protection, and into the public pay. This was undoubtedly a mortification, but was foon fucceeded by others much greater, and of a nature not a little alarming. For the ftates general iffued an order to general Van Reyffel, who commanded the troops of Holland, to break up the cordon or line which they formed on the frontiers of Utrecht, under pain to him and them, of inftant difmiffion from the fervice. The ftates of Holland immediately iffued counter orders, charging Van Reyffel and his officers, under the fame penalty, to preferve their ftation, Both parties now seemed difpofed to carry this civil hoftility to its ut most extreme; for while the ftates general fufpended Van Reyffel from the command of the army, the ftates of Holland voted him full fupport, protection, and the most complete indemnity from all confequences.

These measures were followed by another very important event. It was no less than a revolt of a great majority of the troops of Holland from the orders and jurifdiction of their masters the states of that province.

We have before had occafion to observe, that the army in general held difpofitions very favourable to the interests of the prince of Orange. This had been lately confirmed, with respect to the officers, by their refufal, at the rifque of their commiffions, to comply with the propofed teft. The difpofition of the private men remained, however, ftill doubtful; and, whatever it might be, required the operation of fome active agent, to excite its visible exertion ; at the fame time, that the late augmentation of their pay by the ftates, a measure fo uni

verfally powerful in its effect upon foldiers, feemed to preclude all hope of fuccefs in such an experi

ment.

June 10th,

1787.

Colonel Balneavis (of a noble family in Scotland) had been among the firit of thofe officers who refufed to obey the orders of the ftates, and had accordingly retired from his regiment; but now, confiding probably in the affection of his men, he returned to them at Oudewater, and not only induced them, but a battalion of another regiment who were ftationed along with them in that fortress, to march off with their artillery, and to join the ftadtholder. This fpirited and dangerous adventure ferved as a general figpal of revolt, and the example feemed inftantly to infect the whole line, fo that in lefs than a week the cordon was broken up, the frontiers of Holland left defenceless, and about two thirds of their troops were gone over to the stadtholder.

The alarm and confufion which this mifadventure occafioned, in fuch a feafon and ftate of things, when the pride and affected fuperiority of Holland had not only dif gufted, but nearly excited a general confederacy against her, will be eafily conceived. The volunteers and armed burghers were now the only refuge, and they were immediately called out to fupply the place of the troops, and to take up arms in the defence of their country. The states allowed them pay and maintenance; and, as a last resort, in a case of such imminent danger, they appointed a commiflion of defence, being a kind of field or military deputies, who were to be stationed at Woerden, and to act in concert with general

Van Reyffel, in all fuch measures as tended to the public defence, and particularly in retaining, if poffible, the remainder of their troops from defertion. The city of Amfterdam, in the mean time, fent a detachment of armed burghers to fecure the fluices at Muyden; and fimilar means were used at Harlem.

The ftates of Holland, notwithftanding these misfortunes, found it fo difficult to recede, in any degree, from their ufual haughtinefs, and were fo much irritated against the ftates general, that it was propofed, and eagerly debated in their affembly, that the deputies of the four provinces of Zealand, Friefland, Utrecht, and Guelderland, fhould be commanded to depart from their refidence at the Hague. The more moderate part, however, confidered that this would be fo glaring and unexampled a violation of the union, and in all refpects fo defperate a measure, that they prevented its being adopted; though it feemed that the question was rather laid by for the prefent, than

that the propofal was abfolutely rea jected.

An expedient was, however, reforted to as a substitute (and in fome measure a lefs violent one) than the expulfion of a majority of the ftates general from the Hague. This was to engage their dependent allies, the government of Utrecht, who had long refused any obedience to the provincial states at Amersfort, and treated them upon every occafion with the utmost contempt, to proceed to the laft extremity of depofing, fo far as they could, that affembly, by declaring it illegal, and incapable of its functions, and electing a new set of states from among themselves, who were to be confidered as the representative of the whole province.

But an extraordinary and unforefeen event was now to take place, which was totally to change the nature of thefe contefts, to introduce new actors upon the ftage, and nearly to abforb in its magnitude, even the remembrance of these petty violences and hoftilities.

CHAP.

N

TOTHING could afford a more ftriking inftance how much the iffue of the greatest and most fyftematically conducted affairs of ftate depend on unforeseen events, often collateral to the cause in queftion, than was exhibited by the arreft of the princefs of Orange at Schoonhoven. After the whole train is regularly laid, and political defigns are ripening by mature degrees, it frequently happens, that refolutions are to be taken on the fpur of the occafion, which are decifive of failure or fuccefs, but which admit of little or no deliberation. Thus it was in the affairs of Holland.

It must have been evident to every cool obferver, however li. mited in his political views, that nothing could be more dangerous to the republic than the affording an opening to any foreign power for an hoftile interference in their domeftic feuds, under the colour of a perfonal or family infult. And of all the princes in Europe it was equally evident, that the king of Pruffia, from his near neighbour hood, clofe affinity with the ftadtholder, and, perhaps above all, from the promptnefs in the execution of the greatest measures which has fo long diftinguished that court, fhould have been looked to with the moft guarded caution, in order to prevent the poffibility of any pre-, tence, diftinct from the fubject, for fuch interference.

For the king of Pruffia would have otherwife found it very diffi

cult, in the prefent pofture of affairs, and unlets much more dećifive and dangerous meafures were purfued against the ftadtholder and his family, to colour a violent invasion of the territories of the republic with thofe plaufible pretexts, which the prefent fyltem of policy and conduct adopted by the ftates of Europe has rendered, at least in a confiderable degree, neceffary. But all this difficulty was removed by themselves, through the infult offered to the princefs his fifter; and thereby, a foreign quarrel being involved in their domeftic diffenfions, the fwords that were drawn under pretence of obtaining fatiffaction for the affront, were foon directed to model the state and government.

On the other hand, it is not to be denied, that if the intentions of the princess had not been as pure as her known character affures us they were, the admiffion of fuch a perfon into the very center of their operations, could not but be fatal to the defigns of the republican party. The activity and energy of her difpofition, her acknowledged ability, the affection the provinces bore to her person, and more especially the difficulties her fex would have oppofed on the reftraint which prudence might require, made her an object of fome apprehenfion. The very respect which is attached to the character of mediator is capable of being perverted to finifter purposes. And the peculiar circumftance of a prin

cefs,

cefs, allied to one of the greatest royal houses, after being reduced to fly from her country, nobly rufhing back again into the fcenes of war and tumult, and committing herself to the mercy of hostile factions, that the might plead the cause of her husband and her children; this was a fpectacle not rafhly to be indulged to a people yet in the ferment of a recent revolution, and before the fpirit was properly affimilated to a new government. Men embarked in civil contentions are naturally fufpicious; and the great and critical intereft, in which all is at ftake, cannot liften to thofe perfonal refpects, and bow to the confiderations which regulate the concerns of ordinary times. It may be added too, with fome appearance of probability, that the king of Pruffia would not have engaged in the Dutch affairs at all, if his interference had not coincided with his condition and the plan of his politics; and that, if circumftances had made it neceffary for him to acquiefce in fuch open attacks on the rights of a perfon fo nearly allied to him as the ftadtholder, he would not be moved by a meafure which fome people would call a perfonal unprovoked indignity, but others might conftrue an act of juftifiable rigour, and of political neceffity: fo. that, in cafting up the account, we may find rather the occafion than the cause of the king of Pruffia's irruption into Holland, in the event, the particulars of which we going to relate.

are

The princefs of Orange, whether from a confidence founded in a fenfe of her abilities, or on the influence which the expected might be derived from her sex, dignity, and family, adopted the refolution of pro

ceeding, unaccompanied by the prince her husband, from Nimeguen to the Hague; intending, undoubtedly, to have entered into a perfonal negociation with the leaders of the adverse party, and at the fame time to manage the interests of the stadtholder with the ftates general, the council of ftate, and other great bodies of the government.

Whatever the fecret motives might be, thofe avowed by the princefs were, that he was on her way to the Houfe in the Wood, (a palace belonging to the house of Orange, known by that name, and adjoining to the Hague) in order to communicate to Mr. Van Bleiswick, the grand penfionary, to their noble mightineffes the ftates of Holland, and to their high mightineffes the ftates general, fuch conciliatory propofitions, in the name of the prince her husband, (who could not in the prefent fituation of affairs attend in perfon) as would, if it were yet poffible, prevent the evils and horrors of a civil war, which at prefent hung fo heavily over the republic.

On the other hand, the adverfe party reprefented this mysterious journey as a measure fraught with the greatest dangers. They faid, that in order to facilitate the ftadtholder's open operations against them in the field, the princefs had come into Holland with a view of exciting infurrection and rebellion among the people, and of throwing every thing into confufion at home. That the debauching the troops of the ftate, and procuring a farther desertion of them from their masters, was probably another object of the journey. And, as it was neceffary to inflame as much as poffible the minds of the more vulgar and ig

norant