The emperor was fully aware of the attachment of his daughter to Francis, of her inflexible character; and even when pretending to negotiate for her marriage with Carlos, he was conscious that it was all a mere pretense, and that the union could never be effected.  The British minister at Vienna saw very clearly the true state of affairs, and when the emperor was endeavoring to intimidate England by the menace that he would unite the crowns of Spain and Austria by uniting Maria and Carlos, the minister wrote to his home government as follows: 

“Maria Theresa is a princess of the highest spirit; her father’s losses are her own.  She reasons already; she enters into affairs; she admires his virtues, but condemns his mismanagement; and is of a temper so formed for rule and ambition, as to look upon him as little more than her administrator.  Notwithstanding this lofty humor by day, she sighs and pines all night for her Duke of Lorraine.  If she sleeps, it is only to dream of him; if she wakes, it is but to talk of him to the lady in waiting; so that there is no more probability of her forgetting the very individual government, and the very individual husband which she thinks herself born to, than of her forgiving the authors of her losing either.”

The empress was cordially cooeperating with her daughter.  The emperor was in a state of utter distraction.  His affairs were fast going to ruin; he was harassed by counter intreaties; he knew not which way to turn, or what to do.  Insupportable gloom oppressed his spirit.  Pale and haggard, he wandered through the rooms of his palace, the image of woe.  At night he tossed sleepless upon his bed, moaning in anguish which he then did not attempt to conceal, and giving free utterance to all the mental tortures which were goading him to madness.  The queen became seriously alarmed lest his reason should break down beneath such a weight of woe.  It was clear that neither reason nor life could long withstand such a struggle.

Thus in despair, the emperor made proposals for a secret and separate accommodation with France.  Louis XV. promptly listened, and offered terms, appallingly definite, and cruel enough to extort the last drop of blood from the emperor’s sinking heart.  “Give me,” said the French king, “the duchy of Lorraine, and I will withdraw my armies, and leave Austria to make the best terms she can with Spain.”

How could the emperor wrest from his prospective son-in-law his magnificent ancestral inheritance?  The duke could not hold his realms for an hour against the armies of France, should the emperor consent to their surrender; and conscious of the desperation to which the emperor was driven, and of his helplessness, he was himself plunged into the deepest dismay and anguish.  He held an interview with the British minister to see if it were not possible that England might interpose her aid in his behalf.  In frantic grief he lost his self control, and, throwing himself into a chair, pressed his brow convulsively, and exclaimed, “Great God! will not England help me?  Has not his majesty with his own lips, over and over again, promised to stand by me?”