Page:English Historical Review Volume 35.djvu/548

 540 DUTCH MISSIONS TO ENGLAND IN 1689 October extraordinary, at least once by Odijk alone,* and sometimes by a third personage, the envoy extraordinary, Jacob Hop.^ For another addition was made to the multitude of coimsellors a few days before the great mission finished its work. Hop, the honorary pensionary of the Amsterdam municipality, was another diplomatist whom William, as often as the jealous city would allow it, loved to employ. He had concluded in the spring at Vienna the treaty between the states general and the emperor, which formed, along with the British alliance, the second great comer-stone of William's policy. For the work of connecting the two parts of the structure William had him, too, sent to England with a diplomatic standing, and, once he got there, employed him not only for the special work of dovetailing together the alliance but, characteristically disregarding the ' usual channels ' and the established division of functions, for a good many things that fell normally in the sphere of Arnaut van Citters, the resident minister, who by this time must have been well accustomed to such a loss of importance.^ When William went to Ireland in the following year, it was Hop and not Citters who went with him to represent the Dutch republic, the only power that had a representative on the campaign ; * it was only when William crossed at last to Holland in 1690-1 that Hop returned, and again in the same year, at William's request, he was appointed envoy extraordinary with the special task of dealing with maritime affairs and the affairs of the north.* The appointment this time was made too late to take effect, because the king arrived in Holland before the minister set sail, but when William once again went back for the winter, Hop went with him as envoy extraordinary charged with maritime affairs.* Thus from the beginning of the reign till the spring of 1692 it was the usual state of things for the Dutch to be at least doubly represented at William's court, by a more and a less trusted diplomatist. All these factors helped to create confusion, friction, and dissatisfaction among the statesmen who belonged to the less trusted class. Witsen concludes his last account of his excursion into splendour by some disparaging remarks about courts and by » State Papers, Domestic, 1689-90, pp. 226-7. ' State Papers, Foreign, Foreign Ministers 21 (Record Office). • See N. J. den Tex, Jacob Hop, gezant der Vereenigde Nederlanden (Utrecht, 1861), Hop's life in Nieuw Ned. Biogr. Woordenb. iii, his Verbaal, containing copies of dis- patches and enclosures (Leg. 812-13, The Hague), letters to the Amsterdam burgo- masters (Arch. Burg. Diplom. Miss. S. 11, 6*"% 7, 8, Amsterdam), and letters to Hcinsius (Papers of Heinsius, I a. The Hague). For his appointment to London, see Res. Stat. Gen., 9/19 September 1689. • Bes. Stat. Oen., 17/27 Februarj' 1690. • Ibid. 20/30 April 1691. • Ibid. 9/19 October 1691.