XXIII. 1787. ther oligarchies, of the Union, had been recently BOOK reinforced by a heterogeneous coalition with the zealous partisans of democracy, who equally wished for the total annihilation of the stadtholderian influence and authority. On the representation of the deputies of Haerlem, respecting the riotous disposition of the populace of the Hague, distinguished by their attachment to the stadtholder, the care of the military patrole of that place, vested in the prince of Orange, was transferred to those deputies by a formal resolution of the states of Holland. The prince, after warmly remonstrating against this insult, and vainly insisting upon his claim to the undivided command of the garrison of the Hague, withdrew himself from the seat of government (Sept. 14, 1785), and retired to his palace of Loo. The states of Holland, far from feeling disposed to recede from their resolution, solemnly voted the states and senates of the different provinces to be the undoubted sovereigns, and the stadtholder to be their servant: hence inferring, that the powers so exercised were only delegated, and that the state might resume them whenever it saw sufficient reason ;-concluding, that the entire command of the garrison should hereafter vest in the council committee of the states of Holland. At this period a letter was addressed to the States General by the king of Prussia, signed XXIII. 1787. BOOK at Berlin, September 17, 1785, strongly urging the interposition of their High Mightinesses, in order that the prince stadtholder might peaceably enjoy the rights and incontestable prerogatives appertaining to his dignity of hereditary stadtholder. This application produced not the least effect. The states of Holland, who, as became their superior importance, assumed the lead in the opposition to the stadtholder, ordered as if in contempt of this interference, the arms of the house of Orange to be taken out of the colors of the troops belonging to that province, and that the Swiss guards attendant on the person of the prince should be disbanded. The towns of Hattem and Elbourg, in the province of Guelderland, having manifested a peculiarly refractory and rebellious disposition, the states of Gueldres, in which assembly the Orange interest yet predominated, commissioned the stadtholder to employ military force for the reduction of the burghers. But the states of Holland, Zealand, Overyssel, and Groningen, joined in prohibiting the troops of their respective provinces from acting in this service. The towns in question were however attacked and captured by the prince; and Utrecht, which had deeply imbibed the same sentiments, was, in consequence of its resistance to the states of that province now as XXHL 1787. sembled at Amersfort, expected to be immediately вOOK invested. On this intelligence the states of Holland dispatched a letter to the prince, demanding of him, in twenty-four hours, an explicit declaration of his intentions. The troops of the province were at the same time ordered to march to the frontier for the protection of Utrecht, and a Gordon was formed from Naerden to Schoonhoven. And notwithstanding an explanation and apology from the prince, within the time prescribed, the states of Holland proceeded (Sep. 22, 1786) to the violent resolution of suspending him from his office of captain-general of the province, by a majority of sixteen out of nineteen voices, of which that assembly is composed. The prince of Orange on this occasion addressed a long and elaborate letter to the states of Holland. He had expressly said in his former remonstrance, relative to the garrison of the Hague, "We have not the most distant intention to question the superiority of your noble and great mightinesses over the military, as well of the whole province as the garrison of the Hague. Never (says he) could we suppose ourselves invested with a power equal, much less superior, to that of the States over the military, and that we might act according to our own pleasure, and independently of the sove REIGN." But he now ventured to assume an higher tone; and declaring "his office of hereditary cap XXIII. 1787. BOOK tain-general of Holland and West Friesland to have been secured to him by the unanimous vote of all the members of the state, he affirmed, that as the resolution by which the office had been conferred, passed nemine contradicente, it could not, supposing it to be revocable, be cancelled or even suspended without the like unanimity." This sudden haughtiness of language may, without hesitation, be attributed to an event of great moment, which had recently taken place in the death of Frederic the Great, king of Prussia (August 17, 1786), who was succeeded by his nephew Frederic William II. to whom the prince of Orange was nearly allied by marriage to his sister, the princess Wilhelmina of Prussia. The new monarch, feeling for the situation of his relatives, and eager to make a display of his power, entered with far more zeal into the inte rests of the prince than his illustrious predecessor, who during a reign of forty-six years had excited the admiration of Europe by the greatness of his talents and the splendor of his successes. He had raised Prussia from obscurity and insignificance to the rank of a first-rate power in Europe; and had left his successor in possession of a flourishing kingdom, an immense treasure, and an army of 200,000 men in the highest reputation for courage and discipline.* * The annexation of the rich and extensive province of Silesia, wrested from the house of Austria, to the dominion of XXIII. 1787. In a memorial presented by the count de Goertz, BOOK his Prussian majesty's ambassador extraordinary to the States General (Sept. 18, 1786), he expresses without reserve "the warm part which he takes in the unhappy dissensions subsisting between some of the provinces and the stadtholder, and the very extraordinary oppressions which that prince is innocently obliged to suffer-and urging that a durable termination may be put to these differences, in order that his serene highness the prince stadtholder may return with honor and propriety to the Hague, and resume his high employments→→→ insisting also upon the great interest he had, as the nearest neighbour of the United Provinces, that the government of the republic, conformably Brandenburg, of whose recent grandeur it may be regarded as the basis, was an event ever present to the mind of Frederic. It is said that this monarch being one day writing in his cabi net, and the prince royal, son of the reigning king, interrupting him by playing battledore and shuttlecock, the king, after a slight reproof, in order to prevent the inconvenience, took the shuttlecock and put it in his pocket. The boy at first endeavoured to recover possession of it by soft and soothing language; but finding his blandishments of no avail, he raised his voice, and, stamping upon the ground, exclaimed with passionate emphasis, "SIRE, donnez-moi une réponse categoriqueVoulez-vous me rendre, ou non, mon volant?"-The king, embracing him with astonishment and rapture, replied, “Ah, vrai rejetton du grand electeur, on ne t'arrachera jamais La SILESIE!" |