a dearth of provisions, and the approach of winter, till the latter end of November, when the chevalier de Soto entered the place with six hundred fresh men. This incident was no sooner known than the princes abandoned their enterprise; and leaving their sick and wounded to the mercy of the Piedmontese, marched back to Demont. Having dismantled the fortifications of this place, they retreated with great precipitation to Dauphiné, and were dreadfully harassed by the Vaudois and light troops in the service of his Sardinian majesty, who now again saw himself in possession of Piedmont. The French troops were quartered in Dauphiné; but Don Philip still maintained his footing in Savoy, the inhabitants of which he fleeced without mercy.
RETURN OF COMMODORE ANSON.
After the action at Toulon, nothing of consequence was achieved by the British squadron in the Mediterranean; and indeed the naval power of Great Britain was, during the summer, quite inactive. In the month of June, commodore Anson returned from his voyage of three years and nine months, in which he had surrounded the terraqueous globe. We have formerly observed, that he sailed with a small squadron to the South-Sea, in order to annoy the Spanish settlements of Chili and Peru. Two of his large ships having been separated from him in a storm before he weathered Cape Horn, had put in at Rio de Janeiro, on the coast of Brazil, from whence they returned to Europe. A frigate commanded by captain Cheap, was shipwrecked on a desolate island in the South-Sea. Mr. Anson having undergone a dreadful tempest, which dispersed his fleet, arrived at the island of Juan Fernandez, where he was joined by the Gloucester, a ship of the line, a sloop, and a pink loaded with provisions. These were the remains of his squadron. He made prize of several vessels; took and burned the little town of Payta; set sail from the coast of Mexico for the Philippine Isles; and in this passage the Gloucester was abandoned and sunk: the other vessels had been destroyed for want of men to navigate them, so that nothing now remained but the commodore’s own ship, the Centurion, and that but very indifferently manned; for the crews had been horribly thinned by sickness. Incredible were the hardships and misery they sustained from the shattered condition of the ships, and the scorbutic disorder, when they reached the plentiful island of Tinian, where they were supplied with the necessary refreshments. Thence they prosecuted their voyage to the river of Canton in China, where the commodore ordered the ship to be sheathed, and found means to procure a reinforcement of sailors. The chief object of his attention was the rich annual ship that sails between Acapulco, in Mexico, and Manilla, one of the Philippine islands. In hopes of intercepting her, he set sail from Canton, and steered his course back to the straits of Manilla, where she actually fell into his hands, after a short but vigorous engagement. The prize was called Neustra Signora de Cabodonga, mounted with forty guns, manned with six hundred sailors, and loaded with treasure and effects to the value of three hundred and thirteen thousand pounds sterling; with this windfall he returned to Canton; from whence he proceeded to the Cape of Good Hope, and prosecuted his voyage to England, where he arrived in safety. Though this fortunate commander enriched himself by an occurrence that may be termed almost accidental, the British nation was not indemnified for the expense of the expedition; and the original design was entirely defeated. Had the Manilla ship escaped the vigilance of the English commodore, he might have been, on his return to England, laid aside as a superannuated captain, and died in obscurity, but his great wealth invested him with considerable influence, and added lustre to his talents.
He soon became the oracle which was consulted in all naval deliberations; and the king raised him to the dignity of a peerage. In July, sir John Balchen, an admiral of approved valour and great experience, sailed from Spithead with a strong squadron, in quest of an opportunity to attack the French fleet at Brest, under the command of M. de Rochambault. In the bay of Biscay he was overtaken by a violent storm, that dispersed the ships, and drove them up the English channel. Admiral Stewart, with the greater part of them, arrived at Plymouth; but sir John Balchen’s own ship, the Victory, which was counted the most beautiful first-rate in the world, foundered at sea; and this brave commander perished, with all his officers, volunteers, and crew, amounting to eleven hundred choice seamen. On the fourth day of October, after the siege of Fribourg, the mareschal duke de Belleisle, and his brother, happened in their way to Berlin to halt at a village in the forest of Hartz, dependent on the electorate of Hanover. There they were apprehended by the bailiff of the place, and conducted as prisoners to Osterode; from whence they were removed to Stade on the Elbe, where they embarked for England. They resided at Windsor till the following year, when they were allowed the benefit of the cartel which had been established between Great Britain and France at Franckfort, and released accordingly, after they had been treated by the British nobility with that respect and hospitality which was due to their rank and merit.*
* Mr. Pope, the celebrated poet, died in the month of June. In October, the old duchess of Marlborough resigned her breath, in the eighty-fifth year of her age, immensely rich, and very little regretted, either by her own family or the world in general.
REVOLUTION IN THE BRITISH MINISTRY.
The dissensions in the British cabinet were now ripened into another revolution in the ministry. Lord Carteret, who was by this time earl Granville, in consequence of his mother’s death, had engrossed the royal favour so much, that the duke of Newcastle and his brother are said to have taken umbrage at his influence and greatness. He had incurred the resentment of those who were distinguished by the appellation of patriots, and entirely forfeited his popularity. The two brothers were very powerful by their parliamentary interest; they knew their own strength, and engaged in a political alliance with the leading men in the opposition, against the prime minister and his measures. This coalition was dignified with the epithet of “The Broad Bottom,” as if it had been established on a true constitutional foundation, comprehending individuals of every class, without distinction of party. The appellation, however, which they assumed was afterwards converted into a term of derision. The earl of Granville perceiving the gathering storm and foreseeing the impossibility of withstanding such an opposition in parliament, wisely avoided the impending danger and disgrace, by a voluntary resignation of his employments. The earl of Harrington succeeded him as secretary of state. The duke of Bedford was appointed first lord of the admiralty, and the earl of Chesterfield declared lord-lieutenant of Ireland. The lords Gower and Cobham were re-established in the offices they had resigned; Mr. Lyttelton was admitted as a commissioner of the treasury; even sir John Hinde Cotton accepted of a place at court; and sir John Phillips sat at the board of trade and plantations, though he soon renounced this employment. This was rather a change of men than of measures, and turned out to the ease and advantage of the sovereign; for his views were no longer thwarted by an obstinate opposition in parliament. The session was opened on the twenty-eighth day of November, in the usual manner. The commons unanimously granted about six millions and an half for the service of the ensuing year, to be raised by the land, the malt, and the salt taxes, the sinking fund, and an additional duty on wines. In January, the earl of Chesterfield set out for the Hague, with the character of ambassador-extraordinary, to persuade, if possible, the states-general to engage heartily in the war. About the same time a treaty of quadruple alliance was signed at Warsaw, by the queen of Hungary, the king of Poland, and the maritime powers. This was a mutual guarantee of the dominions belonging to the contracting parties; but his Polish majesty was paid for his concurrence, with an annual subsidy of one hundred and fifty thousand pounds, two-thirds of which were defrayed by England, and the remainder was disbursed by the United Provinces.*
* Robert earl of Orford, late prime minister, died in March, after having for a very short time enjoyed a pension of four thousand pounds granted by the crown, in consideration of his past services. Though he had for such a length of time directed the application of the public treasure, his circumstances were not affluent: he was liberal in his disposition, and had such a number of rapacious dependents to gratify, that little was left for his own private occasions.