The commons at first seemed to proceed with temper. They granted the
sum of five hundred and eighty-six thousand pounds, for building thirty
ships; though they strictly appropriated the money to that service.
Estimates were given in of the expense; but it was afterwards found
that they fell short near one hundred thousand pounds. They also voted,
agreeably to the king's request, the continuance of the additional
excise for three years. This excise had been granted for nine years in
1668. Every thing seemed to promise a peaceable and an easy session.
But the parliament was roused from this tranquillity by the news
received from abroad. The French king had taken the field in the middle
of February, and laid siege to Valenciennes, which he carried in a few
days by storm. He next invested both Cambray and St. Omers. The prince
of Orange, alarmed with his progress, hastily assembled an army, and
marched to the relief of St. Omers. He was encountered by the French,
under the duke of Orleans and Mareschal Luxembourg. The prince possessed
great talents for war; courage, activity, vigilance, patience; but still
he was inferior in genius to those consummate generals opposed to him by
Lewis and though he always found means to repair his losses, and to make
head in a little time against the victors, he was during his whole
life, unsuccessful.
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