SAXE. flattering terms. The succeeding campaigns gained him additional honours. After the victory of Rauceux, which he gained on the 11th October 1746, the king of France made him a present of six pieces of cannon. He was, on the 12th of January of the following year, created maréchal of all the French armies, and, in 1748, commander-general of all those parts of the Netherlands which were lately conquered.
Holland now began to tremble for her safety. Maastricht and Bergen-op-Zoom had already fallen, and nothing but misfortunes seemed to attend the further prosecution of the war. The States General, therefore, offered terms of peace, which were accepted, and a treaty concluded on the 18th October 1748.
Maréchal Saxe retired to Chambord, a country seat which the king of France had given him. Some time after he went to Berlin, where the king of Prussia received him as Alexander would have received Cæsar. On his return to France, he spent his time among men of learning, artists, and philosophers. He died of a fever, on the 30th November 1750, at the age of 54.
Some days before his death, talking to M. Senac his physician about his life, "It has been (says he) an excellent dream." He was remarkably careful of the lives of his men. One day a general officer was pointing out to him a post which would have been of great use. "It will only cost you (says he) a dozen grenadiers." "That would do very well," replied the maréchal, "were it only a dozen lieutenant-generals."
It was impossible for maréchal Saxe, the natural brother of the king of Poland, elected sovereign of Courland, and possessed of a vigorous and restless imagination, to be destitute of ambition. He constantly entertained the notion that he would be a king. After losing the crown of Russia by his inconstancy in love, he formed, it is said, the project of assembling the Jews, and of being the sovereign of a nation which for 1700 years had neither possessed chief nor country. When this chimerical idea could not be realized, he cast his eyes upon the kingdom of Corsica. After failing in this project also, he was busily employed in planning a settlement in some part of America, particularly Brazil, when death surprised him.
He had been educated and died in the Lutheran religion. "It is a pity (said the queen of France, when she heard of his death) that we cannot say a single De profundis (prayer for the dead) for a man who has made us sing so many Te Deum!" All France lamented his death.
By his will, which is dated at Paris, March 1. 1748, he directed that his body should be buried in quicklime: "that nothing (says he) may remain of me in this world but the remembrance of me among my friends." These orders, however, were not complied with; for his body was embalmed, put into a leaden coffin, which was inclosed in another of copper, and this covered with one of wood, bound about with iron. His heart was put into a silver gilt box, and his entrails into another coffin. Louis XV. was at the charge of his funeral. By his order his corpse was interred with great pomp and splendor in the Lutheran church of St. Thomas, at Strasburgh, on the 8th February 1751.
The maréchal was a man of ordinary stature, of a robust constitution, and extraordinary strength. To
an aspect, noble, warlike, and mild, he joined the excellent qualities of the heart. Affable in his manners, and disposed to sympathize with the unfortunate, his generosity sometimes carried him beyond the limits of his fortune. On his death-bed he reviewed the errors of his life with remorse, and expressed much penitence.
The best edition of his Reveries was printed at Paris 1757, in 2 vols. 4to. It was compared with the greatest attention with the original manuscript in the king's library. It is accompanied with many designs exactly engraved, and a Life of the Author. The Life of maréchal Saxe was written by M. d'Espagnac, 2 vols. 12mo. This history is written in the panegyrical style. The author is, however, impartial enough to remark, that in the three battles upon which the reputation of maréchal Saxe is founded, he engaged in the most favourable circumstances. "Never did a general (says he) stand in a more advantageous situation. Honoured with the confidence of the king, he was not restrained in any of his projects. He always commanded a numerous army: his soldiers were steady, and his officers possessed great merit."