There can be little doubt that Louvois, by pursuing that course which had made him odious to the inmates of Saint Germains, had deserved well of his country.  He was not maddened by Jacobite enthusiasm.  He well knew that exiles are the worst of all advisers.  He had excellent information; he had excellent judgment; he calculated the chances; and he saw that a descent was likely to fail, and to fail disastrously and disgracefully.  James might well be impatient to try the experiment, though the odds should be ten to one against him.  He might gain; and he could not lose.  His folly and obstinacy had left him nothing to risk.  His food, his drink, his lodging, his clothes, he owed to charity.  Nothing could be more natural than that, for the very smallest chance of recovering the three kingdoms which he had thrown away, he should be willing to stake what was not his own, the honour of the French arms, the grandeur and the safety of the French monarchy.  To a French statesman such a wager might well appear in a different light.  But Louvois was gone.  His master yielded to the importunity of James, and determined to send an expedition against England.248

The scheme was, in some respects, well concerted.  It was resolved that a camp should be formed on the coast of Normandy, and that in this camp all the Irish regiments which were in the French service should be assembled under their countryman Sarsfield.  With them were to be joined about ten thousand French troops.  The whole army was to be commanded by Marshal Bellefonds.

A noble fleet of about eighty ships of the line was to convoy this force to the shores of England.  In the dockyards both of Brittany and of Provence immense preparations were made.  Four and forty men of war, some of which were among the finest that had ever been built, were assembled in the harbour of Brest under Tourville.  The Count of Estrees, with thirty-five more, was to sail from Toulon.  Ushant was fixed for the place of rendezvous.  The very day was named.  In order that there might be no want either of seamen or of vessels for the intended expedition, all maritime trade, all privateering was, for a time, interdicted by a royal mandate.249 Three hundred transports were collected near the spot where the troops were to embark.  It was hoped that all would be ready early in the spring, before the English ships were half rigged or half manned, and before a single Dutch man of war was in the Channel.250

James had indeed persuaded himself that, even if the English fleet should fall in with him, it would not oppose him.  He imagined that he was personally a favourite with the mariners of all ranks.  His emissaries had been busy among the naval officers, and had found some who remembered him with kindness, and others who were out of humour with the men now in power.  All the wild talk of a class of people not distinguished by taciturnity or discretion was reported to him with exaggeration, till he was deluded