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CHAPTER XLVI.

General desire for peace-Political aspect of Europe - Designs of the kings of England, France, and Spain concerning the United Provinces - Matrimonial schemes of Spain - Conference between the French ministers and the Dutch envoy-Confidential revelations - Henry's desire to annex the Netherlands to France - Discussion of the subject - Artifice of Barneveld - Impracticability of a compromise between the Provinces and Spain Formation of a West India Company-Secret mission from the archdukes to the Hague-Reply of the of the archdukes' envoy - Arrangement of an eight months' armistice.

THE general tendency towards a pacification in Europe at the close of the year could hardly be mistaken. The languor of fatigue, rather than any sincere desire for peace seemed to make negotiations possible. It was not likely that great truths would yet be admitted, or that ruling individuals or classes would recognise the rise of a new system out of the rapidly dissolving elements of the one which had done its work. War was becoming more and more expensive, while commerce, as the world slowly expanded itself, and manifested its unsuspected resources, was becoming more and more lucrative. It was not, perhaps, that men hated each other less, but that they had for a time exhausted their power and their love for slaughter. Meanwhile new devices for injuring humanity and retarding its civilization were revealing themselves out of that very intellectual progress which ennobled the new era. Although war might still be regarded as the normal condition of the civilized world, it was possible for the chosen ones to whom the earth and its fulness belonged, to inflict general damage otherwise than by perpetual battles.

In the east, west, north, and south of Europe peace was thrusting itself as it were uncalled for and unexpected upon the general attention. Charles and his nephew Sigismund,

and the false Demetrius, and the intrigues of the Jesuits, had provided too much work for Sweden, Poland, and Russia to leave those countries much leisure for mingling in the more important business of Europe at this epoch, nor have their affairs much direct connection with this history. Venice, in its quarrels with the Jesuits, had brought Spain, France, and all Italy into a dead lock, out of which a compromise had been made not more satisfactory to the various parties than compromises are apt to prove. The Dutch republic still maintained the position which it had assumed, a quarter of a century before, of actual and legal independence; while Spain, on the other hand, still striving after universal monarchy, had not, of course, abated one jot of its pretensions to absolute dominion over its rebellious subjects in the Netherlands.

The holy Roman and the sublime Ottoman empires had also drifted into temporary peace; the exploits of the Persians and other Asiatic movements having given Ahmed more work than was convenient on his eastern frontier, while Stephen Botshkay had so completely got the better of Rudolph in Transylvania as to make repose desirable. So there was a treaty between the great Turk and the great Christian on the basis of what each possessed; Stephen Botshkay was recognized as prince of Transylvania with part of Hungary, and, when taken off soon afterwards by family poison, he recommended on his death-bed the closest union between Hungary and Transylvania, as well as peace with the emperor, so long as it might be compatible with the rights of the Magyars.1

France and England, while suspecting each other, dreading each other, and very sincerely hating each other, were drawn into intimate relations by their common detestation of Spain, with which power both had now formal treaties of alliance and friendship. This was the result of their mighty projects for humbling the house of Austria and annihilating its power. England hated the Netherlands because of the injuries she

1 Grotius, xv. 712, 713. Meteren, 543.

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had done them, the many benefits she had conferred upon them, and more than all on account of the daily increasing commercial rivalry between the two most progressive states in Christendom, the two powers which, comparatively weak as they were in territory, capital, and population, were most in harmony with the spirit of the age.

The Government of England was more hostile than its people to the United Provinces. James never spoke of the Netherlanders but as upstarts and rebels, whose success ought to be looked upon with horror by the Lord's anointed everywhere. He could not shut his eyes to the fact that, with the republic destroyed, and a Spanish sacerdotal despotism established in Holland and Zeeland, with Jesuit seminaries in full bloom in Amsterdam and the Hague, his own rebels in Ireland might prove more troublesome than ever, and gunpowder plots in London become common occurrences. The Earl of Tyrone at that very moment was receiving enthusiastic hospitality at the archduke's court, much to the disgust of the presbyterian sovereign of the United Kingdom, who nevertheless, despite his cherished theology, was possessed with an unconquerable craving for a close family alliance with the most Catholic king. His ministers were inclined to Spain, and the British Government was at heart favourable to some kind of arrangement by which the Netherlands might be reduced to the authority of their former master, in case no scheme could be carried into effect for acquiring a virtual sovereignty over those provinces by the British crown. Moreover, and most of all, the King of France being supposed to contemplate the annexation of the Netherlands to his own dominions, the jealousy excited by such ambition made it even possible for James's Government to tolerate the idea of Dutch independence. Thus the court and cabinet of England were as full of contradictory hopes and projects as a madman's brain.

The rivalry between the courts of England and France for the Spanish marriages, and by means of them to obtain ultimately the sovereignty of all the Netherlands, was the key

THE UNITED NETHERLANDS.

CHAP. XLVI.

to most of the diplomacy and interpalatial intrigue of the several first years of the century. The negotiations of Cornwallis at Madrid were almost simultaneous with the schemes of Villeroy and Rosny at Paris.

A portion of the English Government, so soon as its treaty with Spain had been signed, seemed secretly determined to do as much injury to the republic as might lie in its power. While at heart convinced that the preservation of the Netherlands was necessary for England's safety, it was difficult for James and the greater part of his advisers to overcome their repugnance to the republic, and their jealousy of the great commercial successes which the republic had achieved.2

It was perfectly plain that a continuance of the war by England and the Netherlands united would have very soon ended in the entire humiliation of Spain. Now that peace

2 "For my own particular," wrote Cornwallis, "though I hold the preservation of the Low Countries most wholesome and necessary for the kingdom of Great Britain, yet dare I not wish their strength and wealth much increased; it being better to endure an advantage in a monarchy than in a people of their condition."-Memorials of affairs of State, from the Papers of Sir Ralph Winwood. London, 1725. Vol. II. p. 76.

"Though we must respect the Hollanders," wrote the Earl of Northampton" (for such reasons as need no dilatation to a man of your capacity), yet we resolve to mark our favours that they be without exception to Spain."-Ibid. pp. 92, 93.

3 "The King" (of Spain) wrote Cornwallis, "being now freed from the distractions he was wont to find by the encounters of the English, proceeds against the Hollanders with more life and hope. If this peace had not been concluded, in mine own understanding I see not how it had been possible for him to have borne out the infinite weight of charges and business laid upon him." And again, "England never lost such an opportunity of winning honour and wealth as by relinquishing the war with Spain. The

3

king and kingdom were reduced to such estate as they could not in all likelihood have endured the space of two years more; his own treasury was exhausted, his rents and customs susigned for the most part for money borrowed, his nobility poor and much indebted, his merchants wasted, his people of the country in all extremity of necessity, his devices of gaining by the increase of the valuation of money and other such of that nature all played over; his credit in borrowing, by means of the incertainty of his estate during the war with England, much decayed; the subjects of his many distracted dominions held in obedience by force and fear, not by and in that regard with this people in love and duty. Himself very young, suffering himself to be wholly governed no great veneration, and the less for by a man (viz. Duke of Lerma) generally hated of his own country. If this state, standing on such feeble foundations, had made but one such stumble as his father did in the time of the late queen, hardly could he have recovered without a fall; his nearest and last-gained kingdoms more hurting this nation than any other, desiring nothing more than the ruin of it."-Ibid. 72, 75, 76.

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had been made, however, it was thought possible that England might make a bargain with her late enemy for destroying the existence and dividing the territory of her late ally. Accordingly the Spanish cabinet lost no time in propounding, under seal of secrecy, and with even more mystery than was usually employed by the most Catholic court, a scheme for the marriage of the Prince of Wales with the Infanta, the bridal pair, when arrived at proper age, to be endowed with all the Netherlands, both obedient and republican, in full sovereignty. One thing was necessary to the carrying out of this excellent plot, the reduction of the republic into her ancient subjection to Spain before her territory could be transferred to the future Princess of Wales.1

It was proposed by the Spanish Government that England should undertake this part of the job, and that King James for such service should receive an annual pension of one million ducats a year. It was also stipulated that certain cities in the republican dominions should be pledged to him as security for the regular payment of that stipend." Sir Charles Cornwallis, English ambassador in Spain, lent a most favourable ear to these proposals, and James eagerly sanctioned them so soon as they were secretly imparted to that monarch. "The king here," said Cornwallis, "hath need of the King of Great Britain's arm. Our king. . . . hath good occasion to use the help of the King of Spain's purse. The assistance of England to help this nation out of that quicksand of the Low Countries, where so long they have struggled to tread themselves out, and by proof find that they sink deeper in, will be a sovereign medicine to the malady of this estate. The addition of a million of ducats to the revenue of our sovereign will be a good help to his estate."

6

The Spanish Government had even the effrontery to offer

4 The important facts connected with this intrigue-except such as, being too delicate to be committed to paper, were entrusted to confidential agentsmay be found in Winwood's Memo

rials, vol. ii. pp. 160-177. Compare Van Deventer, iii. 74.

5 See in particular Winwood, ii. 160, 161.

6 Ibid. 177.