Other blows were in reserve for this adroit and artful intriguer; imprudent and chimerical, always ready to attempt new adventures, and counting upon the resources of his fertile genius. "The Tories seem resolved not to be crushed," wrote he, on the 3rd of August, "and this suffices to prevent its being done. I have lost all by the death of the queen, except my energy of spirit; and I protest to you that I feel it expanding within me. If you wish, in a month, all the world shall say that the Whigs are a lot of Jacobites." Chapter XXXIV. George I. And The Protestant Succession. (1714-1727.) It pleases God to confound the fears as well as the hopes of mankind. All moderate Englishmen were passionately attached to the Protestant succession. The great mass of the nation for some years looked forward to the death of Queen Anne with great anxiety, while the Jacobites awaited that event with ill-disguised confidence, believing it the hour of their triumph. The forebodings of the one, as well as the hopes of the other, were equally disappointed. King George I., although away from England, a foreigner, and unknown to all, was proclaimed without opposition, and his name was received with public acclamations as enthusiastic as though he was a well beloved son, ascending peaceably the throne of his father; a powerful and striking indication of that grave and firm resolution which caused the English nation to remain attached to its religious faith, as well as its political liberties; an indication, however, which was long unrecognized by the partisans of the fallen house of Stuart; faithful and blind, not only to the temper of the English people, but also to the disposition and intentions of the princes for whom they were to sacrifice from generation to generation, their estates and their lives. {136} King George I., although proclaimed, was still absent, remaining in his electorate, which he was loth to leave. He was naturally slow and deliberate, just and moderate, without any charm of mind or manner, and surrounded by favorites more foreign and more dissatisfactory even than himself to the English nation. A Council of Regency governed during his absence. It contained all the illustrious names of the Whig party, with the exception of the Duke of Marlborough, who was soon placed at the head of the army, and Lord Somers, who was old and an invalid. Louis XIV. recognized the new sovereign. One of the first measures voted by Parliament, was the increase of the reward, from five thousand to one hundred thousand pounds sterling, to any one who should arrest the Pretender, if he dared to land upon English soil.