[16] "Till within these few days, during these nine years I have never had occasion to send ill news. Our powder and other stores, for the carrying on these two sieges, left Ghent last Thursday, under the convoy of twelve hundred foot and four hundred and fifty horse. They were attacked by the enemy and beaten, so that they blew up the powder, and sunk the store-boats." Marlborough to the Duchess, 22d September 1710. Coxe, iv. 365.
[17] "Take it we must, for we cannot draw the guns from the batteries. But God knows when we shall have it: night and day our poor men are up to the knees in mud and water." Marlborough to Godolphin, 27th October 1710.
[18] Marlborough to Godolphin, 13th November 1710. Disp. iv. 685, 689. Coxe, iv. 366, 367.
[19] Cunningham, ii. 305.
[20] Marlborough to the Duchess, 26th July 1710. Coxe, iv. 299.
[21] Marlborough to the Duchess, 25th October and 24th November 1710. Coxe, iv. 351, 352.
[22] Bolingbroke's Corresp., i. 41; Mr Secretary St John to Mr Drummond, 20th Dec. 1710.
[23] "I beg you to lose no time in sending me, to the Hague, the opinion of our friend mentioned in my letter; for I would be governed by the Whigs, from whose principle and interest I will never depart. Whilst they had a majority in the House of Commons, they might suspect it might be my interest; but now they must do me the justice to see that it is my inclination and principle which makes me act." Marlborough to the Duchess, Nov. 9, 1710. Coxe, iv. 360.
[24] Coxe, iv. 405.
[25] "Though I never thought of troubling your Majesty again in this manner, yet the circumstances I see my Lord Marlborough in, and the apprehension I have that he cannot live six months, if there is not some end put to his sufferings on my account, make it impossible for me to resist doing every thing in my power to ease him." Duchess of Marlborough to Queen Anne, 17th Jan. 1711. Coxe, iv. 410.