other hand, the landing of a body of regular troops would provide a rallying point for the insurgents. This force should be equal to the number of troops generally quartered about London and able to hold them, while the volunteer royalists would march straight to the capital which was ready to declare in their favour. They would then acquire the magazines and arsenals at the seat of government, and almost all the treasures of England (‘presque toutes les richesses d’Angleterre’). If at that juncture the Scots would rise, the Hanoverians would be driven to despair. No ally of the Elector, however powerful, would venture to attack Great Britain reunited under her legitimate sovereign. The requirement of the English would be 10,000 to 12,000 regular troops sent from abroad; without such a disciplined force the English Jacobites would not risk a rising.[35] Sempill was sent by the Chevalier to Paris to lay these views before Cardinal Fleury. The Cardinal, peace lover though he was, felt that it would be absurd to neglect the assistance that the Jacobites might afford him in the complications which were certain to arise when the death of the Emperor Charles VI., then imminent, should occur.[36] When the English views of requirement were presented to him he received them sympathetically; said that the King of France would willingly grant the help the English Jacobites desired, but two things were absolutely necessary: he must have more exact information than had been given him with regard to what royalist adherents would join his troops on landing, and also as to those who would rise at the same time in the provinces. If the English leaders could satisfy His Majesty on these two points they might expect all they asked for.[37] [Sidenote: Balhaldy’s interview with Fleury.] Such was the state of Jacobite affairs at the French Court when Sempill introduced Balhaldy to Fleury. I know of no categorical statement of the requirements that Balhaldy was to lay before the Cardinal, but from a memorandum he wrote[38] it may be inferred that the Associators had asked for 1500 men with arms, ammunition, and money. Fleury replied that his sovereign was greatly pleased with the proposals of the Scots, and that he approved of their arrangements on behalf of their legitimate king. France, however, was at peace with Great Britain, while Spain was at open war. King Louis would ask the Spanish Court to undertake an expedition in favour of King James to which he would give efficient support.[39] Shortly afterwards, the Cardinal was obliged to tell Balhaldy that Spain declined to entertain the proposal. The Spanish Court disliked the war with England, and was quite aware that it had been forced on Walpole by the Jacobites and the Opposition.[40] Spain was not going to embarrass the British Government by embarking on a Jacobite adventure.