Otherwise 1745 was a disastrous year for Austria. The Allies, Austrians, British, and Dutch, under the Duke of Cumberland, sustained a bloody defeat at Fontenoy in May; and Great Britain, occupied with the domestic disturbance caused by the landing of Charles Edward, had to withdraw from active participation in the war. In August a secret convention was concluded at Hanover between the Kings of Prussia and Great Britain, by which the latter Power guaranteed Silesia to the former. This was the beginning of the end. The British Ministry now notified to the unyielding Queen that she must come to terms with her enemy, or expect no more assistance from England or Holland. The Austrian arms met everywhere with reverses. While the young Queen was planning with Saxony a triumphant march on Berlin, Frederick broke into Saxony and occupied Dresden. On this final blow Maria Theresa accepted the mediation of Great Britain and signed, on Christmas Day, 1745, the peace of Dresden which gave Silesia and Glatz to Frederick. So ends the third period of this strange and erratic war; a labyrinth of fugitive conventions and transient alliances, with two strong purposes in the centre. But the auxiliary combatants remained at strife, just as the seconds in a duel have sometimes fought after their principals had settled their own differences. And so we now enter on its fourth period, that in which the British, Austrians, and Dutch (with the assistance of the Piedmontese in Italy) contended against France and Spain. The part of this war which chiefly concerns Great Britain was fought in Flanders. And in all these transactions it must be noted that a main difficulty of the British Ministry, both from the practical and from the parliamentary point of view, lay in the problem of moving the Dutch. The Hollanders had everything to apprehend from the triumph of the French arms, but their phlegmatic temper, and still more the impracticable nature of their constitution, offered great obstacles to their co-operation. Anglers may see an analogy between these British negotiations with the Dutch and the tardy and tantalising sport of sniggling for eels. At the beginning of 1746, matters seemed to have come to a climax. The French were harrying Flanders, and were threatening to invade Holland. The Dutch Government were now stirred into proposing active measures, and the raising of a large army, to be under the command of the Prince of Waldeck; but they declined to declare war against France. The British agreed to a joint force of 100,000 men, comprising 40,000 to be furnished by the States-General, 30,000 by Austria, some Hanoverians and Saxons to be paid by England and Holland, and 6000 Hessians to be provided by England after Charles Edward had been finally defeated. The Dutch regarded the British offers as inadequate; for it is a cardinal principle of all Continental wars in which Great Britain is concerned