CHAP. XXXV.] WAR IN FLANDERS. 299 Venant, and Mardyck were taken; when Mardyck, in the capture of which an English fleet had assisted, was, according to treaty, put into the hands of the English. Early in the following spring Cromwell compelled Mazarin reluctantly to fulfil his engagements by ordering the siege of Dunkirk. It was a common opinion that Mazarin would have directed the allied forces against Cambray, in order to make himself bishop and prince of that city, and the attention of the Spaniards had been chiefly turned towards the defence of that place. Don John of Austria was now Governor of the Spanish Netherlands. In 1656, the Emperor Ferdinand, with the view of pleasing the cabinet of Madrid, and in the hope of marrying his son to the heiress of the Spanish Crown, had made room for Don John by recalling the Archduke Leopold William from Flanders, and at the same time Fuensaldana, Leopold's lieutenant, was replaced by Caracena. A jealousy between Condé and Leopold had prevented them from acting cordially together; but the haughty and impracticable Bourbon did not co-operate much better with the new governor. The Spaniards were astonished to find that Dunkirk, instead of Cambray, was the point of attack. Turenne, after a long and difficult march, had invested that place (May 25th, 1658). Don John, aware, too late, of his mistake, flew to its relief in such haste that he left his baggage and artillery a day's march in the rear, and encamped in presence of the enemy without the means of fortifying his position. In vain had Condé remonstrated; his sure and experienced eye foresaw the inevitable result. Next day, when Turenne marched out from his lines to engage the Spaniards, Condé inquired of the Duke of Gloucester, the younger brother of Charles II., who was by his side, "Have you ever seen a battle?" "Not yet." "Then in half an hour you will see us lose one." His prediction was speedily verified. The artillery of Turenne, aided by that of some English frigates on the coast, to which the Spaniards had not the means of replying, had already thrown them into disorder before the engagement became general. The charge of three or four thousand of Cromwell's veterans, composing the left wing under Lockhart, decided the fortune of the day. The Spaniards attempted to rally, but were dispersed by the French cavalry. On the right the French infantry were equally successful, in spite of all the efforts of Condé. The rout was complete: 1,000 Spaniards and Germans were killed or wounded, 3,000 or 4,000 more were made prisoners, including many general officers; Condé himself 1 Mém. du duc d'York. 300 BATTLE OF THE DUNES. [CHAP. XXXV. escaped with difficulty. This battle, fought on the 14th of June, 1668, called the "Battle of the Dunes," from its being fought on the dunes or sand hills which line the coast in that neighbourhood, decided the fate of Dunkirk. That place capitulated on the 23rd, and on the 25th, Louis XIV. in person surrendered it to Lockhart. Lord Fauconberg, Cromwell's son-in-law, who was sent to compliment Louis, was received with princely honours; and in return, the Duke of Créqui and Mazarin's nephew, Mancini, were despatched to the Protector with the present of a magnificent sword, and an apology from the Cardinal for not coming in person to pay his respects to so great a man! The remainder of the cam. paign of 1658 was equally fortunate for Turenne. In a short time he took Bergues, Furnes, Gravelines, and other places, and overran all Flanders to within a few leagues of Brussels. These reverses, coupled with others in Italy and in the war with the Portuguese, induced the Spanish Cabinet to think of a pacification; especially as Spain had now become in a manner isolated through the death of the Emperor Ferdinand III. and the policy of France with regard to the Rhenish League. But to explain this, we must cast a retrospective glance on the affairs of the Empire. The state of Germany after the Peace of Westphalia was eminently favourable to French interests. Sweden, the close ally of France, held large possessions in the Empire, which gave her a voice in the Imperial diet. The German princes had become even more independent of the Emperor, and several of them looked up to France for support and protection. In 1651, two leagues had been formed in Germany, with the professed object of carrying out the Peace of Westphalia. The first of these leagues was occasioned by the disorders committed by the troops of the Duke of Lorraine; through whom, as we have seen, the Emperor assisted Spain in her struggle with France. To avert this scourge, the German princes most exposed to it, namely, the Electors of Mentz, Treves, and Cologne, the Count Palatine of the Rhine, and the Bishop of Münster, formed a League at Frankfort (March, 1651', which they subsequently induced the Circles of Suabia, Franconis, and Lower Saxony to join. This union, from the religion of those who formed it, was called the Catholic League. About the same time, in North Germany, the Queen of Sweden, as Duchess of Bremen, the Dukes of Brunswick and Luneburg, and the Landgravine of Hesse also entered into a treaty, called the Protestant League, on the pretext of maintaining their territories and upholding the Peace of Westphalia. These leagues afforded Mazarin CHAP. XXXV.] DEATH OF FERDINAND III. 301 an opportunity to meddle in the affairs of Germany. He demanded that France should be admitted into them as guarantor of the treaties of Westphalia, and he subsequently made them the basis of the Rhenish League, in which French influence was predominant. These leagues were naturally regarded with suspicion and dislike by the Emperor; who, alarmed by the prospect of further coalitions, caused the provisions of the treaties of Münster and Osnabrück to be confirmed by the Diet of Ratisbon in 1654.1 This was called the Complement of the Peace of Westphalia, and served as the groundwork of the capitulation subsequently extorted from Ferdinand's son and successor, Leopold. Treaties in 1656 with the Elector of Brandenburg and the Elector Palatine served further to strengthen French influence in Germany. The Palatine had, in fact, sold himself for three years to France, in consideration of an annual pension. Such being the state of things at the time of the somewhat sudden death of the Emperor Ferdinand III.2 (April 2nd, 1657), Mazarin formed the plan of wresting the imperial crown from the House of Austria, and even of obtaining it for Louis XIV. The opportunity was rendered more promising by the circumstances of the Imperial House. Ferdinand's eldest son, whom he had procured to be elected King of the Romans, with the title of Ferdinand IV., had died in 1654; and the Emperor had not since succeeded in procuring that dignity, a necessary passport to the imperial crown, for his second son, Leopold Ignatius, who was now only seventeen years of age, and consequently still a minor. The situation was further embarrassed by the circumstance that the Emperor, only two days before his death, had signed an alliance with John Casimir, King of Poland, and had pledged himself to assist that Sovereign in the war then going on between him and Charles X., King of Sweden; a policy which was adopted by the Archduke Leopold William, the uncle and guardian of the youthful heir of the House of Austria. When the news of Ferdinand III.'s death reached Paris, Mazarin despatched the Marquis de Lionne and Marshal Gramont into Germany to canvass for the imperial crown, under the ostensible pretext of demanding reparation for some violations of the Peace of Westphalia. Lionne was a dexterous and practised diplomatist; but the real weight of the embassy rested with This is the last Diet presided over by an Emperor in person, and its recess the last ever drawn up.-Menzel, Neuere Gesch. der Deutschen, B. iv. S. 303. 2 Caused by a shock, when ill, at the danger of an infant son, from the effects of a fire. Hormayr, Oestr. Plutarch, ap. Menzel, Ibid. S. 305. 302 FRENCH INTRIGUES FOR THE EMPIRE. 1 [CHAP. XXXV. Gramont, a man of wit and of the world, who, with manners at once agreeable and dignified, united all the qualities of a jovial companion. His task it was to gain by his social qualities the goodwill of the German Electors and Princes in those interminable banquets and drinking bouts which sometimes lasted from midday almost to midnight. It is probable that Mazarin never seriously thought that he should be able to obtain the imperial crown for Louis. His real design seems to have been to transfer it to the Elector of Bavaria, or, at all events, to wrest it in any other manner from the House of Austria; and the canvassing for Louis would serve at least to create division and to gain time. The French ambassadors, on their way through Heidelberg, renewed the alliance with the Elector Palatine, who, for a further sum of 140,000 crowns, and a yearly payment of 40,000 more for three years, placed himself entirely at their disposal. France might also reckon on the three spiritual Electors; among whom the Elector of Mentz alone was actuated by honest, and what he deemed patriotic, motives, Thus, half the Electoral College had been gained, but not the most influential half. Of the other four Electors, John George II. of Saxony was for the House of Austria, out of love for precedent and custom, and also, it is said, from the hope, which everybody but himself saw to be chimerical, of marrying his daughter to the youthful Leopold. Frederick William of Brandenburg was also in favour of Leopold. Political motives connected with the invasion of Poland by Charles X. of Sweden. and his own views on the duchy of Prussia had now induced the far-seeing Elector of Brandenburg to renounce the Swedish alliance, and consequently that of France, for a league with the House of Austria and the Poles, as will be explained in the following chapter. Leopold himself, as hereditary King of Bohemia, the crown of which country, as well as that of Hungary, he had received during his father's lifetime, possessed the Bohemian Electorate; but being a minor, his vote was not yet valid. The eighth and last Elector, Ferdinand Maria of Bavaria, was besitating and undecided. It was not without great opposition that the French ambassadors were admitted into the Electoral Diet, and they soon per 1 Gramont, in his Mémoires, thus describes a dinner at Count Fürstenberg's: "Le dîner dura depuis midi jusqu'à neuf heures de soir, au bruit des trompettes et des timbales, qu'on eut toujours dans les oreilles on y but bien 2,000 ou 3,000 : santés; la table fut étayée, tous les éxcteurs dansèrent dessus; le marécha (Gramont) qui étoit boiteux, y menci le branle; tous les convives s'enivrèrent." - Petitot, t. lvi. p. 463. (2nde sér.) CHAP. XXXV.] ELECTION OF LEOPOLD. 303 ceived that Louis's chance was hopeless. The Elector of Mentz, however, was as desirous as the French Court itself to break the Austrian succession. At his suggestion, Gramont proceeded to Munich, urged the young Elector to become a candidate for the imperial crown, and offered him a yearly pension of a million. crowns from France in support of that dignity. Ferdinand Maria was timid, quiet, and devout; and though urged by his consort, a princess of the ever-aspiring House of Savoy, to seize the glittering prize, he listened in preference to his confessor and to his mother, an Austrian archduchess, who dissuaded him from the attempt. The Elector of Mentz now made another effort to separate the empire from the Austrian monarchy, by proposing that Leopold's uncle, the Archduke Leopold William, the former governor of the Spanish Netherlands, should assume the imperial crown; but this also was declined, and Leopold requested that the votes destined for himself should be transferred to his nephew. As it was now plain that the Empire must fall into the hands of Ferdinand's son, the French Court directed all its endeavours to cripple his power, by imposing on him a rigorous capitulation through the German Princes, who were indeed themselves desirous to restrain the imperial authority. At his election he engaged, among many other articles which regarded Germany, not to furnish the enemies of France with arms, money, troops, provisions, or other commodities; not to afford lodgings, winter quarters, or passage to any troops intended to act against any Power comprised in the treaties of Osnabrück and Münster; nor to interfere in any way in the war then going on in Italy and the Circle of Burgundy. Leopold I. received the Roman Crown July 31st, 1658, after an interregnum of about sixteen months. He had now completed his eighteenth year, and was therefore, according to the Golden Bull, no longer a minor. As a younger son, he had been destined for the Church, and his education had been intrusted to the Jesuits; so that when his destination was changed by the death of his brother, there was not perhaps a more learned sovereign in Europe. He had displayed from his youth a remarkable piety, and his only amusements, as a boy, were to build altars, keep church, and dress out images of saints. He appears to have been a well-meaning prince, but of narrow mind and little spirit, the slave of forms and ceremonies, which he The capitulation is in Dumont, t. vi. pt. ii. p. 226 sq. |