Chapter 8

In which my Lady Betty Tantillion writes of a Scandal

Scarce two years later, King William riding in the park at Hampton
Court was thrown from his horse--the animal stumbling over a
mole-hill--and his collar-bone broken. A mole-hill seems but a small
heap of earth to send a King to moulder beneath a heap of earth
himself, but the fall proved fatal to a system which had long been
weakening, and a few days later his Majesty died, commending my Lord
Marlborough to the Princess Anne as the guide and counsellor on whose
wisdom and power she might most safely rely. Three days after the
accession his Lordship was made Captain-General of the English army,
and intrusted with power over all warlike matters both at home and
abroad. 'Twas a moment of tremendous import--the Alliance shaken by
King William's death, Holland panic-stricken lest England should
withdraw her protection, King Louis boasting that "henceforth there
were no Pyrenees," Whigs and Tories uncertain whether or not to sheath
weapons in England, small sovereigns and great ones ready to spring at
each other's throats on the Continent. Boldness was demanded, and such
executive ability as only a brilliantly daring mind could supply.
Without hesitation all power was given into the hands of the man who
seemed able to command the Fates themselves. My Lord Marlborough could
soothe the fretted vanity of a petty German Prince, he could confront
with composure the stupid rancour of those who could not comprehend
him, in the most wooden of heavy Dutchmen he could awaken a slow
understanding, the most testy royal temper he knew how to appease, and,
through all, wear an air of dignity and grace, sometimes even of
sweetness.

"What matter the means if a man gains his end," he said. "He can afford
to appear worsted and poor spirited, if through all he sees that which
he aims at placing itself within his reach."

"The King of Prussia," said Dunstanwolde as they talked of the hero
once, "has given more trouble than any of the allies. He is ever ready
to contest a point, or to imagine some slight to his dignity and rank.
It has been almost impossible to manage him. How think you my Lord
Marlborough won him over? By doing that which no other man--diplomat or
soldier--would have had the wit to see the implied flattery of, or the
composure to perform without loss of dignity. At a state banquet his
testy Majesty dropped his napkin and required another. No attendant
was immediately at hand. My Lord Marlborough--the most talked of man in
Europe, and some say, at this juncture, as powerful as half a dozen
Kings--rose and handed his Majesty the piece of linen as simply as if
it were but becoming that he should serve as