HOUSE OF ORANGE.] HOLLAND 81 From 1668 to 1672 Louis XIV. made ready to destroy the Dutch ; and so well had his diplomacy served him that they were left without a friend in Europe. In 1672 the storm broke : the English, without a declaration of war, tried unsuccessfully to intercept the Dutch Mediterranean fleet ; and France at once set forth to conquer the hated tradesmen of the north. The States were ill-prepared on land, though their fleet was strong and ready ; party spirit was exceedingly bitter, and the ruling party, well aware that the prince of Orange was very popular with the land forces, had utterly neglected their army. On May 28, 1672, Ruyter fought a great naval battle in Southwold Bay (Solebay) against the duke of York and Marshal D Estr6es: the French held aloof, pleased to see the Dutch and English destroy each other ; the English suffered most, but, as the Dutch withdrew to their own ports, the others claimed the victory. Meanwhile Louis XIV. crossed the Rhine and threatened Amsterdam (see FRANCE). The young prince of Orange alone seemed to rise to the occasion; while others were panic-stricken, sending em bassies of submission to the haughty monarch, making pre parations for a great flight by sea, William with his miser able army did his best, and aroused so strongly the feelings of the people that Amsterdam, passing from dejection to despair and thence to reckless enthusiasm, rose against the De Witts and foully murdered both in the streets. They had just before proclaimed William stadtholder of Holland with powers unlimited. And thus Louis XIV. destroyed the proud republic, though in so doing he had raised up the most formidable enemy he was destined to encounter. His invasion did not prosper ; other nations began to take up the Dutch cause; Germans and Spaniards threatened the embarrassed French army in the Provinces ; so that in 1674 France was on the defensive on every side. William of Orange in that year was defeated at Senef, and had to abandon his plan of penetrating into France, and in 1675 the death of Marshal Turenne, and the retirement of the great Conde, turned the tide of war in favour of the Dutch, except on the sea, where the French fleet defeated and destroyed in the Mediterranean (in 1676) the united navies of Holland and Spain. In 1677 negotia tions for peace went on, and were hastened by the marriage, at the close of the year, of William of Orange with the Princess Mary, daughter of the duke of York. At last, in 1678, came the great peace of Nimeguen, which secured the independence of the Dutch. The aggressive policy of Louis XIV., in the years which followed the peace of Nimeguen, enabled William to lay the basis of the famous confederacy which changed the whole front of European politics. Brandenburg, Denmark, and England sided with the French king; while the league of Augsburg (1686), following directly after the revocation of the edict of Nantes, placed William at the head of the resistance to French domination. The league was joined by the emperor, Spain, the United Provinces, Sweden, Bavaria, and other German princes. The acces sion of James II. to the throne of England made it easy for the stadtholder to keep up close relations with the malcontents in church and state, who regarded him and the Princess Mary as the natural successors to the English throne. On the birth of the prince of Wales the anti- Catholic feeling in England at last grew so strong that William was able to interfere with success ; while the diversion of the attention of Louis XIV. from Holland to the Rhine relieved the timid rulers of Amsterdam from all anxiety. The Revolution of 1688 ensued, and England became, under William s strong rule, the chief member of the great coalition against France. In the grand alliance of 1689-90 he clearly sacrificed Dutch to English in terests, and carried through his policy in spite of great irritation in Holland and Zealand. His power seemed almost autocratic, and the States impotent. Henceforward their part in history becomes quite secondary compared with that of England, and we may refer for details of the great wars to the articles ENGLAND and FRANCE. In 1690 Waldeck, commanding the Dutch, was defeated Holland by Luxembourg at Fleurus ; and the Anglo-Dutch fleet at war was also severely handled off Beachy Head by the p^nce French, who inflicted terrible losses on Dutch commerce. In 1691 the French took Mons ; in 1692 the allied ships ruined Tourville s fleet off La Hogue, and recovered the command of the sea. On land the allies fared ill : Louis took Namur, and after a hard-fought battle Wil liam was defeated at Steenkirk ; in 1693 the Dutch shared in the defeat of Neerwinden, and were not fortunate even on the sea. In 1695 the tide of affairs had turned, and William retook Namur, his greatest triumph after the battle of the Boyne. Negotiations for peace, first attempted in 1694, led to the peace of Ryswick in 1697, in which Peace oi William was recognized by France as king of England, the Ry*wick ! Dutch obtaining a favourable commercial treaty, and the ! right to garrison the Netherland barrier-towns. Holland I was still an important factor in the balancing system rendered necessary by the ambition of France. Louis XIV., however, held himself little bound by the peace. In 1701 he elbowed the Dutch troops out of the barrier- towns ; he defied England by recognizing James III. on the death of his father ; and it was clear to all that another war was imminent, when William III. died in 1702. He had been made hereditary stadtholder in five of the Provinces in 1672 ; but as he left no children as heirs, the old opposition of Holland to his house again sprang up, and, led by the grand pensionary Heinsius, Amsterdam successfully asserted her independence, and ruled through out the coming struggle against Fra~nce with energy and credit. When war was declared in 1702, Maryborough was named The tri- commander-in-chief of English and Dutch troops, an thenceforward became the chief man in the famous " trium- virate" of Marlborough, Heinsius, and Prince Eugene. In 1703 the Dutch invaded Flanders, and fought the drawn battle of Eckeren ; in 1704 they and the English took Gibraltar ; in the same year they took part in the great battle of Blenheim. In 1705 Marlborough led them into the Netherlands ; but, hampered by the deputies of the States, he achieved little. In 1706 he won the battle of Ramillies, and swept the French out of the Netherlands ; in 1708 came Oudenarde, and after it an unsuccessful attempt of Louis XIV. to detach the Dutch from the alliance; in 1709 the terrible battle of Malplaquet and the capture of Mons. After this great changes followed in England, and Maryborough s power came to an end. Negotiations for peace, often tried before, drew towards success in 1712, and in 1713 the peace of Utrecht was Peace oi signed. While France received Aire, St Venant, Bethune, Utrecht, and Douay, the Spanish Netherlands were formally handed over to the United Provinces, which in their turn passed them on, after conclusion of a barrier treaty, to Austria; henceforth they are known as the Austrian Netherlands. A favourable commercial treaty was also made between the Dutch and France. The peace of Utrecht made the re public almost as powerful on shore as she had been by sea ; at the same time it taught her that the great powers around her would use her resources for war, and abandon her when they wanted peace : she therefore determined hence forth to stand clear of all foreign complications. With 1713 the importance of Holland in European politics comes almost to an end. The ruling party in the States took an active part in securing George I. on the throne of England ; and on
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