The overthrow of Marlborough effected an object quite unlooked for by his eager and shortsighted enemies. The efforts of faction, aided by a palace intrigue, showed what had been due to the greatness of one man. Instantly, as if by enchantment, the fabric of victory raised by his all-potent arm was dissolved. Spain was lost, Flanders reconquered, Germany threatened! The arch of the Grand Alliance fell to pieces. These show in brighter colours than ever the greatness and patriotism of Marlborough. Again he took the command of the Hague, though no longer possessing the confidence of the government, and intrusted with no control over diplomatic measures; and again dazzled Europe and petrified his enemies by the splendour of his first achievement. Louis, in order to prevent the irruption of his foes into France, now that almost all his fortresses had been broken through, resolved on the construction of a line of defence on a scale so stupendous as to attract universal wonder--lines subsequently paralleled only by the prodigious lines of Torres Vedras. They were supplied with abundance of cannon, and manned by ninety thousand choice troops of infantry and cavalry under the command of Villars, who at length seemed both impregnable and unconquerable. Marlborough was then in his sixty-second year, and almost worn out by long service, and intense anxieties, and incessant mortifications. "I find myself decay so very fast," he wrote to his Duchess, "that from my heart and soul I wish the Queen and my country a peace, by which I might have the advantage of having a little quiet, which is my greatest ambition."[36] But his mighty powers addressed themselves once more to a commensurate object--the devising an enterprise which should at a stroke deprive his enemy of all his huge defences, and drive him to fight a decisive battle or lose his last frontier fortress. Shortly afterwards, he was confounded by Prince Eugene being withdrawn from him, together with a large section of the army, to repair disasters in a distant part of the Continent. This rendered Villars suddenly anxious for an encounter; but Louis, his eyes intently fixed on the progress of intrigues in London, had peremptorily prohibited him from fighting. Villars vaingloriously styled his lines "Marlborough's _ne plus ultra_," a subject on which he was abundantly jocular. But Marlborough, having carefully studied them, devised a plan which very soon banished his boasts, and plunged him into consternation. We must refer our readers to Mr Alison's exciting description of this feat of strategy, by which Marlborough passed the imaginary "_ne plus ultra_" without having fired a shot, without having lost one man--frustrating by a sudden march nine months' labour, and suddenly exhibiting to Marshal Villars the palsying spectacle of Marlborough's whole army drawn up in battle array on the _inner_ side of the impregnable lines! All this was the work of Marlborough alone.