MARIA THERESA. 401 " Yes," exclaimed the members of the Diet, " our life and blood." Some timely help, too, came from George II of England, and it was with English guineas and Hungarian horsemen that she endeavored to expel Frederick from Silesia, and keep at bay the armies of France and Spain. Such enthusiasm was there for her in England, that a public subscription was started for her benefit. The Duchess of Marlborough subscribed the extraordinary sum of forty thousand pounds sterling, and other ladies of London a hundred thousand more — so touched were the susceptible hearts of the English people at the spec- tacle of a young and beautiful woman defending her hereditary rights against such numerous and powerful enemies. The Empress, however, thought it due to her dignity to decline this friendly succor, and said to the ladies, that she would defend her states by the help of her loyal subjects alone. It added to the general interest in her fortunes, that she was about again to become a mother, and knew not, as she said, whether there would remain to her a city in which she could give birth to her child. Despite the heroic efforts of the Hungarians, she was compelled to yield Silesia to the King of Prussia in order to detach him from the coalition against her. She then waged successful war against her other enemies until, in the eighth year of her reign, she concluded a treaty of peace which left her mistress of all the ancient posses- sions of her house, excepting alone the fine province wrested from her by the invincible Frederick. After this eight years of most desperate and desolating warfare, Maria Theresa enjoyed a precious interval of seven years of peace ; which is about the duration of two presidential terms. Then it was that, for the first time, she could display the gentler and benevolent traits of her
