I'm the Dauphin in France

Chapter 397 The Busy Marquis of Wellesley

Ludwig IX was politically more pro-Prussian, but he stated in his "Initiative" that if the Southern Netherlands insisted on breaking away from Austrian rule, a king must be elected to govern the Southern Netherlands, otherwise the Southern Netherlands Parliament should not be recognized by any monarch.

The initiative has been responded to by ten countries including Spain, France, Bavaria and Mainz.

What surprised Lord Wellesley most was that Austria was also one of the signatories of the initiative.

However, he immediately figured out the relationship involved. The Austrians signed "The Parliament of the Southern Netherlands should not be recognized by any monarch." They believed that the Southern Netherlands would never accept the election of a king. Now the Southern Netherlands Parliament was controlled by Van der Nott's group of liberals. It would be easier to let them go to the gallows than to let them choose a king for themselves.

In fact, Austria was the biggest behind-the-scenes promoter of the "Southern Netherlands Initiative". As for the copyright of the initiative, it was naturally held by Joseph II's beloved nephew.

Wellesley angrily stabbed the ground with his cane and cursed Ludwig IX again in his heart.

If Britain now also asked the people of the Southern Netherlands to elect a king, it would be tantamount to pushing the Southern Netherlands Parliament to the opposite side. If it rejected the "initiative", it would be cutting itself off from the entire European continent.

He immediately ordered his men to set off and rush to Potsdam overnight.

A few days later, he finally dispelled the latter's suspicion after he promised William II to provide 50 pounds of aid and handed over all affairs of the Southern Netherlands to Prussia and stopped Britain from interfering.

Then, Wellesley rushed to Saxony without stopping...

At the same time, London was crowded with diplomats from various countries.

In addition to receiving seven or eight rounds of diplomatic envoys every day and explaining to them that Britain had no intention of exporting revolution, British Prime Minister Pitt the Younger was also frequently summoned by George III to inquire about the situation, and was extremely busy and exhausted.

In the British Parliament, the Whigs did not miss the opportunity to suppress him, and they never stopped questioning him. Fox was even ready to initiate a vote of no confidence in him, but fortunately, the king suppressed it in the end, saving his political life.

After a month of turmoil, Pitt the Younger and George III discussed repeatedly and finally issued an official announcement.

In the announcement, Britain first stated that the previous riots in France had nothing to do with Britain. Then it said that it did not agree with the current political situation in the Southern Netherlands, but did not give in on the election of the king. Finally, it promised that Britain would "suggest" the Hanoverian army to gradually withdraw from the Southern Netherlands and would not oppose Austria's restoration of its rule over the Southern Netherlands.

After making these huge concessions, and after Wellesley appeased each country one by one and gave up a lot of interests, the condemnation of various countries against Britain gradually weakened.

The British Parliament, which had resumed normal operations, also began to deal with the backlog of affairs during this period, including a proposal submitted by Lord Talmos, the special envoy to the Maghreb, to make tariff concessions to Morocco and establish it as a textile transit point in North Africa.

Wellesley was in Italy at the time, trying to put out the "export of revolution" issue and was unable to attend the parliamentary questioning, so the matter was temporarily shelved.

On the other hand, the overwhelmed Wellesley finally completed his diplomatic mission and immediately went to Brussels to learn about the implementation of the previous deployment.

According to his plan, Van der Nott would send people to Wallonia to incite unrest, preferably spreading the chaos to Luxembourg.

He knew that France had made large investments in Luxembourg, so stability there would be an important bargaining chip in his talks with the French on the Indian issue.

However, as soon as he arrived at the border of the Southern Netherlands, he received an order from Pitt the Younger to stop all contact with the Southern Netherlands Parliament and return to London as soon as possible.

George III had been driven to the point of nearly having a relapse of his mental illness by the accusation of "exporting revolution" - he suffered from porphyria [Note 1], and had recovered from his last attack less than half a year ago. The entire British royal family was worried at this time, fearing that he would be stimulated to go crazy again, so they repeatedly asked Pitt the Younger not to get involved in the affairs of the Southern Netherlands liberals.

When Wellesley returned to London, he discovered that the benefits he had promised to Morocco were still stuck with Parliament.

He had been running around and being looked down upon for a while, and had almost forgotten about this matter. So he hurried to the parliament to explain the details of the exchange of interests and urged the parliament to vote for it.

By the time Morocco actually received the benefits from the British, nearly three months had passed since Wellesley's last trip to North Africa.

The news that the Marquis of Cornwallis's attack on Mysore was thwarted and he requested further reinforcements, as well as the news that Mysore occupied the whole of Travancore and was heading towards Carnatic, reached Britain.

The whole of London exploded...

Paris.

Mars Room at the Palace of Versailles.

"Your Majesty, you have won nine games in a row. You are now at the peak of your luck." A seven or eight-year-old Russian girl sat obediently beside Queen Mary at the big baccarat table, blinking her big blue eyes and looking at her. "I think you should continue to stick to your intuition."

"Okay, sweetheart, I'll listen to you." Queen Mary giggled, grabbed a handful of gold and placed it in front of the "Banker" grid, "I think this game is still Banker!"

The little girl picked up a piece of cake and put it in her mouth, muttering in a very low voice: "If you keep winning like this, your uncle won't keep nagging me about France's financial problems all day long... Oh, this is too sweet, does the chef have a way to buy duty-free sugar?"

If it weren't for the enthusiastic invitation from the Queen of France and her uncle's constant urging, she really didn't want to come to such a boring place.

The dealer in front suddenly announced calmly, "Banker wins."

"Wow, ten consecutive wins!" Queen Mary jumped up from her chair excitedly, turned around and hugged Alexandra and kissed her hard, "You are really my angel, dear, ten consecutive wins, do you know? I haven't won like this for a long time!"

Ever since she knew that her son was interested in this little girl, she would send people to invite her to the Palace of Versailles from time to time to attend various balls, concerts, and gambling games in order to create opportunities for her son.

It’s a pity that Joseph has been very busy and rarely participates in these social activities. Instead, she and the little girl became more and more familiar with each other.

Queen Mary couldn't help but think of her niece, and then she sighed softly, if only Joseph liked Clementine, how great it would be, she would be standing next to her now...

She was suddenly startled, and the scene of Clementine accompanying her to gamble last year unexpectedly emerged in her mind. It seemed that she hardly ever won at that time. The worst time was that she even lost 17 games in a row. She was so depressed that she couldn't sleep for half the night.

She looked at Alexandra again, and suddenly the regret in her heart became much less.

【Note 1】: Porphyria, also known as hemoporphyria, is a group of porphyrin metabolic disorders caused by the lack of certain enzymes or reduced enzyme activity in the heme synthesis pathway. It can be a congenital disease or an acquired disease. The main clinical symptoms include photosensitivity, digestive system symptoms and mental and neurological symptoms.

(End of this chapter)