Elisabeth Farnes; "The Termagant of Spain," (Paperback)

Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: INTRODUCTION. xix Konigsegg, and the widening breach leading to the war of 1733. An admirable monograph on the Quadruple Alliance was published by 0. Weber in 1887. C'arutti has lavished the documentary treasures at his disposal upon his Storia ddla diploinaziu delta Cortc l i Savoia, which is indispensable for an undertaking of tbe important relations between the Courts of Madrid and Turin. The first volume of Baudrillart's Philippe V. et la cow de France has appeared within the last year.i It deals at present with but one year of Elisabeth's reign, but it is doubtless destined to be the standard authority upon Philip V. Had it appeared earlier, I should have hesitated to undertake the present tusk; it is perhaps equally difficult to precede or to follow such a work. It is almost unnecessary to state that the eloquent and readable general history of Spain, by Lafuente, has been a constant companion. I have thought it hardly necessary to enumerate all English authors who are of utility for this period, though it may be worth while to point to the running commentary furnished by the Annual Retjutrr and the Gentleman's Magazine, both which sprang into existence within its first few years. The harvest stored by Coxe in his Kings of Spain, and in his memoirs of Lord Walpole and Sir R. Walpole, i.s at once to be admired and grudged by a gleaner in the same field. It was originally intended that this volume should Ije accompanied by a history of Maria Theresa from another hand. Apart, therefore, from the failure of the English ambassadors' reports, the years succeeding the ileath of the Emperor Charles VI. have been intention- i The second volume appeared in 1891, since tho MS. left my Lands. I have therefore been able to make but slight use of it. xx INTRODUCTION. all...