[18] "Her Majesty, my lord, has reason to believe that we shall come to an agreement upon the great article of the union of the monarchies, as soon as a courier sent from Versailles to Madrid can return. It is, therefore, the Queen's _positive command_ to your Grace that _you avoid engaging in any siege, or hazarding a battle_, till you have further orders from her Majesty. I am, at the same time, directed to let your Grace know, that you are _to disguise the receipt of this order_; and her Majesty thinks you cannot want pretences for conducting yourself, without owning that which might at present have an ill effect if it was publicly known. _P.S._ I had almost forgot to tell your Grace that communication is made of this order _to the Court of France_, so that if the Marshal de Villars takes, in any private way, notice of it to you, your Grace will answer it accordingly."--_Mr Secretary St John to the Duke of Ormond_, May 10, 1712. BOLINGBROKE'S _Correspondence_, ii. 320. [19] Eugene to Marlborough, June 9, 1712.--Coxe vi. 199. This disgraceful defection on the part of the English government excited, as well it might, the utmost indignation among the Allies, and produced mingled feelings of shame and mortification among all real patriots or men of honour in this country. By abandoning the contest in this manner, when it was on the very point of being crowned with success, the English lost the fruit of TEN costly and bloody campaigns, and suffered the war to terminate without attaining the main object for which it had been undertaken. Louis XIV., defeated, and all but ruined, was permitted to retain for his grandson the Spanish succession; and England, victorious, and within sight, as it were, of Paris, was content to halt in the career of victory, and lost the opportunity, never to be regained for a century to come, of permanently restraining the ambition of France. It was the same as if, a few days after the battle of Waterloo, England had concluded a separate peace, guaranteeing the throne of Spain to Joseph Buonaparte, and providing only for its not being held also by the Emperor of France. Lord Halifax gave vent to the general indignation of all generous and patriotic men, when he said, in the debate on the address, on 28th May, after enumerating the proud list of victories which, since the commencement of the war, had attended the arms of England,--"But all this pleasing prospect is totally effaced by the orders given to the Queen's general, not to act offensively against the enemy. I pity that heroic and gallant general, who, on other occasions, took delight to charge the most formidable corps and strongest squadrons, and cannot but be uneasy at his being fettered with shackles, and thereby prevented from reaping the glory which he might well expect from leading on troops so long accustomed to conquer. I pity the Allies, who have relied upon the aid and friendship of the British nation, perceiving that