William was sitting there, so deeply sunk in melancholy that he did not seem to perceive that any person had entered the room.  The Lord Keeper, after a respectful pause, broke silence, and, doubtless with all that cautious delicacy which was characteristic of him, and which eminently qualified him to touch the sore places of the mind without hurting them, implored His Majesty to be reconciled to the Princess.  “Do what you will,” said William; “I can think of no business.”  Thus authorised, the mediators speedily concluded a treaty.587 Anne came to Kensington, and was graciously received; she was lodged in Saint James’s Palace; a guard of honour was again placed at her door; and the Gazettes again, after a long interval, announced that foreign ministers had had the honour of being presented to her.588 The Churchills were again permitted to dwell under the royal roof.  But William did not at first include them in the peace which he had made with their mistress.  Marlborough remained excluded from military and political employment; and it was not without much difficulty that he was admitted into the circle at Kensington, and permitted to kiss the royal hand.589 The feeling with which he was regarded by the King explains why Anne was not appointed Regent.  The Regency of Anne would have been the Regency of Marlborough; and it is not strange that a man whom it was not thought safe to entrust with any office in the State or the army should not have been entrusted with the whole government of the kingdom.

Had Marlborough been of a proud and vindictive nature he might have been provoked into raising another quarrel in the royal family, and into forming new cabals in the army.  But all his passions, except ambition and avarice, were under strict regulation.  He was destitute alike of the sentiment of gratitude and of the sentiment of revenge.  He had conspired against the government while it was loading him with favours.  He now supported it, though it requited his support with contumely.  He perfectly understood his own interest; he had perfect command of his temper; he endured decorously the hardships of his present situation, and contented himself by looking forward to a reversion which would amply repay him for a few years of patience.  He did not indeed cease to correspond with the Court of Saint Germains; but the correspondence gradually became more and more slack, and seems, on his part, to have been made up of vague professions and trifling excuses.

The event which had changed all Marlborough’s views had filled the minds of fiercer and more pertinacious politicians with wild hopes and atrocious projects.