Page:Cambridge Modern History Volume 1.djvu/481

 Utrecht; in Holland the leaders of the government set up at Hoorn by the Hoeks were put to death by the Kabeljaauws and the town pillaged; and Haarlem only escaped similar treatment by payment of an onerous fine. In the midst of this confusion, Maximilian had to allow the States of the Netherlands, assembled at Alost with the exception of Luxemburg and Gelders, to open a formal negotiation with Louis XI (November), with whom they had been for some time in secret communication. Nor was he able to refuse his assent to the basis on which, in December, 1482, the Peace of Arras was actually concluded, viz. the marriage of his daughter Margaret to the Dauphin, with Artois and Burgundy for her dowry. It was further settled by this peace that Philip should do homage to Louis for Flanders, so that the old relation of vassalage against which Charles the Bold and his father had so long struggled was restored, and a pretext for fresh intervention established. But the Flemish communes, satisfied with the restoration of free commercial intercourse with France, would probably have been prepared to sacrifice Namur and Hainault into the bargain, and Louis, now near his end, seemed to have lived long enough to master the House of Burgundy. Maximilian, who had been left out of the Council of four, appointed, with Ravenstein at its head, to carry on the government of Flanders with the Estates on behalf of Philip, was powerless, and unable to obtain the annual pension granted to him about this time except by compliance. In March, 1483, he finally accepted the Peace of Arras, and without any interposition on his part, his daughter was transferred into the guardianship of the French King, and on June 23 solemnly betrothed to the Dauphin.

Soon after this Maximilian was able to strengthen his personal position by a successful intervention against the Hoek revolt at Utrecht. On returning to his capital Bishop David had been brutally insulted and imprisoned at Amersfoort, and Engelbert of Cleves had been set up in his place. At the head of a force of 12000 men, commanded by a staff of celebrated captains, the Archduke laid siege to Utrecht, which capitulated in September and was condemned to pay a heavy fine. Bishop David once more held his entry into the prostrate city as the spiritual ruler of his see (he died peacefully as such at Wyk in 1496); but Maximilian was acknowledged as the administrator of its temporalities. It was in the course of this successful campaign that he received the news of the death of Louis XI. Though this event could hardly lead to the undoing of the Peace of Arras, it could not but reassure him as to the future relations between France and the Flemings, for he was not aware how much of her father's spirit survived in Anne de Beaujeu, under whose control the government of Charles VIII was carried on during the first eight years of his reign. He now declared the powers of the Council of Flanders to have determined, and a storm of protests and charges ensued, in the course of which the Flemings