FRENCH MINISTRY STOP PAYMENT.

The implacability of the court of Vienna was equalled by nothing but the perseverance of the French ministry. Though their numerous army had not gained one inch of ground in Westphalia, the campaign on that side having ended exactly where it had begun; though the chief source of their commerce in the West Indies had fallen into the hands of Great Britain, and they had already laid their account with the loss of Quebec; though their coffers hung with emptiness, and their confederates were clamorous for subsidies,—they still resolved to maintain the war in Germany. This was doubtless the most politic resolution to which they could adhere; because their enemies, instead of exerting all their efforts where there was almost a certainty of success, kindly condescended to seek them where alone their whole strength could be advantageously employed, without any great augmentation of their ordinary expense. Some of the springs of their national wealth were indeed exhausted, or diverted into other channels; but the subjects declared for a continuation of the war, and the necessities of the state were supplied by the loyalty and attachment of the people. They not only acquiesced in the bankruptcy of public credit, when the court stopped payment of the interest on twelve different branches of the national debt, but they likewise sent in large quantities of plate to be melted down, and coined into specie, for the maintenance of the war. All the bills drawn on the government by the colonies were protested to an immense amount, and a stop was put to all the annuities granted at Marseilles on sums borrowed for the use of the marine. Besides the considerable savings occasioned by these acts of state-bankruptcy, they had resources of credit among the merchants of Holland, who beheld the success of Great Britain with an eye of jealousy; and were, moreover, inflamed against her with the most rancorous resentment, on account of the captures which had been made of their West India ships by the English cruisers.

GEORGE II. 1727-1760