The Story of Nations - Holland/Chapter 36

Perhaps, if the life of William IV. had been prolonged, mischievously subject as Holland became to British policy during the war which was concluded by the Peace of Aix-la-Chapelle in 1748, the country, though it would have necessarily fallen far behind its ancient vigour and reputation, might have to a large extent recovered. William IV., though a very ordinary person, and invested with powers which he speedily extended, such as those of chief director and governor of the East and West India Companies, was sincerely anxious to promote or restore the prosperity of his country, and had at least the wisdom to know that the show of arbitrary power was more dangerous than the possession of it. Nor was William, raised to office at the conclusion of one war, anxious to consolidate his authority by sacrificing the interests of Holland and provoking another war. Hence the memory of William IV, is respected in Holland to a degree which neither the length of his reign, nor the capacity which he exhibited at all justify. He died in 1751, at the age of forty, after he had held his office, now made hereditary, for only four years. He left an only son, afterwards William V., then only three years old, and a daughter. His widow, Anne of England, became regent under the title of Governess, and the Duke of Brunswick was continued as commander-in-chief, an office conferred on him by William IV. when his own health was breaking. Perhaps the misfortunes and miseries of the next epoch have been a benefit to the memory of William IV.

Of course, Anne of England, the Governess, during the time that she lived and had the management of affairs, did her very, best to make the hereditary stadtholderate an irrevocable situation, and, indeed, the Dutch, once high-spirited and jealous of their liberties, seem to have vied with nations, in which servility is a tradition, in fulsome adulation of the house of Orange and the young prince. One of her projects, in which she succeeded after some opposition, was to make the councils in the towns the nominees of the Orange party. She died in January, 1759, when her son was eleven years old, and at the time of her death was deservedly distrusted 'and disliked. The cause of this feeling was the incessant attacks she made on what remained of the Dutch constitution, and her obvious sacrifice of Dutch to English interests during the Seven Years' War.

The object of this war was to determine which of the two countries, France or Great Britain, should succeed in obtaining a sole market in the Eastern and Western Worlds. The contest, in brief, was for North America and India, and for some time the issue was doubtful. Now it was of no consequence whatever to Holland which side should win in the struggle, if indeed the success of either country boded any good to Dutch trade. The English envoy, Yorke, claimed a subsidy from the Dutch, and the French envoy, D'Affry, was equally positive that, according to the faith of treaties, Holland was bound to assist the French. The Governess, of course, was on the side of the English envoy. But she could not induce the States to take part in the war. All she could do was to leave Holland in as defenceless a state as possible, and to connive at the enormous injuries which British privateers inflicted on Dutch shipping.

One of the objects which the advocates of the sole-market theory had, was to destroy the commerce of their rivals. Now the English Government, which was rapidly becoming the principal, if not the only, maritime power of Europe, resolved to stop all trade with France, not only between that country and its own subjects, but between France and all other nations, defining contraband in such a way as to cover nearly all goods, and insisting on the right of search. These large powers were conferred, according to the policy of the time, on privateers, between whom and pirates there was only a metaphysical distinction. In a short time the trade of Holland was nearly ruined by these pirates, and the elder Pitt, who wished to cripple France, and drag Holland into his war, encouraged the wrong-doers. Perhaps at no time in its history, were more outrageous injuries perpetrated on a neutral nation than those which the Dutch suffered from the English during the time of the elder Pitt's administration. These privateers' crews pillaged the ships of the Dutch companies who were trading to the Dutch colonies, on the plea that they, might be carrying French goods. The Peace of Paris in 1763 gave the Dutch some breathing time, but in the same year a formidable commercial panic, attended with numerous bankruptcies, occurred in Amsterdam.

The peace of 1763 virtually secured to Great Britain what she entered on the war to gain, a sole market. The French were almost entirely expelled from India, and were left a feeble power in North America. But the success of the struggle brought about the ruin of the policy which it had established. As long as the French held possession of the Mississipi, and could connect their southern and northern settlements by a chain of forts, and adequate communications, they were a natural source of alarm to the British plantations in the New World, and the necessity, of British defence was a guarantee of colonial loyalty. But as soon as ever the danger was removed, the only power which the American Colonies had to fear was the British Government, and as is well-known, that government soon gave occasion for a quarrel, the outcome of which was American independence, and the overthrow of the sole-market theory. It is true that the elder Pitt was opposed to the scheme for taxing the Colonies. But the expenditure of his wars had left British finance in a desperate condition, and had made the Colonies a nation. I cannot predict, had the Stamp Act not been imposed, and the Boston Mohawks had not been called on to resist the tea duty, how long these colonies would have acquiesced in dependence. But I am pretty sure that as soon as ever a colony can hold its own, the tie to the mother country is inevitably weak, and will bear no strain.

The time when the young Stadtholder, William V., came to his majority was eagerly welcomed. The Dutch still believed in the house of Orange, and anticipated, in their own words, that the prince would “fill the place of those immortal heroes, who for two centuries,” &c. He was eighteen years of age when this prophecy was uttered. Perhaps there never lived a man who more completely falsified expectations than William V. did. He was totally deficient in resolution, indeed in any character, and the faults of his nature were studiously accentuated, it was believed, by the ignorance of all public affairs in which his guardian, Louis of Brunswick, had brought him up. To this person he entirely deferred - with him he could do little, without him he could do nothing. He soon (1767) married a princess of Prussia, a woman of great ability, but entirely indifferent to Dutch interests. Subject to her and to the Duke of Brunswick, William soon merited the distrust, and finally the contempt, of the people whose great history he was to bring to so disgraceful a conclusion. Already Holland had become impotent.

Twelve years after the Peace of Paris, the War of American Independence broke out. The Stadtholder of course wanted the States to take the side of the English, and thus repudiate the very principles to which they owed their own independence. But Holland had now accepted a hereditary sovereign, and hereditary sovereigns always constitute themselves the judges of a difference between their people and themselves. The Dutch had reversed that doctrine, and now a section of the English race was following their example. She could not therefore take the English side. In consequence, the English Government revived the old practice of piracy, under the name of privateering, made prize of Dutch ships sailing to French and Spanish ports, though no war had been declared with either country, and informed the Dutch Government, that if the States, in order to protect their own commerce, increased their naval force, they would treat the action as one of hostility. As an Englishman, I am heartily ashamed of telling the story. It is one of undisguised tyranny, violence, oppression, practised by a strong on a weak state, in which the head of the latter was a traitor to his country's best interests. In 1779, the English commander, Fielding, captured the Dutch mercantile fleet, with four Dutch men-of-war; and in 1780, Yorke, the English ambassador at the Hague demanded subsidies from the States, whom his government just before plundered.

By this time, however, the English Government had overstrained the patience of all other nations. It was seen that, unless some steps were taken, England would put herself effectively into the position which Philip II. had very ineffectually assumed, and declare that the three oceans belonged to her only, and that, commerce on the part of any other people must depend on her will. Hence Catherine II. of Russia, formulated the celebrated agreement, known as the “Armed Neutrality,” in 1780. It was joined by all the principal states of Europe. Every effort was made by the English to bring about the exclusion of the Dutch from this alliance, and in this they were of course assisted by the Stadtholder. The Dutch hesitated, but in the end resolved. In 1780, England declared war on Holland, and severed a connection which had lasted for more than two centuries.