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This is one of the great performances of polity which mankind seem agreed to celebrate and admire; yet, to all this nothing was necessary but the determination of a very few men to be silent.

From this time the queen of Hungary proceeded with an uninterrupted torrent of success. The French, driven from station to station, and deprived of fortress after fortress, were, at last, enclosed with their two generals, Bellisle and Broglio, in the walls of Prague, which they had stored with all provisions necessary to a town besieged, and where they defended themselves three months before any prospect appeared of relief.

The Austrians, having been engaged chiefly in the field, and in sudden and tumultuary excursions, rather than a regular war, had no great degree of skill in attacking or defending towns. They, likewise, would naturally consider all the mischiefs done to the city, as falling, ultimately, upon themselves; and, therefore, were willing to gain it by time rather than by force.

It was apparent that, how long soever Prague might be defended, it must be yielded at last, and, therefore, all arts were tried to obtain an honourable capitulation. The messengers from the city were sent back, sometimes unheard, but always with this answer: “That no terms would be allowed, but that they should yield themselves prisoners of war.”

The condition of the garrison was, in the eyes of all Europe, desperate; but the French, to whom the praise of spirit and activity cannot be denied, resolved to make an effort for the honour of their arms. Maillebois was at that time encamped with his army in Westphalia. Orders were sent him to relieve Prague. The enterprise was considered as romantick. Maillebois was a march of forty days distant from Bohemia, the passes were narrow, and the ways foul; and it was likely that Prague would be taken before he could reach it. The march was, however, begun: the army, being joined by that of count Saxe, consisted of fifty thousand men, who, notwithstanding all the difficulties which two Austrian armies could put in their way, at last entered Bohemia. The siege of Prague, though not raised, was remitted, and a communication was now opened to it with the country. But the Austrians, by perpetual intervention, hindered the garrison from joining their friends. The officers of Maillebois incited him to a battle, because the army was hourly lessening by the want of provisions; but, instead of pressing on to Prague, he retired into Bavaria, and completed the ruin of the emperour’s territories.

The court of France, disappointed and offended, conferred the chief command upon Broglio, who escaped from the besiegers with very little difficulty, and kept the Austrians employed till Bellisle, by a sudden sally, quitted Prague, and without any great loss joined the main army. Broglio then retired over the Rhine into the French dominions, wasting, in his retreat, the country which he had undertaken to protect, and burning towns, and destroying magazines of corn, with such wantonness, as gave reason to believe that he expected commendation from his court for any mischiefs done, by whatever means.

The Austrians pursued their advantages, recovered all their strong places, in some of which French garrisons had been left, and made themselves masters of Bavaria, by taking not only Munich, the capital, but Ingolstadt, the strongest fortification in the elector’s dominions, where they found a great number of cannon and a quantity of ammunition, intended, in the dreams of projected greatness, for the siege of Vienna, all the archives of the state, the plate and ornaments of the electoral palace, and what had been considered as most worthy of preservation. Nothing but the warlike stores were taken away. An oath of allegiance to the queen was required of the Bavarians, but without any explanation, whether temporary or perpetual.

The emperour lived at Frankfort, in the security that was allowed to neutral places, but without much respect from the German princes, except that, upon some objections made by the queen to the validity of his election, the king of Prussia declared himself determined to support him in the imperial dignity, with all his power.