of the Ministers than the Peoples The Dutch believ'd it at first intended only against De Witt 's Faction in favour of the Prince of Orange and in England some laid it to the Corruption of Ministers by the Money of France and some that pretended to think deeper laid it to deeper Designs The Lord Clifford's violence in beginning it gave it an ill air in general and the disuse of Parliaments a cruel maim in the chief sinews of War The Subsidies from France bore no proportion to the charge of our Fleets and our Strength at Sea seem'd rather lessen'd than increas'd by the conjunction of theirs Our Seamen fought without heart and were0 more afraid of their Friends than their Enemies and our Discontents were so great at Land that the Assembling of our Militia to defend our Coasts was thought as dangerous as an Invasion But that which most press'd His Majesty to the thoughts of a Peace was the resolution of Spain to declare the War with England as they had done already with France in favour of Holland unless the Peace were suddenly made which would have been such a blow to our Trade as could not easily have been fenc'd and lost us that of the Mediterranean as the Dutch War had done that of the Northern Seas So as the necessity of this conjuncture was only kept off by the Honour of our Alliance with France However that Crown being not able to furnish Supplies enough to carry on the War without a Parliament could not oppose the calling one upon this occasion When the Parliament met tho' they seem'd willing to give the King Money yet it was to make the Peace with Holland and not to carry on the War And upon His Majesty's demanding their Advice they gave it unanimously That the Peace should be made There were too many Parties engag'd in this Quarrel to think of a General Peace tho' a Treaty to that purpose had been set on foot an Cologn under the Mediation of the Swedes between the Ministers of the Emperor Spain Holland and some Princes of the Empire on the one part and His Majesty and France on the other but without any the least appearance of success For tho' all the Confederates had a mind to the Peace between England and Holland yet none of them desir'd it with France This made both the Dutch and the Spaniards set on foot all the engins they could to engage His Majesty in some Treaty of a separate Peace to which the necessity of His Affairs the humour of his People and the instances of his Parliament at last determin'd him towards the end of the year 1673. Upon the first Meeting of the Parliament the Duke of Buckingham to ingratiate himself with the House of Commons whose ill humour began to appear against those they esteem'd the chief Authors of the War had desir'd leave of that House that he might be heard there in his own defence upon that subject In his Speech among many endeavours to throw the odium of the War from himself upon the Lord Arlington he desir'd that Lord might be ask'd who was the Author of the Triple-Alliance As if he understood himself to be so The Lord Arlington coming afterwards upon the like desire into the same House of Commons and answering some parts of the Duke's Speech when he came to that Particular He told them he could easily answer that Question of the Duke's by telling them That the Author of that Alliance was Sir William Temple This I suppose gave the occasion for Reflections upon what had pass'd in the course of my former Ambassies in Holland and at Aix and His Majesty and his Ministers the resolution to send for me out of my private retreat where I had passed two years as I intended to do the rest of my Life and to engage me in going over into Holland to make the separate Peace with that State Upon the 2d of February 1671 4. His Majesty receiv'd the certain Advice of the States having passed a resolution That the Charges and Dignities possessed by the Prince of Orange and his Ancestors should become Hereditary to his Children And at the same time he also receiv'd a Letter from the States with the desire of Pasports for the Ambassadors whom they were resolv'd to send to His Majesty with Instructions and Powers to treat and conclude a Peace and in the mean time they offer'd a suspension of Arms. This offer coming upon the neck of the Parliaments advice to His Majesty to enter into Treaty with the Spanish Ambassador upon the Propositions he had advanced and which the King had order'd to be sent to the Parliament It was not believ'd by the Ministers that a Treaty could be refus'd without drawing too much odium upon themselves and reflection upon the Government On th' other side it was suspected what Practices might be set on foot by Dutch Ambassadors upon the general discontent reigning against the present War Therefore that very afternoon a resolution was taken at the private Juncto to send rather than to receive an Ambassy upon this subject and that I should be the Person imploy'd Two Gentlemen were sent to my House within half an hour of one another from the Earl of Danby then Lord Treasurer and the Earl of Arlington first Secretary of State to order my attendance upon His Majesty My Lord Arlington told me he would not pretend the merit of having nam'd me upon this occasion nor could he well tell whether the King or Lord Treasurer did it first but that the whole Committee had joyn'd in it and concluded That since the Peace was to be made there was no other Person to be thought of for it And accordingly the King gave me his Commands with many expressions of kindness and confidence to prepare for my Journey and the Secretary to draw up my Instructions I told the King I would obey him and with a great deal of pleasure to see His Majesty returning to the Measures upon which I had formerly serv'd him but that I might do it the better I begg'd of him that I might go over without the Character of Ambassador which would delay or embarras me with preparations of Equipage and with Ceremonies there that were uncessary to so sudden a dispatch His Majesty thought what I said very pertinent and so order'd that I should go only as Plenipotentiary but that I should have in all kinds the appointment of Ambassador and that I should take upon me the Character too when the Peace was concluded Within three days I was ready and the morning my Dispatches were so too the Marquess of Frezno Spanish Ambassador sent my Lord Arlington word while I was with him that he had receiv'd full power from the States to Treat and Conclude a Peace and was ready to enter upon it whenever His Majesty pleased My Lord Arlington surpriz'd was at first of opinion the King should go on his own way and I my Journy and give
upon the French Terms That since they were agreed there they hoped His Majesty would not be against it That however France had ordered him to make his Majesty the offer of a great Sum of Money for his Consent tho' to a thing already accepted by Holland and wherein his Majesty was consequently not concerned That Monsieur Louvoy desired the Ambassador to write this immediately to Lord Treasurer and to offer him a very considerable Sum for himself that should be sent over in Money Jewels or by Bills as he should chuse and Mr. Montague added That it was desired this Affair should be treated only between them two and not communicated to either of the Secretaries of State My Lord Treasurer read the Letter to me and I said Well my Lord What do you say to the Offer He Answered That he thought 't was the same thing as if it should be made to the King to have Windsor put into the French hands and so he should treat it and that we had nothing to do but to go on with our Treaty with the Confederates This his Lordship and I were incharged with and had brought near a conclusion when Letters came from Mr. Hyde with Representations made him from the Pensioner at the Hague of the dispositions in Holland running violently into a Peace and the absolute necessity he thought there was of concluding it upon the taking of Gant and danger of Antwerp which was then threatned and the loss whereof would be so fatal to the Trade of Holland especially Amsterdam Hereupon Mr. Godolphin was dispatched immediately into Holland to bring the last and surest Account he could get of the resolutions there upon this Affair and return with the greatest speed he could he did so and brought the same account of all dispositions which Mr. Hyde had given and in the process of our Treaty with the Confederates Monsieur Van Beuningham when he came to the point was forced to confess That he had no Powers to conclude without first communicating to the States which must draw into length and uncertainty About this time the French Ambassador began to change his Language who had ever before pretended That His Majesty should be always Arbiter of the Peace but now assuring that his Master had agreed with Holland he seemed to wonder and expostulate why the King should pretend to obtain better Terms for the Spaniards than their Allies the Dutch were content with I was then pressed by the King and Lord Treasurer to go into Holland to know their final Resolutions whether they would yet go on with the War in case his Majesty should go into it But I excused my self knowing the Dutch were too much prest by so near approaches of France to declare themselves upon a reserve of the King 's and said If his Majesty resolved to go that way he must first take his measures with the Parliament for the War and then send them word in Holland he was ready to declare it in case they would pursue it and upon this Message I knew the Dutch so well as to believe they would do it and keep close to their late Alliance with his Majesty This the King was unwilling to do but posted Mr. Godolphin again into Holland about the middle of April to know their final resolutions and Prorogued the Parliament for Fourteen Days During these Negotiations and since the Money given by the Parliament and in Six Weeks time the King had raised an Army of about Twenty thousand men the compleatest and in all appearance the bravest Troops that could be any where seen and might have raised many more upon so great a concurrence of the peoples humour with His Majesty's seeming design of entring into a War against France and it was confest by all the Foreign Ministers That no King in Christendom could have made and compleated such a Levy as this appeared in such a time My Lord Treasurer upon the Twentieth came to me and assured me of the King's Resolution being at length fixed to go into the War and desired me to prepare what the King was to say to the Parliament upon this occasion which I did When I carried it to my Lord Treasurer I met there Letters from Mr. Hyde and Godolphin That Holland absolutely desir'd the Peace even upon the Terms proposed by France and had resolv'd to send Monsieur Van Lewen over hither to dispose the King to be contented with them He arriv'd and the King sent me immediately to him to know his Errand He was the Chief of the Town of Leyden and had join'd with Amsterdam Harlem Delf and some others in promoting the Peace even upon the French Conditions But being a man of great Honour and Worth and having done it upon the suspicion that England was still at bottom in with France and that all the rest was but Grimace the Prince had procur'd him to be sent over on purpose to satisfie himself and thereby his Complices for the Peace that the King's intentions were determined to enter into the War which His Highness thought the only means to prevent the Peace When I came to Monsieur Van Lewen he told me freely That it was the most against their hearts in Holland that could be to make a Peace upon Terms so low and unsafe for Flanders and that if the King had gone into the War as was promised upon France delaying or refusing to accept his Scheme they would certainly have continu'd it but His Majesty's Proceedings look'd ever since so uncertain or unresolv'd that it had raised Jealousies in Holland of our Measures being at bottom fix'd and close with France which made most of the Towns in Holland think they had nothing else left to do but to go in with them too as fast as they could and the approach of the French Army to Antwerp left them now no time to deliberate Yet he professed to me in private That if the King would immediately declare the War he believed the States would still go on with it in pursuit of their Alliance and the Terms therein contained I made this Report to the King who seem'd positive to declare the War in case the Parliament advis'd him and promis'd to support it when an unlucky peevish Vote mov'd by Sir T C in spight to my Lord Treasurer passed the House of Commons That no Msney should be given till satisfaction was received in matters of Religion This left all so loose and so lame that the King was in a rage reproach'd me with my Popular Notions as he term'd them and ask'd me when or how I thought he could trust the House of Commons to carry him through the War if he should engage in it And I had not much indeed to say considering the Temper and Factions of the House nor could I well clear it to my self by my Observation whether the King was firmly resolved to enter into the War or if he did whether the House of Commons would
have supported him in it or turned it only to ruin the Ministers by the King's Necessities 'T is certain no Vote could ever have passed more unhappily nor in such a Counter-Season nor more cross to the humour of the House which seem'd generally bent upon engaging His Majesty in the War and the Person that moved it was I believe himself as much of that mind as any of the rest but having since the loss of his Employment at Court ever acted a part of great animosity in opposition to the present Ministry in whose hands soever it was This private ill humour carried him contrary to his publick intentions as it did many more in the House who pretended to be very willing to supply the King upon occasion of the War or even of his Debts but that they would not do it during my Lord Treasures Ministry In short there was such fatal and mutual distrust both in the Court and Parliament as it was very hard to fall into any sound measures between them The King at least now saw he had lost his time of entring into the War if he had a mind to it and that he ought to have done it upon my Lord Duras's return and with the whole Confederacy And my Lord Essex told me I had been a Prophet in refusing to go into Holland to make that Alliance which had as I said pleased none at home or abroad and had now lost all our measures in Holland and turn'd theirs upon France But the turn that the King gave all this was That since the Dutch would have a Peace upon the French Terms and France offered money for his Consent to what he could not help he did not know why he should not get the money and thereupon ordered me to Treat upon it with the French Ambassador who had Orders to that purpose I would have excused my self but he said I could not help seeing him for he would be with me at my House by Seven next Morning He accordingly came and I told him very truly I had been ill in the night and could not enter into Business The Ambassador was much disappointed and pressed me all he could but I defended my self upon my illness till at length he left me without entring upon any thing When I got up I went immediately to Sheen writ to my Lord Treasurer by my Wife May the Tenth 1678. how much I was unsatisfied with being put upon such a Treaty with the French Ambassador that belonged not at all to my Post and which they knew I thought dishonorable to the King and thereupon I offered to resign to His Majesty both my Ambassy at Nimeguen and my Promise of Secretary of State 's Place to be disposed by his Majesty as he pleased My Lord Treasurer sent me word The King forced no man upon what he had no mind to but if I resolved this should be said to him I must do it my self or by some other for he would not make my Court so ill as to say it for me and so it rested and I continued at Sheen without stirring till the King sent for me In the mean time from the beginning of May the ill humor of the House of Commons began to break out by several Discourses and Votes against the Ministers and their Conduct which increased the ill opinion His Majesty had conceived of their intentions in pressing him to enter upon a War yet notwithstanding all this he had as I was told by a good hand conceived such an Indignation at one Article of the private Treaty proposed by Monsieur Barillon that he said he would never forget it while he lived and tho he said nothing to me of his Resentment yet he seemed at this time more resolved to enter into the War than I had ever before seen or thought him Monsieur Ruvigny the Son was dispatched into France to know the last intentions of that Court upon the terms of the Peace proposed by His Majesty but brought no Answer clear or positive so as His Majesty went on to compleat his Levies and to prepare for the War but May the eleventh the House of Commons passed another Negative upon the Debate of money which so offended the King that he Prorogued them for ten days believing in that time his Intentions to enter into the War would appear so clear as to satisfie the House and put them in better humour Monsieur Van Lewen distasted with these delays and the Counterpaces between King and Parliament begins to discourse boldly of the necessity his Masters found to make the Peace as they could since there was no relying upon any measures with England for carrying on the War and the Season was too far advanced to admit any longer delays Upon these Discourses from him His Majesty began to cool his Talk of a War and to say The Peace must be left to the Course which Holland had given it and tho' upon May the twenty third the Parliament met and seemed in much better temper than they parted yet news coming about the same time that Monsieur Beverning was sent by the States to the French Court at Gant to propose a Cessation of Arms for six Weeks in order to negotiate and agree the Terms of the Peace in that time the Affairs began now to be looked upon both in Court and Parliament as a thing concluded or at least as like to receive no other motion than what should be given it by Holland and France And indeed the dispositions were so inclined to it on both sides that the Terms were soon adjusted between them These Articles having been so publick I shall not trouble my self to insert them but only say they seemed so hard both to Spain and to the Northern Princes who had made great Conquests upon the Swedes that they all declared they would never accept them and when the French Ambassadors at Nimeguen desired Sir Lionel Jenkins to carry them to the Confederates he refused to do it or to have part in a Treaty or Conditions of Peace so different from what the King his Master had proposed and what both his Majesty and Holland had obliged themselves to pursue by their late Treaty at the Hague About this time France by a Conduct very surprizing having sent Monsieur la Feuillade to Messina with a common expectation of reinforcing the War in Sicily shewed the Intention was very different and of a sudden ordered all their Forces to abandon that Island with whom many Messineses returned fearing the Vengeance of the Spaniards to whom they were now exposed and this was the only important Service done that Crown by all his Majesty's Intentions or preparations to assist them for no man doubted that the abandoning of Sicily was wholly owing to the apprehensions in France of a War with England which they thought would give them but too much occasion for imploying of their Forces and indeed the eyes and hopes of all the Confederates were now turned so
observing the remaining Paces of the General Peace by that of the North which was left to be made at the Mercy of France And though Denmark and Brandenburgh looked big and spoke high for a time after the Peace between the Empire and France pretending they would defend what they had conquered from the Swedes in Germany yet upon the march of the French Troops into the Brandenburgh Countrey both those Princes made what haste they could to finish their separate Treaties with France and upon certain sums of Money agreed on delivered up all they had gained in this War to the Crown of Sweden Thus Christendom was left for the present in a General Peace and France to pursue what they could gain upon their Neighbours by their Pretensions of Dependences and by the droit de bienseance which they pursu'd with such imperious Methods both against the Empire and the Spaniardt as render'd their Acquisitions after the Peace greater at least in consequence than what they had gained by the War since not only great Tracts of Country upon the score of Dependences but Strashurgh and Lutzenburgh fell as Sacrifices to their Ambition without any neighbouring Prince or States concerning themselves in their Relief But these Enterprises I leave to some others Observations Very soon after my Arrival at the Hague the King sent me Orders to provide for my return as soon as I could possibly be ready and bid me acquaint the Prince and the States That he had sent for me over to come into the Place of first Secretary of State in Mr. Coventry's room My Lord Treasurer writ to me to the same purpose and with more Esteem than I could pretend to deserve telling me among other things They were fallen into a cruel Disease and had need of so Able a Physician This put me in mind of a Story of Dr. Prujean the greatest of that Profession in our time and which I told my Friends that were with me when these Letters came A certain Lady came to the Doctor in great trouble about her Daughter Why what ails she Alas Doctor I cannot tell but she has lost her Humour her Looks her Stomach her Strength consumes every day so as we fear she cannot live Why do not you Marry her Alas Doctor that we would fain do and have offer'd her as good a Match as she could ever expect but she will not hear of marrying Is there no other do you think that she would be content to Marry Ah Doctor that is it that troubles us for there is a young Gentleman we doubt she loves that her Father and I can never consent to Why look you Madam replies the Doctor gravely being among all his Books in his Closet then the case is this Your Daughter would Marry one Man and you would have her Marry another in all my Books I find no Remedy for such a Disease as this I confess I esteemed the Case as desperate in a Politick as in a Natural Body and as little to be attempted by a Man who neither ever had his own Fortune at heart which such Conjunctures are only proper for nor ever could resolve upon any pusuits of it to go against either the true Interest or the Laws of his Countrey One of which is commonly endanger'd upon the fatal misfortune of such Divisions in a Kingdom I chose therefore to make my excuses both to the King and to my Lord Treasurer and desir'd leave to go to Florence and discharge my self of a promise I had made some years past of a Visit to the Great Duke the first time I had leisure from my Publick Imployments Instead of granting this Suit the King sent a Yatch for me towards the end of February 167 8. with Orders to come immediately away to enter upon the Secretary's Office about the same time with my Lord Sunderland who was brought into Sir Joseph Williamson's Place I obey'd His Majesty and acquainted the Prince and States with my Journey and the design of it according to his Command who made me Compliments upon both and would have had me believe that the Secretary of State was to make amends for the loss of the Ambassador But I told the Prince that tho I must go yet if I found the Scene what it appear'd to us at that distance I would not charge my self with that Imployment upon any terms that could be offer'd me We knew very well in Holland That both Houses of Parliament believed the Plot That the Clergy the City the Countrey in general did so too or at least pursu'd it as if they all believ'd it We knew the King and some of the Court believ'd nothing of it and yet thought not fit to own that Opinion And the Prince told me He had reason to be confident that the King was in his heart a Roman Catholick tho he durst not profess it For my own part I knew not what to believe of one side or t'other but thought it easie to presage from such contrary Winds and Tides such a Storm must rise as would tear the Ship in pieces whatever Hand were at the Helm At my arrival in England about the latter end of February I found the King had Dissolv'd a Parliament that had sat eighteen years and given great testimonies of Loyalty and compliance with His Majesty till they broke first into Heats upon the French Alliances and at last into Flames upon the business of the Plot I found a new Parliament was called and that to make way for a calmer Session the resolution had been taken at Court for the Duke's going over into Holland who enbarqu'd the day after my arrival at London The Elections of the ensuing Parliament were so eagerly pursu'd that all were in a manner engag'd before I came over and by the dispositions that appear'd in both Electors and Elected it was easie to presage in what temper the Houses were like to meet My Lord Shaftsbury my Lord Essex and my Lord Hallifax had struck up with the Duke of Monmouth resolving to make use of His Credit with the King and to support it by Theirs in the Parliament and tho the first had been as deep as any in the Councels of the Cabal while he was Chancellor yet all Three had now fallen in with the common Humour against the Court and the Ministry endeavouring to inflame the Discontents against both and agreed among themselves That none of them would come into Court unless they did it all together Which was observed like other common strains of Court-Friendships Sir William Coventry had the most Credit of any man in the House of Commons and I think the most deservedly not only for his great Abilities but for having been turn'd out of the Council and the Treasury to make way for my Lord Cliffora's Greatness and the Designs of the Cabal He had been ever since opposite to the French Alliances and bent upon engaging England in a War with that Crown and assistance
had never been esteem'd so before The King of France march'd as far as Vtrecht where he fix'd his Camp and his Court and from thence began to consider of the ways how to possess himself of the rest which was defended only by their Scituation upon some flat Lands that as they had by infinite labour in Canals and Digues been either gain'd or preserv'd from Inundations so they were subject to them upon opening the Sluces whenever the Dutch found no other way of saving their Country but by losing it This at least was generally believ'd in the French Camp and Court and as I have heard was the Preservation of the State For that King unwilling to venture the Honour and Advantage of such Conquests as he had made that Summer upon the Hazards of a new sort of War with a merciless Element where neither Conduct nor Courage was of use resolv'd to leave the rest to practices of Peace with the States upon the advantage of the terms he stood in and the small distance of place between them or if these should not succeed then he trusted to the Frosts of the following Winter which seldom fail in that Country to make all passable and safe for Troops and Carriages themselves that in Summer would be impassable either from the Waters or the depth of Soil In the mean time the State and the Government of Holland took a new Form and with it a new Heart Monsieur De Witt and his Brother had been Massacreed by the sudden fury of the People at the Hague and by the Fate of Ministers that Govern by a Party or Faction who are usually Sacrificed to the first great Misfortunes abroad that fall in to aggravate or inflame the general Discontents at home The Fact and the manner having been very unusual may be the Subject of others enquiry as it was of Mine which gave me this account The Ruart of Putten Eldest Brother to Monsieur De Witt had been accused of a design upon the Prince's Life and of endeavouring by Money to engage one of his Highness's Domestiques in that Attempt But no other Witness appearing he was sentenc'd only to be Banished at which the People show'd great dissatisfaction being possest with an Opinion of his Guilt The Morning he was to come out of Prison Monsieur De Witt against the Opinion of his Friends would needs go himself to bring him out with more Honour and carry him out of Town and to that purpose went with his Coach and four Horses to the Court This being not usual to this Minister made the People take more notice of it and gather together Tumultuously first in the streets where he passed and then about the Court where the Prisoner was kept Some of the Trained Bands of the Hague that were upon the Guard mingled among them and began to rail aloud against the Judgment of the Court the Crime of one Brother and the Insolence of the Other who pretended as they said to carry him away in Triumph In the midst of this Heat and Passion rais'd by these kind of Discourses among the Populace the two Brothers came out some of the Train'd Bands stop'd them began to treat them at first with ill Language and from Words fell to Blows upon which Monsieur De Witt foreseeing how the Trajedy would end took his Brother by the hand and was at the same time knock'd down with the butt end of a Musket They were both presently laid dead upon the place then drag'd about the Town by the Fury of the People and Torn in pieces Thus ended one of the greatest Lifes of any Subject in our Age and about the 47 th year of his own after having Served or rather Administred that State as Pensioner of Holland for about eighteen years with great Honour to his Countrey and himself After the Death of these Brothers the Provinces and Towns run with Unanimous Voices into Publick Demands of the Prince's being restored to the Authority of his Ancestors The States had in the beginning of the Year declared him Captain General and Admiral of their Forces which was no more than De Witt had always profest was designed for Him when he should be of Age but this was found neither to have satisfied England nor the Prince's Party at home and therefore all the Members of the State agreed in those Acts that were thought necessary to a full Restitution of His Highness now at the Age of Twenty one Years to the Office and Power of Stadtholder with all advantages and even some more than those which had been exercised by his Ancestors At the same time Monsieur Fagel was introduced into Monsieur De Witt 's Place of Pentsioner of Holland whose Love to his Countrey made him a Lover of the Prince as believing it could not be Sav'd by any other Hand and whose Zeal to his own Religion made him an Enemy irreconcilable to France whose Professions as well as Designs were to destroy it This Revolution as it calm'd all at Home so it made the first Appearance of defending what was left of the Country The State grew United the Army in Heart and Foreign Princes began to take Confidence in the Honour and Constancy of the Young Prince which they had in a manner wholly lost upon the Divisions and Misfortunes of the State The French themselves turn'd all their Application and Practices the same way and made the Prince all the offers that could be of Honour Advantages to his Person and Family Provided he would be contented to depend upon them The Bait they thought could not fail of being swallow'd and about which most Artifice was employ'd was the Proposal of making the Prince Sovereign of the Provinces under the Protection of England and France And to say truth at a time when so little of the Provinces was left and what remain'd was under Water and in so eminent danger upon the first Frosts of the Winter this seemed a lure to which a meaner Soul than that of this Prince might very well stoop But his was above it and his Answers always firm That he never would betray a Trust that was given him nor ever fell the Liberties of his Countrey that his Ancestors had so long defended Yet the Game he play'd was then thought so desperate that one of his nearest Servants told me he had long expostulated it with his Master and ask'd him at last how he pretended to live after Holland was lost and whether he had thought so far The Prince told him he had and that he was resolv'd to live upon the Lands he had left in Germany and that he he had rather pass his life in Hunting there than sell his Country or his Liberty to France at any Price I will say nothing of the Ambassy sent at this time by his Majesty to the French King at Vtretcht where the Three Ambassadors Duke of Buckingham Lord Arlington and Lord Halifax found him in his highest Exaltation for
Territories lye closer and rounder than they wert then left That when this should be concluded His Majesty would be ready to enter into the strongest Guaranties they could desire and might with Honour enter into a War to preserve it though He could not to obtain it The Pensioner first gave me thanks for my good Offices in the late Peace and in all the measures of Friendship that had interceded between His Majesty and them since the first breach he Applauded the King's resolution in so pious and generous an offer and acknowledg'd his Interest might lead him to other dispositions That he doubted not the States willingness to accept it all the difference would be about the time and the manner of doing it As to this he said they could not do it without the communication at least of their Allies but would immediately give them part of His Majesty's offer and the States dispositions to receive it That for the terms of a Peace as to their own parts they would be content to make His Majesty the Arbiter of it That they had already recover'd all the Towns they had lost except Grave and Mastricht the last of which was in some manner engag'd to Spain when it should be recover'd and for the other they doubted not to have a good account of it very soon orders being already gone to invest it But he doubted whether their Allies would be so easy in their expectations or demands and that 't was impossible for the States to leave them who have sav'd their Countrey from ruin when two so great Kings had invaded them nor to break the Treaties which they had made Offensive with the Emperor Spain and Brandenburgh That the term stipulated with Spain oblig'd them to reduce France to the Treaty of the Pyrenees but only a reserve was made by one Article which was Unless it should otherwise be agreed by consent between them That whatever Spain would be content with should satisfy them though they were both equally sensible of the Designs and Ambition of France as well as of their ill talent to the States That they could never hope for such another conjuncture to reduce them to such bounds and measures as might be safe to their Neighbours and give quiet to Christendom That it was now an ill time to enter into the terms of a Peace between France and Spain because he knew they should have ill Grace to demand the restitution of any Towns the Spanjards had lost in Flanders by the last War and given up by the Peace that succeeded it and yet His Majesty knew as well as they that without it a Peace could neither be safe for Flanders nor for Holland nor consequently for England But he believ'd there would not pass many days before some decisive Action would happen between the Armies now not far distant in the Field which would make room for the Negotiation of Peace that might succeed next Winter in which His Majesty would find the Interests and Humours of a Trading Countrey as theirs was very strong and dispos'd to press their Allies as far as was possible to facilitate so great and so good a work And for the rest of the Allies besides Spain He had no reason to suspect any great difficulties would arise so little having yet pass'd in the War between France and them The Pensioner was right in expecting some sudden Action between the Armies for about the middle of August came the news of the Battel of Seneffe between the Confederates under the Command of the Prince of Orange and the French under the Prince of Conde But it prov'd not an Action so decisive as was expected between two Armies of so great Force and so animated by the hatred and revenge of the Parties as well as by the Bravery and Ambition of the Commanders The success of this Fight was so differently reported by those engag'd in it that it was hard to judge of the Victory which each side challeng'd and perhaps neither with any great reason The Confederates had for some days sought a Battel with great desire and endeavour and the French avoided it with resolution not to Fight unless upon evident advantage whilst both Armies lay near Nivelle and not far distant from one another The Reason of this was thought to be of one side the ardour of the young Prince of Orange to make way by a Victory into France it self and there revenge the Invasion of his Countrey and at the same time to make his first essay of a Pitch'd Battel against so great and renown'd a General as the Prince of Conde On the other side this old Captain had too much Honour to lose and thought he had not enough to gain by entring the lists with a Prince of three and twenty years old bred up in the shade of a contrary Faction till he was forc'd into the Field by the French Invasion of his Countrey Nor was the Advantage less on the French side in the Reputation of their Troops than of their General compos'd of excellent Officers chosen Soldiers exactly disciplin'd long train'd for action before they began it and now flesh'd by the uninterrupted Successes of two Wars But the Dutch Troops when the Prince of Orange enter'd upon the Command were old or lazy Soldiers disus'd with long Peace and disabled with young unskilful Officers chosen by no other merit than that of a Faction against the House of Orange then fill'd up when the War broke out with hasty and undistinguish'd Levies and disheartn'd with perpetual Losses of Towns and defeats of Parties during the two first Campagns The Prince of Conde had another restraint upon the usual boldness of his nature in such occasions which was the ill posture he had been in at Court since this King's Reign and in regard how much more he would have to answer for than another man upon any great misfortune to his Army which must have left the way open for the Confederates to enter France unguarded on that side by any strong Frontier so as no man knew what shake it might give to the greatness of that Crown with the help of great and general Discontents whereof this Prince was thought to have his share Upon these Dispositions in the Generals the Battel was for some time industriously sought and avoided Till the Prince of Orange believing there was no way of coming to a Battel but by the siege of some place that might be thought worth the venture to relieve broke up march'd away towards Seneffe his Army divided into three Parts whereof the German Troops under the Count de Souches had the Van the Spanish under Prince Vaudemont the Reer and the Dutch under the Count Waldeck the main Battel with whom the Prince marched and Commanded the whole Confederate Army The Prince of Conde observing their march which was not far from one side of his Retrenchments and that by the straitness of some Passages they were forced to file off in small
serve him the best I could in so good an Endeavour and for the rest I should leave the Field free to my Lord Ossory and Him while they stay'd at the Hague as to all that was secret as to the rest I desir'd they would make what use they pleas'd of Me and my House My Lord Arlington took all I said very well and said 'T was not necessary I should leave them after I had introduc'd them to the Prince but in such a manner as I saw he would not dislike it nor have any body thought to have any part in the Successes he expected So next morning I brought them to the Prince and after a quarter of an hour's stay left them together The Prince would have had me stay'd but my Lord Arlington said not a word and I pretended some Letters press'd me and so went away and never saw them together any more while they stay'd at the Hague unless at Dinner or in mix'd and publick Company The truth is I was not the worse entertain'd during the course of this Adventure for my Lord Arlington told me every day what he thought fit of all that pass'd between them and the Prince told me not only the thing but the manner of it which was more important than the matter it self for This had no effect but the Other a great deal and that lasted long My Lord Arlington told me much of his Expostulations and with what good turns of Wit he had justified both the King's Part in the late War and His Own but that upon all he found the Prince dry and sullen or at the best uneasie and as if he wish'd it ended That upon Discourse of the State of Christendom and what related to the War he was engag'd in he made him no Overtures at all nor entred further than That the King might bring him out of it with Honour if he pleased and with Safety to Christendom if not it must go on till the Fortunes of the Parties changing made way for other thoughts than he believ'd either of them had at this time That this might happen after another Campania which none but His Majesty could prevent by inducing France to such terms as He thought just and safe for the rest of Christendom This was the Sum of what my Lord Arlington pretended to have pass'd in three long Conferences after which it grew so uneasy between them that he told me he had absolutely given it over and would not say a word more of business while he was there and attended His Majesty's Orders after the return of his Dispatches but would divert himself in the mean time as well as he could see the Prince as often as he pleased at Dinner or in Company but ask it no more in private unless the Prince of himself desir'd it and upon the whole gave all the signs of being equally disappointed and discontented with the Success of this Undertaking The Prince on the other side told me with what Arrogance and Insolence my Lord Arlington had entred upon all his Expostulations with him both upon the King's Chapter and His Own That it was not only in the Discourses of it as if he pretended to deal with a Child that he could by his Wit make believe what he pleased but in the manner he said all upon that Subject it was as if he had taken Himself for the Prince of Orange and him for my Lord Arlington That all he said was so artificial and giving such false Colours to things every body knew that he that was a plain Man could not bear it and was never so weary of any Conversation in his Life In short all the Prince told me upon it look'd spighted at my Lord Arlington and not very much satisfied with the King's Intentions upon this Errand tho he said he was sure His Majesty never intended he should treat it in the manner he had if he remembred that he was his Nephew tho nothing else After the first Conversations my Lord Arlington staid near six Weeks in Holland either upon contrary Winds to return his Dispatches or to carry him away often at Dinner with the Prince at Court or at Count Waldeck's or Monsieur Odyke's or with Me putting on the best Humour and Countenance affecting the Figure of one that had nothing of business in his Head or in the design of this Journey but at heart weary of his stay in Holland and unwilling to return with no better Account of his Errand and as it prov'd he had reason for both I found the Pensioner and Count Waldeck thought That the bent of my Lord Arlington was To draw the Prince into such Measures of a Peace as France then so much desired Into a discovery of those Persons who had made Advances to the Prince or the States of raising Commotions in England during the late War into secret Measures with the King of assisting him against any Rebels at home as well as Enemies abroad and into the Hopes or Designs of a Match with the Duke's Eldest Daughter Tho they said he found the Prince would not enter at all into the First was obstinate against the Second treated the Third as a disrespect to the King to think he could be so ill belov'd or so imprudent to need it and upon mention made of the last by my Lord Ossory he took no further hold of it then saying His Fortunes were not in a condition for him to think of a Wife Thus ended this Mystical Journey which I have the rather unveil'd because perhaps no other could do it nor I without so many several Lights from so many several Hands and because tho it brought forth no present Fruits yet Seeds were then scattered out of which sprung afterwards some very great Events My Lord Arlington return'd was receiv'd but coldly by the King and ill by the Duke who was angry that any mention had been made of the Lady Mary tho it was done only by my Lord Ossory and whether with Order from the King or no was not known So as never any strain of Court-skill and Contrivance succeeded so unfortunately as this had done and so contrary to all the Ends the Author of it proposed to himself Instead of advancing the Peace he left it desperate instead of establishing a Confidence between the King and the Prince he left all colder than he found it instead of entring into great personal Confidence and Friendship with the Prince he left an Unkindness that lasted ever after instead of retrieving his own Credit at Court which he found waining upon the increase of my Lord Danby's he made an end of all he had left with the King who never after us'd him with any Confidence further than the Forms of his Place and found my Lord Treasurer's Credit with the King more advanced in six weeks he had been away than it had done in many months before Whatever was the occasion France had this Winter an extreme desire of a
the other Wheels for while His Illness lasted and the event was doubtful all was in suspence and none of the Parties engag'd seem to have other Motions or Sentiments than what were rais'd by the Hopes or Fears of so important a Life After some days Fever it prov'd the Small-Pox which had been very Fatal in His Family and gave the greater Apprehensions to His Friends and His Countrey who express'd indeed a strange concernment upon this occasion by perpetual concourse of People to enquire after every minute's progress of His Illness Whilst it lasted he had taken a fancy hardly to Eat or Drink anything but what came from my House which the People after took notice of as it pass'd and tho' perhaps few Foreigners have had the luck to be better thought of or us'd in a strange Countrey than we had ever been in Holland yet several of our Dutch Friends told us That in case any thing fatal happen'd to the Prince from this Disease they believ'd the People would pull down our Houses and tear us all in pieces upon knowing what he took in his Sickness came from our hands God be thank'd all past without any bad accident tho ill symptoms at first and his recovery next to the Blessing of God was owing to the great evenness of his temper and constancy of mind which gave way to no impressions or imaginations that use to be of ill consâ—quence in that disease so that it pass'd in the common forms and within twenty days he was abroad and fell into the present business of the Scene among which the preparation for the Campania was the chief I cannot here forbear to give Monsieur Benting the Character due to him of the best Servant I have ever known in Prince's or private Family He tended his Master during the whole course of his Disease both night and day nothing he took was given him nor he ever remov'd in his Bed by any other hand and the Prince told me that whether he slept or no he could not tell but in Sixteen days and nights he never call'd once that he was not answer'd by Monsieur Benting as if he had been awake The first time the Prince was well enough to have his Head open'd and comb'd Monsieur Benting as soon as it was done begg'd of his Master to give him leave to go home for he was able to hold up no longer He did so and fell immediately sick of the same Disease and in great extremity but recover'd just soon enough to attend his Master into the Field where he was ever next his person The Campania happen'd to begin later than it u'sd to do on the French side both from the expectation what the Prince's sickness would end in and from some Commotions succeeding one another about this time in Guienne and Brittany upon occasion of the Imposts or Gabels which drew some of the French Forces into those parts But when those troubles were ended as they were by an unusual strain of Lenity and Clemency in composing them all imaginary endeavours were us'd to prepare in France for the Campania The King intended to Attack Flanders in the Head of all the choice of his Forces and with the greatest Vigour and Impression he could make this year upon the Spanish Netherlands yet the King pretended to be but a Volunteer in the Army of which he declar'd the Prince of Condé General whether to put the greatest Compliment he could on so great Merit or to hinder his Brother from making difficulty of Acting under that Prince's Orders And Monsieur Turenne was to be employ'd in Alsace to attend and amuse as much as he could the German Army for fear of giving the King too much diversion in Flanders and this with Orders to Act by concert with Count Wrangel General of the Swedish Forces in Pomerania who gave hopes of Marching so far into Germany as to concert his Actions or at least Motions with those of Monsieur Turenne On the other side the Confederates were as busy in their provisions against these designs The Elector of Mentz was drawn to throw off the remainders of his Neutrality and to receive the Imperial Troops into his Towns as Strasburgh had done and practices were set on foot to change the temper of the Court of Bavaria with hopes of success Montecuculi prepar'd to come down into Alsace with the Army of the Emperor and the adjoyning Circles and the Elector of Brandenburgh came to the Hague after the Prince of Orange's illness where Treaties were concluded with the King of Denmark's Ministers and review'd with the Duke of Lunenburgh's After which the Elector went immediately away to the relief of his own Subjects and Countrey then invaded and spoil'd by the open hostility of the Swedish Forces Whil'st he was at the Hague the Compliments pass'd in form between us but without visit or interview tho the Elector desir'd and pursu'd it with more instance than I well understood For he sent his Minister at the Hague first to me and afterwards engag'd the Prince himself to endeavour it by finding some expedient in the difficulties of Ceremony or else by proposing a third place But the French Ambassadors having taken up a form of refusing to visit any Elector unless they might have the hand given them in those Princes Houses and the Electors having never consented to it I told the Prince I could not go lower than the French Ambassadors did in that nor any other point and that meeting in a third place would look like a sort of approving the refusal made by the Electors And so I never saw this Prince during his stay at the Hague much to my regret because I had been possess'd of many qualities very esteemable in him In the mean time how useless soever for the present yet the forms of His Majesty's Mediation went on After it had been accepted by all parties the first Point that came to be consider'd on was the place of Treaty about which the Swedes could not surmount the difficulties during the course of the Mediation The House of Austria propos'd to have the Congress in some of the free Towns of the Empire as Francfort Hamburgh Strasburgh and some others France refus'd ever to come into any Town of the Empire upon the insults they receiv'd and complain'd of so much at Cologn in the seisure of Prince William of Furstenburg and a great sum of the French Money there but offer'd at the same time to come and Treat at Breda tho' belonging to one of the Parties engag'd in the War which they would make pass for a great condescention and testimony of that King's inclination to a Peace The Confederates on the other side would not hear of Breda they took that proposition as an artifice first to ingratiate with the States beyond the rest of their Allies but next which was the point of importance they look'd upon it as design'd to carry on either a separate Treaty with the
of the Pyrenees and in the year 1670. forc'd to escape by night and almost alone by a sudden surprize of the French Troops in the height and security of Peace after this he never had a home any more for the rest of his life which was spent in suing for Protection and Relief from the several Princes of Christendom who resented the injustice of his Case which none pretended to defend but yet none to concern themselves in it till upon the last War he fell into his share of the Confederacy with the weight of two or three thousand Lorainers that still follow'd his Fortune and enter'd into Leagues with the Emperor and most of the Allies for his restitution He seem'd not to deserve the Fortune of a Prince only because he seem'd not to care for it to hate the Constraints and Ceremonies that belong to it and to value no Pleasures in Life but the most natural and most easie and while he had them was never out of humour for wanting the rest Generous to his Servants and Soldiers when he had it and when he wanted endeavouring to make it up by the Liberties he gave them very much belov'd and familiar among both And to give his Picture by a small trait one of his Ministers told me That not long before he died all his Family was a Gentleman of the Horse as he was call'd another of his Chamber and a Boy that look'd to a little Nag he us'd to ride one day he call'd for his Horse the two first told him the Boy was not to be found He bid them however get him his Horse They could not agree which of them should go and Saddle him till the Duke bid them go and one or t'other of them do it or else he swore he would go down and Saddle his Horse himself they were as ham'd and 't was done About the same time died at the Hague the old Princess Dowager of Orange a Woman of the most Wit and good Sense in general that I have known and who had thereby a great part in forming the race of the Prince and the mighty improvement it receiv'd from three very extraordinary Women as well as three so great Men in the last descents None has shew'd more the force of Order and Oeconomy than this Princess who with small Revenues never above Twelve thousand pounds a year since her Husband's deash liv'd always in as great plenty and more curiousness and elegance than is seen in many greater Courts Among other pieces of Greatness She was constantly serv'd all in Gold Plate which went so far as to great Bottles for Water and a great Cistern for Bottles to the Key of her Closet and every thing of that kind She usually touched which I mention because I think 't is what the greatest Kings of Christendom have not pretended to do nor any I have heard of on this side Persia. In November this year happen'd a Storm at Northwest with a Spring-tide so violent as gave apprehensions of some loss irrecoverable to the Province of Holland and by several Breaches in the great Digues near Enckhuysen and others between Amsterdam and Harlem made way for such Inundations as had not been seen before by any man then alive and fill'd the Country with many relations of most deplorable Events But the incredible diligence and unanimous endeavours of the People upon such occasions gave a stop to the Fury of that Element and made way for recovering next year all the Lands tho' not the People Cattel and Houses that had been lost Before the end of the year the Danes took Wismar from the Suedes and by an open War those two Crowns came to be engag'd in the common quarrel and after a great expectation of some extraordinary Successes in the Spanish Affairs from Don John's intended expedition into Italy to command all the Forces and Provinces of that Crown both there and in Sicily when he was ready to go and meet de Ruyter at Barcelona who attended him there with the Dutch Fleet design'd for Messina he was by a Court-Intrigue recall'd to Madrid the King was then arriv'd in his Fourteenth year and took upon him the Government as now in Majority and by the advice of some near him in favour writ a Letter to Don John to invite him to Court to assist him in the Government he obey'd but stay'd not there above a Fortnight or three Weeks till by the Credit and Authority of the Queen Mother he was forc'd to quit his ground there and return to Saragoza and so vanish'd a mighty expectation that had been rais'd in Spain and other places of great effects that were to follow this Prince's coming to the Administration of Affairs and very great Sums of Money were wholly lost that had been employ'd in the Preparations of his Journey and Equipage for Italy And Sicily was left almost hopeless of recovery from the Successes of the French who had taken many Posts about Messina and threaten'd many more and other Towns were fear'd to follow the Example of that great Revolt After the Prince's return from the Campania to the Hague in October I had several Conferences with him upon the subject of the Peace and the Terms that both his Majesty and the States might think reasonable between France and Spain and both those Crowns be in any probability of consenting to That which France pretended was the terms of the Peace of Aix and retaining the County of Burgundy which had been since conquer'd or if either this Province or some of the most important Frontier Towns of Flanders should be restor'd then an equivalent to be made them for such restitution The Spaniards talk'd of nothing less than the Peace of the Pyrenees and that they would rather lose the rest of Flanders by the War than part with Burgundy by the Peace and said both the King and the States were as much concern'd in Flanders as the Crown of Spain and had the same Interest to see it safe by a War or a Peace which could not by such a Frontier as was left by that of Aix That which my Lord Arlington had propos'd to the Prince and Pensioner and which pass'd for his Majesty's Sentiment tho he pretended no Orders was the terms of Aix la Capelle but in regard of the necessity for the Spaniards to have a better Frontier in Flanders than was left by that Peace That the French should give up Aeth and Charleroy and Oudenarde for Aire and St. Omer And that if they parted with the County of Burgundy it should be for something in exchange His Majesty commanded me to assure the Prince That if a Peace could be made upon these terms or any so near them that he might hope to obtain the consent of France His Majesty for the security of Flanders would give his own Gaurranty to the Peace and enter into the strictest Alliance the States could desire for preserving it or defending Flanders in case
of a new rupture He bid me further assure the Prince That for his Patrimonial Lands in Burgundy which were about eight thousand Pounds a year and Lordships of the greatest Royalty in that County he would undertake for his secure possessing them tho that County should remain in the French hands or for selling them to that King and at what price the Prince himself could think fit to value them The Prince's Answer was That for his own part he could be very well content to leave the terms of a Peace to his Majesty himself and believ'd the States would do so too but they were both engag'd by Treaty and Honour to their Allies and there was no thought of making Peace without them That he believ'd the Spaniards might be perswaded to it upon the terms of Aix with restitution only of Aeth Charleroy and Oudenarde towards composing some kind of necessary Frontier on that side but to part with Aire and St Omer without any further and greater exchange he believ'd they would not in the present posture of things That for France retaining the County of Burgundy as Conquer'd in this last War he was sure neither Spain nor the Emperor would ever consent to it unless they were beaten into it by disasters they had no reason to expect tho' for his own part he should be content with it provided the French would restore Tournay Courtray Lisle and Doway with their dependencies to the Spaniards in lieu of it because by that means Flanders would have a secure Frontier on that side and a reasonable good one by Aeth and Charleroy on the other and the security of Flanders was the chief interest of the States upon the Peace That for himself he thank'd his Majesty for his offer as to his Lands in Burgundy but they never came into his thought upon the terms of a Peace nor should ever hinder it but on t'other side he would be content to lose them all to gain one good Town more for the Spanjards in Flanders When I put him in mind as the King order'd me of the apprehensions He and the States might have of the Greatness of the House of Austria if their Successes continued he told me There was no need of that till they should go beyond the Peace of the Pyrenees whenever that should happen he should be as much a French man as he was now a Spaniard but not before He ended in desiring That whatever Plan his Majesty thought fit to propose for a Peace he would do it at the Congress at Nimeguen for the number and variety of Pretensions and Interests were grown so great by all the Parties now engag'd in a war that it could not be done in any other place and for his part he could never consent to any Treaty separate from his Allies That he believ'd they would be reasonable and if France would be so too the Peace might be made if not perhaps another Campania might bring them to reason and that this might have done it if some differences between him and the Spanjards in the Actions propos'd had not hinder'd the successes they hop'd for in Flanders and if Montecuculi's impatience to be at Vienna and pass the Winter there upon the Factions stirring at Court had not made him repass the Rhine and take his Winter-quarters in the Circles of the Empire there because if he had done it in Alsace he doubted his presence with the Army might be thought necessary After this Conference and no return from His Majesty to the account I gave him of it the Discourse ceas'd of Private Measures to be agreed to between His Majesty and the Prince and States for promoting a Peace and all thoughts began now to turn upon forming the Congress at Nimeguen I had another testimony given me of the firmness I had always found in the Prince upon the subject of the Peace by what one of the Spanish Ministers told me had lately pass'd between him and the Duke of Villa Hermosa His Highness had a long pretence depending at Madrid for about Two hundred thousand Pounds owing to his Family from that Crown since the Peace of Munster It had ever been delay'd tho' never refus'd an Agent from the Prince had of late very much press'd the Queen Regent of Spain upon this Subject and with much ado had obtain'd an Order for Fifty thousand Pounds and Bills were put into his hands by the Ministers there which when they arriv'd in Flanders instead of being paid they were Protested The Duke Villa Hermosa was so asham'd of this treatment that he sent a person purposely to excuse it to the Prince and assure him the fault was not in the Queen nor Ministers but only in the choice of hands by which it was transmitted and desir'd his Highness would not take it ill of the Queen The Prince answer'd No not at all on t'other side I have reason to take it well of the Queen for if she did not think me the honestest Man in the World she would not use me so however nothing of this kind shall hinder me from doing what I owe to my Allies or to my Honour Notwithstanding all I had written from the Prince to His Majesty upon this Subject yet my Lord Arlington upon pretended intelligence from his Relations in Holland endeavour'd to perswade him that he knew not the Prince's mind for want of some body that had more credit with him than I had and at the same time he pursu'd the Prince by Letters to desire the King to send over some such person as he might treat with in the last confidence upon all matters between them The Prince shew'd me his Letters and bid me assure the King and my Lord Treasurer that he could say no more than he had done to me and would not say so much to any other Man However my Lord Arlington upon the former suggestions prevail'd with the King to send over Sir Gabriel Sylvius instructed to know the bottom of the Prince's Mind upon the Subject of the Peace before the Campania began He acquainted the Prince with this resolution and that he was a person they knew His Highness would trust The Prince shewed me this Letter too and said He knew not what he meant that Lord Arlington knew as well as any Man how far he trusted both Sir Gabriel Sylvius and me This good usage ended all Correspondence between Lord Arlington and me which had lasted by Letters to this time tho' coldly since my being last in England But upon Sir Gabriel Sylvius's coming to the Hague in January and my preparation to go for Nimeguen I ended that scene having not learn'd enough of the Age nor the Court I liv'd in to act an unsincere part either in Friendship or in Love When Sir Gabriel came to the Hague he pass'd for a Man of some great Intrigue was perpetually at Court or in Conversation and Visits with the persons near the Prince or most imploy'd in the
for the Treaty in order to it They declar'd their disapproval of the French Pretension rais'd to Lorain which seem'd only to obstruct it and that they would send their Ministers to the Congress whether the French came or no and their Commissary at the Hague so well seconded these new dispositions of his Court that whil'st the Congress look'd desperate by the declar'd obstinacy of both sides upon the Point of Lorain Ships and Passports were dispatch'd by the States with consent of their Allies to fetch the Swedish Ambassador from Gottenburgh into Holland The Confederates were besides much animated in their hopes from the dispositions and humours express'd in a late Session of Parliament in England which grew so high against the French or at least upon that pretence against the present Conduct of his Majesty or his Ministers that the King Prorogu'd them about Christmas before any of the matters projected by the warm Men amongst the House of Commons were brought into form The French were upon their march into Flanders and that King at the Head of a great and brave Army threatning some great Enterprize The Prince was preparing to go away into the Field with resolution and hopes of having the honour of a Battel at the opening of the Campania all thoughts of the Congress meeting before the end of it were laid aside when about the middle of May I was extremely surpriz'd to receive a Packet from Secretary Williamson with the French Passports for the Duke of Lorain's Ministers in the Form and with the Stiles demanded by the Allies And hereupon all difficulties being remov'd the Passports were exchang'd by the end of May. Some days were lost by a new demand of the Allies for Passports likewise for the Duke of Nieuburgh's Ministers who was newly entered into the common Alliance and the same paces were expected likewise from the Duke of Bavaria at least so the Germans flatter'd themselves or their Friends Upon this some of the Ministers of the Allies at the Hague whose Masters were very unwilling the Congress should begin before the campania ended prevail'd with the States to send Deputies to me to demand Passports for the Duke of Nieuburgh and any other Princes that should enter into their Alliance and to declare That if these were refus'd by France they would look upon what had been already granted as void I was something surpris'd at so unexpected a Message from the States and told their Deputies That such a Resolution was unpracticable That His Majesty had undertaken to procure Passports for the Parties engag'd in the War and all the Allies they had nam'd on both sides which was done and thereupon the Congress ready to begin and such a delay as this would occasion was both a disrespect to His Majesty and that could not be consented by France nor the Reciprocal of it by any of the Allies that foresaw the Consequences which might happen upon it That some Allie of France might fall off to the Confederates or some of the Confederates to France and with such Circumstances as it could not be expected either of them should think fit to give Passports or treat with them at the Congress nor was it a thing in any form to demand Passports without naming for whom they should be After several other exceptions the Deputies desir'd me to let them represent my reasons against it to the States and to expect their Answer till the next afternoon and one of them told me as he went out That I had all the reason in the world and that they had been too easie in it upon the instances of some Allies Next day the Deputies came to let me know the States had alter'd their resolution and desir'd only That His Majesty would procure Passports for the Duke of Nieuburgh's Ministers which I easily undertook This Change had not pass'd without violent heats between the States Deputies and the Ministers of some Allies who press'd them so far as one of the Deputies answer'd him Que pretendez vous donc Messieurs de nous faire deschirer par la Canaille Which shows the disposition that run so generally at this time throughout the Trading Provinces towards a Peace There remain'd now but one Preliminary undetermin'd which was To fix some extent of Neutral Countrey about the Place of Congress France would have extended it two leagues round the Allies would have it bounded of one side by the River of the Waal upon which Nimeguen stood and was divided by it from the Betow a part of the Province of Holland and through which lay the strait Road into the rest of that Countrey Both these Proposals were grounded upon the same reason That of France to facilitate the Commerce of their Ambassadors with the Towns of Holland incite the desires and enter into Practices of Peace distinct from the motions of the Congress That of the Allies to prevent or encumber the too easie and undiscover'd passage of the French Emissaries upon this occasion However both were positive in their Opinions so as this matter came not to be determin'd till some time after the Congress began and but lamely then CHAP. II. THE Prince was now ready to go into the Field and told me That before he went he must have some talk with me in private and at leisure and to that purpose desir'd it might be in the Garden of Hounslerdyke We appointed the hour and met accordingly He told me I would easily believe that being the only Son that was left of his Family he was often press'd by his Friends to think of Marrying and had many persons propos'd to him as their several humours led them That for his own part he knew it was a thing to be done at one time or other but that he had hitherto excus'd the thoughts of it otherwise than in general till the War was ended That besides his own Friends the Deputies of the States begun to press him more earnestly every day and the more as they saw the War like to continue and perhaps they had more reason to do it than any others That he had at last promis'd them he would think of it more seriously and particularly and so he had and resolv'd he would marry but the choice of a person he thought more difficult That he found himself inclin'd to no Proposals had been made him out of France or Germany nor indeed to any that had been mention'd upon this occasion by any of his Friends but that of England That before he concluded to make any paces that way he was resolv'd to have my Opinion upon two Points but yet would not ask it unless I promis'd to answer him as a Friend or at least an indifferent Person and not as the King's Ambassador When I told him he should be obey'd he went on and said That he would confess to me during the late War neither the States nor He in particular were without applications made them from several Persons
the Passports I got loose from the Hague about the beginning of July 1676. upon my journey to Nimeguen where the French and Dutch Ambassadors being already arriv'd prest very much for my coming in regard Sir Lionel Jenkins excus'd himself from performing any acts or Offices of the Mediation till my arrival and contented himself to pass only the usual Visits The dispositions I observ'd in the several Parties towards the success of this Congress when I went in order to the opening of it were very different and very unlikely to draw it to any sudden issue but only to attend and be Govern'd by the Successes of the several Armies in the Field and the events expected from the Actions of the Campania The French had given all the facility they could for some Months past to the forming of the Congress and made all the haste they could for their Ambassadors to be upon the place desiring no better Peace than upon the present Plan of Affairs and hoping by their forwardness and the great backwardness of some of the Allies to make way for some separate Treaties with those among them who began to be impatient for the Peace The House of Austria was sullen as losers use to be and so were very slow and testy in all their paces towards this Treaty The Germans hoping for great successes of their Arms in this Campania and the Spaniards flattering themselves with the Interests His Majesty had in the preservation of Flanders and with the part which the Parliament in England seem'd of late to have taken in their Affairs and both were in hopes that something might arise from one of these sides to make room for pretensions that could not be in countenance as things stood at present The Swede was very earnest for a Peace as having more hopes of recovering himself that way than by the course of a War Denmark and Brandenburgh were violent for continuing the War finding the Swedes weak divided and unrelievable by France any otherwise than with their Moneys and hoping to drive them this Summer out of Germany The States were very desirous of the Peace having no pretences of their own but to get well out of a War that ruin'd their Trade and drain'd their Money but they durst not break from their Confederates not trusting England enough nor France at all so as to leave themselves in a condition of depending upon either of them after the Peace should be made One general Thread run through the Councils on both sides on the French to break the confidence and union of the Confederacy by different paces and advances to the several Parties in the course of the Treaty on the Confederates to preserve the same confidence and union with which they had carried on the War even after the Peace should be made His Majesty tho' he was offer'd by some of the Parties to be Arbiter as well as Mediator in the present differences and was known by them all to have it in his power to make that figure as he pleas'd yet chose the other and gave us orders accordingly only to perform the Offices of a bare Mediation and to avoid the Parties submitting their differences to his determination so that upon the whole it was easie to foresee the Congress would only prove a business of form and proceed no otherwise than as it should be mov'd or rather govern'd by the events of the Field However the opening of it might well be call'd the dawn of a Peace which put me in mind of the only Prophecy of this sort that I had ever thought worth taking notice of nor should I have done so but that Monsieur Colbert show'd it me at my coming to Nimeguen and made me remember to have seen it in my Lord Arlington's hands in the year 1668. who told me it was very old and had been found in some Abby of Germany It was in these terms Lilium intrabit in terram Leonis feras in brachiis gerens Aquila movebit alas in auxilium veniet filius hominis ab Austro tunc erit ingens bellum per totum terrarum orbem sed post quatuor annos pax elucescet salus erit filio hominis unde exitium putabatur Those that have a mind to give credit to such Prophesies from the course of events must allow the Leopards the Ancient Arms of England to be meant by Feras the King of Spain by filius hominis the Congress at Nimeguen four years after the War began by the Dawn of Peace and Spain's having been sav'd by the States or the Prince of Orange by those from whom their ruin was expected But I easily believe that as most Prophecies that run the World arise from the Contrivances of Crafty or the Dreams of Enthusiastical Heads and the Sense of them where there is any lies wrapt up in mystical or incoherent expressions fit to receive many sorts of Interpretations and some perhaps from the leisure of great Wits that are ill entertain'd and seek diversion to themselves by writing things at random with the scornful thought of amuzing the World about nothing so others of them are broach'd for old either after events happen or when they are so probable as to be easily conjectur'd by fore-seeing men And it seems strange that of the first kind being so many no more happen to be fulfill'd with the help of so much inclination to credit as well as so much invention to wrest the meaning of words to the sense pretended But whether this I mention may not have been one of the last kind is uncertain for in that very year it was produc'd and given my Lord Arlington by a French Man as he told me the design of this War was not only laying but well advanc'd by the Practices of Monsieur Colbert upon the Ministers of our Court where he was then Ambassador and by the violent humour of my Lord Clifford to enter the Leagues then projected by France so that the very day the Parliament gave his Majesty a mighty sum of Money to Compliment him upon so applauded a Councel and Success as that of the Triple Alliance in the Year 1668. That Lord coming out of the House of Commons where he was then a Member could not hold saying to a Friend of mine who came out with him That for all this great joy it must not be long before we have another War with Holland And which of these two Prophesies were the more to be consider'd or the better ininspir'd I leave it to every one to guess as they please Nimeguen is seated upon the side of a Hill which is the last of Germany and stoops upon the River Woal that washes the lower part of the Town and divides it from the Betow an Island lying all upon flat low Ground between the Woal and the old Rhine which was the ancient Seat of those the Romans call'd Batavians and for their Bravery and love of Liberty took into their Confederacy
Ambassadors of Crown'd Heads though we gave it only to the first of the Ambassy upon the President of the Munster Treaty and were follow'd in it by the French and Swedes in the whole course of this Treaty at Nimeguen This Pace of the Emperor seem'd not so much grounded as some thought upon his compliance with so considerable an Ally as upon a design to assist another Pretention of his own which is not only a difference of Place but also of Rank from all other Crown'd Heads of Christendom Whereas the other Kings though they yield him the Place yet they do not allow him a difference of Rank But if the Emperor could by his Example prevail with other Kings to Treat the Electors like Crown'd Heads it would fortifie the Pretensions of the Emperor to a difference of Rank since there is a great one and out of all contest between him and the Electors My second Remark is That among all the Punctilioes between the Ambassadors at Nimeguen none seem'd to me to carry them to such heights as the Swedes and the Danes The first standing as stiff upon all Points of not seeming to yield in the least to the French Ambassadors tho' their Allies and from a Crown not only of so mighty Power but from whom alone they expected the restoring of their broken State in Germany and the Danish Ambassador upon the French Powers being exhibited in French said he would give his in Danish unless they would do it in Latin as a common Language alledging he knew no difference between Crown'd Heads that the Danish King had been as great as the French are now and in their present Dominions are as Absolute Upon all which Monsieur Beverning could not forbear to reflect and say to us That in his Remembrance there was no sort of Competition made by those two Northern Kings with the other three great Kings of Christendom That the treatment of the States to them was very different and their Ministers made no difficulty of signing any Instruments after the Ministers of the three Great Crowns 'T is I think out of question that the pretention of Parity among the Crown'd Heads was first made in the North by Gustavus when he told Monsieur Grammont the French Ambassador in Sweden upon this occasion That for his part he knew no distinction among Crown'd Heads but what was made by their Virtue and this Pretence was not much disputed with him in respect to the greatness of his Qualities as well as of his Attempts and Successes and his example was follow'd by the Kings of Denmark and has since left Place a thing contested among them all 'T is true the French have claim'd the Precedence next to the Emperor with more noise and haughtiness than the rest but have been yielded to by none except the Spaniard upon the fear of a War they were not able to deal with nor have they since been willing to own the weakness of that confession but have chosen to fall into what measures they could of encouraging and establishing the Pretence of Parity among Crown'd Heads The most remarkable Instance of this happen'd at Nimeguen where upon a publick meeting of the Allies the Dispute arising between Spain and Denmark for the place at Table Don Pedro consented to have it taken by turns and at the first to be divided by lot The French Ambassadors made their pretence of preference next the Mediators at Nimeguen in the first return of their Visits from Ambassadors arriving but was neither yielded to by Swede or Dane nor Practis'd by the Emperors Ambassadors who made their first Visit to the Mediators and the next without Distinction to the first that had visited them The Emperor took Advantage of the French as well as the rest having yielded to the Mediators and during this Treaty made a Scruple tho' not a Refusal of doing it by which he distinguish'd himself from the other Crowned Heads We were content to keep it as much as we could from Decision with them but it once happen'd that upon a Meeting with the Allies at the Dane's House Count Kinkski was there before I and Sir Lionel came into the Room where Chairs were set for all the Ambassadors After the common Salutations I went strait up to the Chair that was first in Rank and stood before it to sit down when the rest were ready but my Colleague either losing his time by being engag'd in longer Civilities or by Desire not to be engag'd in Contests gave room to Count Kinkski a very brisk Man to come and stand before the Chair that was next me and consequently between me and my Colleague When I saw this and consider'd that tho' the Place was given me by the Imperialists yet it was not given to the King's Ambassy I chose not to sit down but falling into the Conference that was intended I stood all the while as if I did it carelesly and so left the Matter undecided The Prince of Orange about the latter End of December writ very earnestly to me to make a Step for some few Days to the Hague knowing I had leave from His Majesty to do it when I thought fit And finding all things without present Motion at Nimeguen I went thither and arriv'd the last day of the Year The first of the next being 1677. I attended His Highness We fell into large Discourses of the Progress of the Treaty the Coldness of the Parties the affected Delays of the Imperials and Spaniards the declar'd Aversion of the Danes and Brandenburgh and concluded how little was to be expected from the formal Paces of this Congress Upon all which the Prince ask'd if I had heard any more of His Majesty's Mind upon the Peace since I had been last with him I told him what I remembred of his last Letter to me upon that Subject which was That he concluded from the Prince's Discourses to me that he had then no mind to a Peace that he was sorry for it because he thought it was his Interest to have it That he had try'd to know the Mind of France upon it but if they would not open themselves farther of one side nor His Highness on the other than they had yet done he would content himself with performing only His Part of a Mediator and in the Common Forms The Prince said This look'd very cold since His Majesty was alone able to make the Peace and knew well enough what it would come to by the Forms of the Congress That for his own part he desir'd it and had a great deal of reason both because His Majesty seem'd to do so and to think it his own Interest as well as the Prince's and because the States not only thought it their Interest but absolutely necessary for them That he would not say this to any but to the King by me because if France should know it they would he doubted be harder upon the Terms That both Spain and the Emperor had
should fall into it with the greatest Regret that could be yet he did not see what else was to be done and did not know one Man in Holland that was not of the same Mind That he did not talk with me as an Ambassador but a Friend whose Opinion he esteem'd and desir'd That he told me freely Leur fort leur soible and would be glad to know what else I thought they could do upon all these Circumstances Et dans accablement de leur Estat par une si longue guerre I return'd his Compliment but excus'd my self from giving my Opinion to a Person so well able to take Measures that were the fittest for the States Conduct or his own but desir'd to know what He reckon'd would become of Flanders after the Dutch had made their Separate Peace because the Fate of that Countrey was that wherein the rest of their Neighbours were concern'd as well as they He answer'd It would be lost in one Summer or in two but more probably in one That he believ'd Cambray Valenciennes Namur and Mons might be lost in one Summer That after their Loss the great Towns within would not offer at defending themselves excepting Antwerp and Ostend for which they might perhaps take some Measures with France as I knew the French had offer'd Monsieur de Witt upon their first Invasion in 1667. I ask'd him how he reckon'd this State was to live with France after the Loss of Flanders And if he thought it could be otherwise than at Discretion He desir'd me to believe that if they would hope to save Flanders by the War they would not think of a Separate Peace but if it must be lost they had rather it should be by the last which would less exhaust their Country and dishonour the Prince That after Flanders was lost they must live so with France as would make them find it their Interest rather to preserve their State than to destroy it That it was not to be chosen but to be swallow'd like a desperate Remedy That he had hop'd for some Resource from better Conduct in the Spanish Affairs or that some great Impression of the German Armies upon that side of France might have brought the Peace to some reasonable Terms That for his own part he had ever believ'd that England it self would cry Halt at one step or other that France was making and that if we would be content to see half Flanders lost yet we would not all nor Sicily neither for the Interest of our Trade in the Mediterranean That the King had the Peace in his Hands for these two Years past might have made it when he pleas'd and upon such Conditions as he should think fit of Justice and Safety to the rest of his Neighbours as well as himself That all Men knew France was not in a condition to refuse whatever Terms His Majesty resolv'd on or to venture a War with England in Conjunction with the rest of the Allies That the least show of it if at all credited in France was enough to make the Peace That they had long represented all this in England by Monsieur Van Beuninghen and offer'd His Majesty to be the Arbiter of it and to fall into the Terms he should prescribe but not a Word in Answer and all received with such a Coldness as never was though other People thought we had reason to be a little more concern'd That this put him more upon thinking a separate Peace necessary than all the rest That he confes'd Cuncta prius tentanda till he found at last 't was immedicabile vulnus That for their living with France after Flanders was lost he knew well enough what I meant by asking but after that the Aims of France would be more upon Italy or Germany or perhaps upon us than them That it could not be the Interest of Franco to Destroy or Conquer this State but to preserve it in a Dependance upon that Crown That they could make better Use of the Dutch Fleets than of a few poor Fisher Towns that they should be reduc'd to if any Violation were made either upon their Liberties or Religion That the King of France had seen their Country and knew it and understood it so and said upon all Occasions That he had rather have them for his Friends than his Subjects But if after all I concluded their State must fall in four and twenty Hours yet it were better for them to defer it to the last Hour and that it should happen at Night rather than at Noon This was discours'd with such Vehemence and Warmth that he was not able to go on and having said It was not a Matter to be resolv'd between us Two I left him after wishing him Health enough to go through the Thoughts and Businesses of so great a Conjuncture Next Morning I went to the Prince and after some common Talk told him what had past in my Visit to the Pensioner and ask'd His Highness If he had seen him since or knew any thing of it He said No and so I told him the Detail of it and upon Conclusion That he said he saw nothing else to be done but to make a separate Peace and that he knew not a Man in Holland who was not of his Mind The Prince interrupted me saying Yes I am sure I know one and that is My Self and I will hinder it as long as I can but if any thing should happen to me I know it would be done in two days time I ask'd him Whether he was of the Pensioner's Mind as to what he thought likely to happen the next Campania He said The Appearance were ill but Campania's did not always end as they began That Accidents might happen which no Man could fore-see and that if they came to one fair Battel none could answer for the Event That the King might make the Peace if he pleas'd before it began but if we were so indifferent as to let this Season pass for his part he must go on and take his Fortune That he had seen that Morning a poor old Man tugging alone in a little Boat with his Oars against the Eddy of a Sluce upon a Canal that when with the last Endeavours he was just got up to the Place intended Force of the Eddy carried him quite back again but he turn'd his Boat as soon as he could and fell to his Oars again and thus three or four times while the Prince saw him and concluded this old Man's Business and His were too like one another and that he ought however to do just as the old Man did without knowing what would succeed any more than what did in the poor Man's Case All that pass'd upon these Discourses I represented very particularly to the Court the first Part immediately to the King the rest to the Secretaries of State and added my own Opinion That if His Majesty continued to interpose no further than by
the Service of the Allies Who took this Answer however for an ill Sign of that Prosecution which they hoped from His Majesty for the Relief of their Languishing Affairs The Hopes of those great Actions promised by the Imperialists this Summer on the Rhine began to Flat Their Troops finding no Subsistence in those Countries which had been wholly desolated by the French in the Beginning of the Year to prevent their March The Prince of Orange observing all these Circumstances and foreseeing no resource for the Interests of the Allies unless from his Majesty and that it was likely to prove an unactive Summer in Flanders the French resolving not to come to a Battel and he not able to form a Siege and oppose a French Army that should come to relieve it he sent Monsieur Bentinck over into England about the beginning of June to desire his Majesty's leave that he might make a Journey thither so soon as the Campania ended He received a civil Answer but with Wishes from the King That he would first think of making the Peace and rather defer his Journey till that were concluded About the middle of June my Son came over to me at Nimeguen and brought me Letters from my Lord Treasurer to signify his Majesty's Pleasure that I should come over and enter upon the Secretary of State 's Office which Mr. Conventry had offered his Majesty to lay down upon the payment often thousand Pounds That the King would pay half the Money and I must lay down the rest at present tho his Lordship did not doubt but the King would find the way of easing me in time of that too I writ immediately to my Lord Treasurer to make my Acknowledgment to his Majesty but at the same time my Excuses That I was not in a condition to lay down such a Sum my Father being still alive and keeping the Estate of the Family and desiring that the King's Intention might at least be respited till he saw how the present Treaty was like to determin In return of my Letters on the second of July Mr. Smith one of the King's Messengers being sent Express and making great diligence arrived at Nimeguen and brought me his Majesty's Commands to repair immediately over in a Yatcht which he had sent on purpose for me In obedience to this Command I left Nimeguen but without any Ceremony pretending only a sudden Journey into England but saying nothing of the Occasion further than to my nearest Friends At my Arrival the King asked me many Questions about my Journey about the Congress draping us for spending Him so much Money and doing nothing and about Sir Lionel asking me how I had bred him and how he passed among the Ambassadors there and other Pleasantries upon that Subject After a good deal of this kind of Conversation He told me I knew for what he had sent for me over and that 't was what he had long intended and I was not to thank him because he did not know any Body else to bring into that Place I told his Majesty that was too great a Compliment for me but was a very ill one to my Country and which I thought it did not deserve that I believed there were a great many in it fit for that or any other Place he had to give and I could name two in a breath that I would undertake should make better Secretaries of State than I. The King said Go get you gone to Sheen we shall have no good of you till you have been there and when you have rested your self come up again I never saw him in better humour nor ever knew a more agreeable Conversation when he was so and where he was pleased to be familiar great Quickness of Conception great Pleasantness of Wit with great Variety of Knowledg more Observation and truer Judgment of Men than one would have imagined by so careless and easy a manner as was natural to him in all he said or did From his own Temper he desired nothing but to be easy himself and that every Body else should be so and would have been glad to see the least of his Subjects pleased and to refuse no Man what he asked But this softness of temper made him apt to fall into the Perswasions of whoever had his kindness and confidence for the time how different soever from the Opinions he was of before and he was very easy to change hands when those he employed seemed to have engaged him in any Difficulties so as nothing looked steddy in the Conduct of his Affairs nor aimed at any certain end Yet sure no Prince had more Qualities to make him loved with a great many to make him esteemed and all without a grain of Pride or Vanity in his whole Constitution nor can he suffer Flattery in any kind growing uneasy upon the first Approaches of it and turning it off to something else But this humour has made him lose many great Occasions of Glory to himself and Greatness to his Crown which the Conjunctures of his Reign conspired to put into his Head and have made way for the aspiring Thoughts and Designs of a Neighbour Prince which would not have appeared or could not have succeeded in the World without the Applications and Arts imployed to manage this easy and inglorious Humour of the King 's I staid two days at Sheen in which time some of Secretary Coventry's Friends had prevailed with him not to part with his Place if he could help it unless the King would let him recommend the Person to succeed him who should pay all the Money he expected and which the King had charged himself with When I came to Town the King told me in his Closet all that had passed between Him and Mr. Coventry the day before upon this occasion That He did not understand what he meant nor what was at the bottom for he had first spoke to His Majesty about parting with his Place said his Health would not go through with it made the Price he Expected for it and concluded all before He had sent for me over That now he pretended he did not mean to quit it unless he might present one to succeed him and hoped he had not deserved His Majesty should turn him out But the King said upon it That under favour He was resolved to take him at his Word and so He had told him and left him to digest it as he could Upon this I represented to the King how old and true a Servant Mr. Coventry had been of his Father's and His how well he had served him in this Place how well he was able to do it still by the great credit he had in the House of Commons where the King 's great Business lay in the ill state of his Revenue how ill such a Treatment would agree with his Majesty's Nature and Customs and for my own part that it would be a great favour to me to respite this change till he
return The Question was Who should go and my Lord Treasurer said it must be He or I for none else had been acquainted with the debate of this business The Prince said it must be I for my Lord Treasurer could not be spared and it must be some person upon whose Judgment and Truth he could rely as to the Intentions of that Court The King order'd me to be ready in two days which I was and the Evening before I was to go meeting His Majesty in the Park he called me to him and a little out of Countenance told me He had been thinking of my Journey and my Errand and how unwelcome I should be in France as well as my Message and having a mind to gain the Peace he was unwilling to anger them more than needs Besides the thing being not to be reasoned or debated any body else would serve the turn as well as I whom he had other use of and therefore he had been thinking to send some other Person I saw he doubted I would take it ill but told him and very truly he would do me the greatest Pleasure in the World for I never had less mind to any Journey in my life and should not have accepted it but in perfect Obedience The King that was the gentlest Prince in the World of his own Nature fell into good humour upon seeing I took it not ill pretended to think whom he should send and at last asked me what I thought of my Lord Duras I said Very well upon which he seem'd to resolve it But the thing had been agreed in the morning as I was told upon the Duke's desire who thought France would accept the Terms and that the Peace would be made and had a mind to have the Honour of it by sending a Servant of his own Whether there were any other Motive I know not but my Lord Duras went immediately with the Orders before mentioned and some few days after the Prince and Princess embarqued for Holland where Affairs pressed his return beyond the hopes of my Lord Duras from France the King assuring him he would never part from the least point of the Scheme sent over and would enter into the War against France if they refus'd it However he went not away without a great mortification to see the Parliament Prorogued the next Spring which the French Ambassador had gain'd of the King to make up some good Meen with France after the Prince's Marriage and before the dispatch of the Terms of a Peace to that Court. Upon my Lord Duras's arrival at Paris the Court there were surpriz'd both at the thing and more at the manner but made good Meen upon it took it gently Said The King knew very well he might always be Master of the Peace but some of the Towns in Flanders seemed very hard especially Tournay upon whose Fortifications such vast Treasures had been expended and that they would take some short time to consider of the Answer My Lord Duras told them he was ty'd to two days stay but when that was out he was prevail'd with to stay some few days longer and to come away without a positive Answer What he brought was what they had said to him before That the Most Christian King hoped his Brother would not break with him upon one or two Towns but even upon them too he would send Orders to his Ambassador at London to treat with His Majesty himself By this gain of time and artifical drawing it into Treaty without any positive refusal this blow came to be eluded which could not easily have been so any other way The King was softned by the softness of France The Ambassador said at last He had leave to yield all but Tournay and to treat even for some equivalent for that too if the King insisted absolutely upon it The Prince was gone who had spirited the vigour of the whole resolution and the Treaty of it began to draw out into Messages and Returns from France However the ill humour of People growing higher upon the noise of a Peace and negotiated in France and the late Prorogation of the Parliament this was by Proclamation anticipated soon after my Lord Duras's return tho' a thing something unusual and a countenance made as if the King resolv'd to enter into the War for which the Parliament seem'd impatient whenever the King seem'd averse to it but grew jealous of some tricks whenever the Court seem'd inclin'd to it About the end of December 1677. the King sent for me to the Foreign Committee and told me he could get no positive Answer from France and therefore resolv'd to send me into Holland to make a League there with the States for forcing both France and Spain if either refused to make the Peace upon the Terms he had proposed I told the King What he had agreed was to enter into the War with all the Confederates in case of no direct and immediate Answer from France That this perhaps would satisfie both the Prince and Confederates abroad and the People at home but to make such a League with Holland only would satisfie none of them and disoblige both France and Spain Besides it would not have an effect or force as the Tripple-Allliance had being a great Original of which this seem'd but an ill Copy and therefore excus'd my self from going The King was set upon it tho' I pretended domestick Affairs of great importance upon the Death of my Father and pleaded so hard that the Duke at last desir'd the King not to press me upon a thing I was so averse from and would be so inconvenient to me and desir'd I might propose who should be sent with the Treaty I made my acknowledgments to the Duke for his favour and propos'd that Mr. Thyn should be sent from the Office with a Draught of the Treaty to Mr. Hyde who was then come from Nimeguen to the Hague upon a Visit to the Princess This was done and the Treaty sign'd there on the sixteenth of January though not without great difficulties and dissatisfaction of the Prince who was yet covered in it by the private Consent of the Spanish Minister there in behalf of his Master so as the War could not break but upon France in case of their refusal In the mean time France draws out the Treaty upon the Terms at London into length never raising more than one Difficulty at a time and expostulating the unkindness of breaking for the single Town of Tournay though that was indeed more important than any Three of the others being the only strong one to guard that side of the Frontier and giving way for any sudden Invasion upon Gant and Antwerp and the very heart of the Country But while this Game was playing in England they had another on foot in Holland especially at Amsterdam by raising Jealousies of the measures taken between the King and Prince upon the Marriage as dangerous to the Liberties of Holland and
wholly upon England for any resource in their Affairs after Holland had deserted them as they thought by such precipitate terms of a Peace that many of the chief Ministers at Nimeguen left that place as of no more use to the Treaty it was designed for and went into England where they thought the whole scene of that Affair then lay among whom was Count Antoine the Danish Ambassador and soon after Monsieur Olivecrantz the Swedish with the Elector of Brandenburgh's Envoy and several others However the Negotiation continued there between the French Ambassadors and Monsieur Beverning till he was sent to the French Camp where he concluded the Terms of the Peace towards the end of June and a Cessation from all Hostilities in Flanders for six weeks which was given to the Dutch to endeavour the Spaniards entring into the Peace upon the Terms they had proposed for them And in the whole Course of this Negotiation France seemed to have no regards but for Holland and for them so much that the most Christian King assured the States That tho' Spain should not agree yet he had such care of their satisfaction that he would always provide such a Barriere in Flanders should be left as they thought necessary for their safety and that after the Peace should be made and the ancient Amity restored he would be ready to enter into such Engagements and Measures with them as should for ever secure their Repose and their Liberty This was by all interpreted an invidious word put in on purpose to cajole the Enemies of the Prince who ever pretended the suspicions of his affecting more Authority than they desired and thereby kept up a Popular Party in the State the chief of whom had been the chief promoters of the present Peace and indeed the Prince was not at all reserved in the Endeavours of opposing it but used all that was possible and agreeable to the Forms of the State yet all in vain the humour having spread so far at first in Holland and from thence into the other Provinces that it was no longer to be opposed or diverted by the Prince In the mean time England was grown pretty indifferent in the matter of the Peace and Spain seemed well inclined to accept their part of it But the Emperor the King of Denmark and Elector of Brandenburgh fell into the highest Declarations and Reproaches against the States that could be well invented ripping up all they had ventured and suffered in a War they had begun only for the preservation of Holland how they were now abandoned by them in pretending to conclude Imperious and Arbitrary terms of a Peace upon them without their consent That they were willing to treat with France and make a Peace upon any safe and reasonable Conditions but would never endure to have them imposed as from a Conqueror and would venture all rather than accept them especially those for the Duke of Lorain whose case was the worst treated tho' the most favoured in appearance by all the Confederates and the least contested by France Notwithstanding all these storms from their Allies the Dutch were little mov'd and held on their course having small regard to any of their satisfaction besides that of Spain in what concern'd the Safety of Flanders and the necessities of that Crown made them easie tho' as little contented as the rest So as the Peace was upon the point of signing by the French and Dutch Ambassadors when an unexpected Incident fell in which had like to have overturn'd this whole Fabrick and to have renew'd the War with greater Heats and more equal Forces by engaging England to a share of it in favour of the Confederates which they had been long practising without Success and now without Hopes In the Conditions which Holland had made for the French restoring the six Towns in Flanders to Spain there was no particular mention made of the time of that Restitution the Dutch understanding as well as the Spaniards That it was to be upon the Ratifications of the Peace with Spain and Holland whether any of the other Allies on each side were included or no. But when the Dutch Treaty was near signing the Marquess de Balbaces either found or made some occasion of enquiring more particularly of the French Intentions upon this Point The French Ambassadors made no difficulty of declaring That the King their Master being obliged to see an entire Restitution made to the Swedes of all they had lost in the War could not evacuate the Towns in Flanders till those to the Swedes were likewise restored and that this detention of places was the only means to induce the Princes of the North to accept of the Peace Monsieur Beverning gave Account to his Masters of this new pretence and the States order'd him to let the French Ambassadors know he could not sign the Peace without the Restitution of the Places in Flanders upon the Ratification of the Treaty The French Ambassadors were firm on t'other side and said Their Orders were positive to insist upon the Restitution of Sweden The States hereupon sent to Monsieur Van Lewen to acquaint his Majesty with this unexpected Incident and to know his Opinion and Resolution upon a point of so great moment to the Peace of Christendom on the one side and to the Safety of Flanders on the other The King was difficult at first to believe it but sending to the French Ambassador at London to know the Truth of it and finding him own his Master's intention not to evacuate the Towns till the General Peace was concluded and Sweden satisfied He was both surpriz'd and angry at this proceeding of France and next morning sent for me to the Foreign Committee and there declar'd his resolution of sending me immediately into Holland with Commission to sign a Treaty with the States by which they should be obliged to carry on the War and His Majesty to enter into it in case France should not consent within a certain time limited to evacuate the Towns The Duke fell into this Counsel with great warmth and said at the Committee That it was plain by this pace that France was not sincere in the business of the Peace That they aim'd at the Universal Monarchy and that none but His Majesty could hinder them from it in the Posture that Christendom stood All the Lords of the Committee agreed with so general a concurrence that it was hard to imagin this should not prove a steddy Resolution how little soever we had been given to any such His Majesty took the pains to press Van Lewen to go over with me to perswade the States of the sincereness and constancy of his resolution to pursue this Measure with the utmost of his Power and took upon himself to excuse to the States his Masters the making this Journey without Their consent Upon this Dispatch Mr. Godolphin who had been so lately in Holland told me That if I brought the States to
the Treaty His Majesty propos'd upon this occasion he would move the Parliament to have my Statue set up the Success whereof may deserve a further Remark in its due place Monsieur Van Lewen and I went over in July 1678. in two several Yatchs but met soon at the Hague where upon my first Conference with the Commissioners of Secret Affairs one of them made me the handsomest Dutch Compliment I had met with That they esteemed my coming into Holland like that of the Swallow's which brought fair Weather always with it The Prince received me with the greatest joy in the World hoping by my Errand and the Success of it either to continue the War or recover such Conditions of the Peace for his Allies as had been wrested out of his hands by force of a Faction begun at Amsterdam and spread since into the rest of the Provinces To make way for this Negotiation I concerted with Monsieur Van Lewen to dine at his Country-house with Monsieur Hoeft of Amsterdam Van Tielt of Harlem Patz of Rotterdam and two or three more of the Chief Burgomasters who had promoted the Peace or rather precipitated it upon the French Conditions After Dinner we entred into long Conferences in which Monsieur Van Lewen assur'd them with great confidence of the King's sincereness in the resolutions he had taken and seconded very effectually all I had to say upon that Subject which had the more credit from one who had gone as far as any of them in pursuit and acceptance of the Peace The Prince was impatient to know what had passed in this Meeting which made me go to him that evening and I told him what I was very confident to have found That Monsieur Patz was incurable and not otherwise to be dealt with but that all the rest were good and well meaning persons to their Countrey abused first by Jealousies of His Highness's Match in England by apprehensions of Our Court being wholly in the Measures of France and by the plausible Offers of France towards such a Peace as they could desire for themselves That they were something enlightned by the late refusal of delivering up the Spanish Towns till the satisfaction of Sweden and would I doubted not awaken their several Towns so as to make them receive favourably His Majesty's Proposition upon this Conjuncture It happen'd accordingly for Monsieur Hoeft proposing at Amsterdam to make a tryal and judgment of the sincerity of France upon the whole proceeding of the Peace by their evacuating the Spanish Towns and without it to continue the War he carried his Point there in spight of Valkeneer and the same followed in all the rest of the Towns So that when I fell into this Negotiation I concluded the Treaty in six days by which France was obliged to declare within fourteen after the date thereof That they would evacuate the Spanish Towns or in case of their refusal Holland was engag'd to go on with the War and England immediately to declare it against France in conjunction with Holland and the rest of the Confederates It is hardly to be imagined what a new life this gave to the Authority and Fortunes of the Prince of Orange who was now owned by the States to have made a truer judgment than they had done of the measures they were to expect both from France and England the last having proceeded so resolutely to the offers of entring into the War which was never believed in Holland and France after raising so important a difficulty in the Peace having proceeded in the War so far as to Block up Mons one of the best Frontiers remaining to Flanders which was expected to fall into their hands before the Term fixed for the conclusion or rupture of the Peace should expire Preparations were made with the greatest vigour imaginable for his Highness's Expedition to relieve Mons and about Ten thousand English already arrived in Flanders were ordered to March that way and joyn the Prince He went into the Field with a firm belief that the War would certainly go on since France seemed too far engaged in Honour to yield the Evacuation of the Towns and tho' they should yet Spain could not be ready to Agree and Sign the Peace within the Term limited And he thought that he left the States resolved not to conclude otherwise than in conjunction with that Crown And besides he hoped to engage the French Army before the term for Signing the Peace should expire and resolved to relieve Mons or dye in the attempt whether the Peace succeeded or no so as the continuance of the War seemed inevitable But no man since Solomon ever enough considered how subject all things are to Time and Chance nor how poor Diviners the wisest men are of future Events how plainly soever all things may seem laid towards the producing them nor upon how small accidents the greatest Counsels and Revolutions turn which was never more proved than by the course and event of this Affair After the Treaty concluded and signified to France all the Arts that could be were on that side imployed to elude it by drawing this matter into Treaty or into greater length which had succeeded so well in England They offered to treat upon it at St. Quintin then at Gant where the King Himself would meet such Ambassadors as the Dutch should send to either of those Towns But the States were firm not to recede from their late Treaty concluded with His Majesty and so continued till about five days before the term was to expire Then arrived from England one De Cros formerly a French Monk who some time since had left his Frock for a Petticoat and insinuated himself so far in the Swedish Court as to procure a Commission or Credence at least for a certain petty Agency in England At London he had devoted himself wholly to Monsieur Barillon the French Ambassador tho' pretending to pursue the Interests of Sweden About a Week after I had sent a Secretary into England with the Treaty Signed This man brought me a Packet from Court Commanding me to go immediately away to Nimeguen and there to endeavour all I could and from His Majesty to perswade the Swedish Ambassadors to let the French there know That they would for the good of Christendom consent and even desire the King of France no longer to defer the Evacuation of the Towns and consequently the Peace upon the sole regard and interest of the Crown of Swden I was likewise Commanded to assure the said Ambassadors that after this Peace His Majesty would use all the most effectual Endeavours he could for restitution of the Towns and Countries the Swedes had lost in the War It was not easie for any man to be more surprized than I was by this Dispatch but the Pensioner Fagel was stunned who came and told me the whole Contents of it before I had mentioned it to any man and that De Cros had gone about most
industriously to the Deputies of the several Towns and acquainted them with it and that the Terms of the Peace were absolutely consented and agreed between the two Kings that he had brought me orders to go strait to Nimeguen and that I should at my arrival there meet with Letters from my Lord Sunderland the King's Ambassador at Paris with all the particulars concluded between them How this Dispatch by De Cros was gained or by whom I will not pretend to determin but upon my next return for England the Duke told me That He knew nothing of it till it was gone having been a hunting that morning my Lord Treasurer said all that could be to excuse himself of it and I never talked of it to Secretary Williamson but the King indeed told me pleasantly that the Rogue De Cros had out-witted them all The Account I met with at Court was That these Orders were agreed and dispatched one morning in an hours time and in the Dutchess of Portsmouth's Chamber by the intervention and pursuit of Monsieur Borillon However it was and what endeavours soever were made immediately after at our Court to retrieve this Game it never could be done and this one Incident changed the whole Fate of Christendom and with so little seeming ground for any such Council that before De Cros's arrival at the Hague the Swedish Ambassadors at Nimeguen had made the very same Declaration and Instances to the French Ambassadors there that I was posted away from the Hague upon the pretence of persuading them to resolve on When I arrived at Nimeguen there remained but three days of the term fixed by the late Treaty between His Majesty and the States at the Hague either for the French assent to the evacuation of the Towns or for the carrying on of the War in conjunction of England with Holland and consequently the rest of the Confederates I found all Men there perswaded that the Peace would not succeed and indeed all appearances were against it The French Ambassadors had given many Reasons in a formal sort of Manifesto to the Dutch why the King their Master could not consent to it without the previous satisfaction of Sweden whose Interests he esteemed the same with his own but yet declaring he was willing to receive any expedients the States should offer in this matter either by their Ambassadors at Nimeguen or such as they should send to His most Christian Majesty at Saint Quentin or Gant The Dutch gave them an Answer in Writing declaring It was a matter no longer entire since upon the difficulty raised about the Evacuation of the Towns the States their Masters had been induced to sign a Treaty with England from which they could not recede nor from the day therein fixed for determining the Fate of either Peace or War and as there was no time so there could be no use of any Deputation to St. Quentin or Gant nor any other Expedient besides the assent of France to evacuate the Towns After this the French Ambassador had declared to the Dutch That they had found the King their Master was resolved at the desire of the Swedes to retard the Peace no longer upon their consideration and would consent to evacuate the Towns upon condition the States would send their Deputies to treat upon the ways of securing the future satisfaction to Sweden which was by both intended But the Dutch Ambassadors continued peremptory that there could be no deputation made by their Masters and that if the term fixed by the late Treaty with England should elapse there was no remedy but the War must go on To this the French Ambassadors replying that their hands were bound up from proceeding further without such a Deputation the Peace was thereupon esteemed desperate and the more so because at the same time the Duke of Lutzenburg pressed Mons and the Mareschal Scomberg seemed to threaten Colen demanding of them immediate satisfaction of the Money that had been seized during the Assembly there and Brussels it self grew unquiet upon their finding themselves almost surrounded by French Troops so as the Confederate Ministers thought themselves secure of what they had so much and so long desired and aimed at which was a long War in conjunction with England for they neither believed France would yield a point they had so long and so publickly contested nor if they did that the Dutch would suffer their Ambassadors to sign the Peace without Spain and the time was now too near expiring for agreeing the Terms and Draught of a Treaty between the two Crowns which had not yet been in any kind digested In the midst of these Appearances and Dispositions at Nimeguen came the fatal Day agreed by the late Treaty at the Hague for determining whether a sudden Peace or a long War were to be reckoned upon in Christendom when in the morning early Monsieur Boreel who had been sent from Amsterdam to the Dutch Ambassadors at Nimeguen went to the French Ambassadors and after some Conference with them these three Ambassadors went immediately to those of Holland and declared to them they had received Orders to consent to the evacuation of the Towns and thereupon to sign the Peace but that it must be done that very morning Whether the Dutch were surprized or no they seemed to be so and entring into debate upon several of the Articles as well as upon the Interests of Spain this Conference lasted near five hours but ended in agreement upon all the Points both of Peace and Commerce between France and Holland and Orders for writing all fair with the greatest haste that was possible so as the Treaty might be signed that Night About Four in the Afternoon the French Ambassadors having demanded an hour of me and Sir Lionel came to us at my House gave us an account of their agreement with the Dutch Ambassadors upon all Points in difference between them and of the Treaty's being so ordered as that it should be signed that Evening and made us the offer that they would all come and sign it at my House that so we might have the part in it that was due to the Mediators We answered them That having been sent by His Majesty with Instructions only to Mediate a general Peace we could not by our Orders assist at the signing of a particular One and therefore desired them to excuse us from having any part in this Conclusion between them and the Dutch either by the Signing it at our Houses or by using our Names as Mediators in the Treaty The Dutch Ambassadors came to us likewise with the same Communication and Offer and received the same Answer and I observed their Conversation upon this mighty and sudden turn to be a good deal embarassed and something irresolute and not very well agreed between the two Ambassadors themselves Monsieur Beverning complained of the uncertainty of our Conduct in England and the incurable Jealousies that De Cros's Journey had raised in Holland That
People there with Jealousies of the Prince's Match in England and of Designs from both upon their Liberties by a long and unnecessary Continuance of the War They united the Factions in Amsterdam upon the sente of a Peace and upon their own Conditions to avoid those that had been Proposed by His Majesty When they had gained their Point with the several Deputies in Holland they acquainted the King with their being sure of the Peace on that side and by his Ambassador at Paris made Offers of mighty Sums both to himself and his chief Minister only for their Consent to such a Peace as Holland it self was content with When the States had absolutely resolved on the Peace by the particular Faction of Amsterdam and general Terror upon the French taking of Gant and threatning Antwerp they esteemed the humour in Holland so violent towards the Peace and so unsatisfied with the fluctuation of our Councils in England that they thought they might be bold with them upon the Interests of Spain and so raised the pretence of not evacuating the Towns before the satisfaction of Sweden and tho' I know this was by the Politicians esteemed a wrong pace of France yet I did not think it so but that all Appearances were for their succeeding in it Nor had they reason to believe either our Court or Holland would have resented it to that degree they did or that they could have fallen into such close and sudden measures and with such confidence as they happened to do upon this occasion by the Treaty of July at the Hague When this was concluded they made all the Offers that could be at breaking the force of it by drawing it into Negotiation and by condescentions to the States unusual with that Crown even to the greatest Kings They poysoned it by the Dispatch of de Cros and by his instructions as well as Artifices and Industry to make the Contents of it publick at the Hague which were pretended at Court to be sent over to me with the greatest secret that could be At the same time they made all the Declarations of not receding from the difficulties they had raised otherwise than by Treaty and thereby laid asleep all Jealousies of the Confederates as well as endeavours to prevent a blow they did not believe could arrive where the Honour of France seemed so far ingaged And thus they continued till the very day limitted for their final Declaration The secret was so well kept that none had the least umbrage of it that very morning When they declared it they left not the Dutch Ambassadors time enough to send to their Masters fearing if they had the States would have refused to sign without Spain which could not be ready before the time must have elapsed for incurring the effects of the late Treaty Thus the Peace was gained with Holland His Majesty was excluded from any fair pretence of entring into the War after the vast Expence of raising a great Army and transporting them into Flanders and after a great expectation of his People raised and as they thought deluded Spain was necessitated to accept the terms that the Dutch had negotiated for them and this left the Peace of the Empire wholly at the mercy and discretion of France and the restitution of Lorain which all had consented in wholly abandoned and unprovided So that I must again conclude the Conduct of France to have been admirable in the whole course of this Affair and the Italian Proverb to continue true Che gle Francesi pazzi sono morti On the contrary our Councils and Conduct were like those of a floating Island driven one way or t'other according to the Winds or Tides The Kings dispositions inclin'd him to preserve his measures with France and consequently to promote a Peace which might break the present Confederacy The humour of his People and Parliament was violent towards engaging him in a War the Ministers were wavering between the fears of making their Court ill or of drawing upon them the heats of a House of Commons whom the King's Expences made him always in need of From these humours arose those uncertainties in our Councils that no Man who was not behind the Curtain could tell what to make of and which appeared to others much more mysterious than indeed they were till a new and formidable Engin beginning to appear upon the Stage made the Court fall into an absolute resolution of entring into the War just when it was too late and to post away the Ratifications of the Treaty of July so as to arrive the day after the French and Dutch had sign'd the Peace and after the King had given the States occasion to believe he did not intend to ratifie it but that he had taken his Measures with France for so all Men in Holland concluded from De Cros's Journey and the Commands he brought me for mine to Nimeguen at a time when my presence at the Hague was thought the most necessary both to ratifie the Treaty if it had been intended and to keep the States firm to their resolutions upon it Thus ended in smoak this whole Negotiation which was near raising so great a fire France having made the Peace with Holland treated all the rest of it with ease and leasure as playing a sure Game England to avoid a cruel Convulsion that threatned them at home would fain have gone into the War if Holland would have been prevail'd with but they could not trust us enough to lose the present Interest of Trade for the uncertain Events of a War wherein they thought their Neighbours more concern'd than Themselves About two or three days after my return to the Hague and exchanging the Ratifications came the News of the Battel of Mons between the Prince of Orange and the French under the Command of the Duke of Lutzenburgh who had posted himself with the Strength and Flower of the French Forces so as to prevent the Prince's Design of Relieving Mons. And I remember the day the Dutch Peace was signed at Nimeguen I was saying to the Mareschal d' Estrades That for ought I knew we might have a Peace sign'd and a Battel fought both in one day He reply'd There was no fear of it for the Duke of Lutzenburgh had writ him word He was so posted that if he had but Ten Thousand Men and the Prince Forty ye he was sure he would not be forced whereas he took His Army to be stronger than That of the Prince I need not relate an Action so well known in the World and so shall only say That in spight of many Disadvantages from an Army drawn so suddenly together so hasty a March as that of the Dutch and Posts taken with so much skill and fortified with so much industry by the French as was believed the Prince upon the fourteenth of August attacqued them with a resolution and vigour that at first surprized them and after an obstinate and bloody Fight
upon her back carryed him cross two Rooms set him down at the bottom of the Stairs pull'd off his Shoes put him on a pair of Slippers that stood there and all this without saying a word but when she had done told him He might go up to her Mistress who was in her Chamber I am very glad to have a little divertion with such pleasantries as these the thoughts of the busie Scene I was so deep engaged in that I will confess the very remembrance of it and all the strange surprizing turns of it began to renew those cruel Motions they had raised both in my head and heart whilst I had so great and so sensible a part in them But to return where I left the thread of these Affairs After the Peace of Holland and France the Ministers of the Confederates especially those of Denmark and Brandenbargh employed their last Efforts to prevent the Spaniards agreeing to their part of the Peace as accepted for them by the Dutch They exclaimed at their breach of Honour and Interest That what was left the Spaniards in Flanders by those Terms was indefensible and could serve but to exhaust their Men and Treasures to no purpose That the Design of France was only to break this present Confederacy by these separate Treaties and so leave the Spaniards abandoned by their Allies upon the next Invasion which they would have reason to expect if Spain should use them with as little regard of their Honour and Treaties as the Dutch Ambassadors seemed to design These themselves also met with some difficulties in their Mediation by a Pretension raised in France upon the County of Beaumont and Town of Bovigues which they did not find to have been mentioned in what had passed between the French and Dutch upon the score of Spain before the Peace was signed All these Circumstances began to make it look uncertain what would at length be determined by the States as to their Ratifications which were like to be delayed till Spain had concluded their Treaty though those of France had been dispatched so as to arrive at Nimeguen the twenty second of this Month and Monsieur d' Avaux commanded from thence to the Hague in quality of Ambassador Extraordinary to the States and the French Army had retired into France at the same time the Dutch return'd from before Mons. So that all seemed on the French side resolved to pursue the Peace on the side of the Empire and Princes of the North to carry on the War On the Spaniards very irresolute whether or no to accept the Peace the Dutch had mediated for them And in Holland 't was doubtful whether to ratifie that their Ambassadors had signed and whether at least before the Treaty of Spain should be agreed Whilst the minds of men were busied with different reasonings and presages as well as wishes upon this Conjuncture About the end of August Mr. Hyde arrived at the Hague from England without the least intimation given me of his Journey or his Errand so that I was surprized both to see him and to hear the design of such a sudden dispatch The substance of it was to acquaint the States how much the King had been surprized at the news of their Ambassadors having signed a particular Treaty with France even without the inclusion of Spain and without any Guaranty given for the evacution of the Towns within the time requisit To complain of this Precipitation of the States and at the same time of the new Pretensions that Franee had advanced upon the County of Beaumont and the Town of Bovigues which had retarded the Peace of Spain and hindred it from being concluded at the same time with that of Holland which His Majesty understood always to have been the Intention of the States as well as His own That for these Reasons he understood and believed that the late Treaty of July between His Majesty and the States ought to take effect the case being fallen out against which that was provided and both Parties being thereby obliged to enter jointly into the War against France That if the States would hereupon refuse to ratify the Treaty their Ministers had signed at Nimeguen His Majesty offered to declare War immediately against France and carry it on in all points according to the Articles and Obligations of the said Treaty with the States Tho' Mr. Hyde did not know or did not tell me the true spring of this resolute pace that was made by our Court so different from all the rest in the whole course of this Affair yet he assured me they were both in earnest and very warm upon the scent and desired nothing so much as to enter immediately and vigorously into the War in case Holland would be perswaded to continue it and that no time nor endeavours were to be neglected in pursuing the Commission he brought over which was given jointly to us both and recommended to me particularly from Court with all the instances and earnestness that could be When I carried him that very Evening to the Prince at Hounslerdike and he acquainted his Highness with the whole extent of his Errand and Instructions The Prince received it very coldly and only advised him to give in a Memorial to the States and ask Commissioners to treat by whom he would find what the Mind of the States was like to be upon this Affair and at which he would at present make no conjecture After a short Audience Mr. Hyde went to the Princess and left me alone with the Prince who as soon as he was gone lift up his Hands two or three times and said Was ever any thing so hot and so cold as this Court of yours Will the King that is so often at Sea never learn a Word that I shall never forget since my last passage When in a great Storm the Captain was all Night crying out to the Man at the Helm Steddy Steddy Steddy if this Dispatch had come twenty days ago it had changed the Face of Affairs in Christendom and the War might have been carried on till France had yielded to the Treaty of the Pyrenees and left the World in quiet for the rest of our lives As it comes now it will have no effect at all at least that is my opinion tho I would not say so to Mr. Hyde After this he ask'd me what I could imagin was at the bottom of this new heat in our Court and what could make it break out so mal a propos after the dissatisfaction they had expressed upon the late Treaty when it was first sent over and the Dispatch of De Cros so contrary to the design of it I told him very truly That I was perfectly ignorant of the whole matter and could give no guess at the motions of it And so I continued till some Months after when I was advised That the business of the Plot which has since made so much noise in the World was just
of the Confederates and was now extremely dissatisfied with the conclusion of the Peace and with the Ministry that he thought either assisted or at least might have prevented it and in these dispositions he was like to be follow'd by the best and soberest part of the House of Commons For my Lord Treasurer and Lord Chamberlain I found them two most admirable Emblems of the true and so much admir'd Felicity of Ministers of State The last notwithstanding the greatest skill of Court and the best turns of Wit in particular Conversation that I have known there and the great Figure he made in the First Part of these Memoirs was now grown out of all Credit and Confidence with the King the Duke and Prince of Orange and thereby forc'd to support himself by Intrigues with the persons most discontented against my Lord Treasurer's Ministry whose Greatness he so much envy'd and who was yet at this time in much worse condition than himself tho not so sensible of it for he had been very ill with the late Parliament upon account of Transactions with France which tho He had not approved yet He durst not defend Himself from the imputation for fear of exposing his Master He was hated by the French Ambassador for endeavouring as he thought to engage the King in a War with France He was in danger of being pursued by his Enemies next Parliament for having as they pretended made the Peace and endeavoured to stifle the Plot and yet I found within a Fortnight after I arrived that he sat very loose with the King his Master who told me several reasons of that change whereof one was his having brought the business of the Plot into the Parliament against his absolute Command and to compleat the happy and envied state of this Chief Minister the Dutchess of Portsmouth and Earl of Sunderland were joined with the Duke of Monmouth and Earl of Shaftsbury in the design of his ruin What a Game so embroyled and play'd on all sides with so much heat and passion was like to end in no man could tell But I that never had any thing so much at heart as the Union of my Countrey which I thought the only way to its greatness and felicity was very unwilling to have any part in the Divisions of it the deplorable effects whereof I had been too much acquainted with in the Stories of Athens and Rome as well as of England and France and for this reason tho I was very much pressed to enter upon the Secretary's Office immediately after my arrival yet I delay'd it by representing to His Majesty how necessary it was for him to have one of the Secretaries in the House of Commons where it had been usual to have them both and that consequently it was very unfit for me to enter upon that Office before I got into the House which was attempted and failed But how long this excuse lasted and how it was succeeded by many new and various accidents and how I was prevailed with by the King to have the Part I had afterwards in a new Constitution of Councel and how after almost two years unsuccessful endeavours at some Union or at least some allay of the heats and distempers between the King and His Parliaments I took the resolution of having no more to do with Affairs of State will be the Subject of a Third Part of these Memoirs FINIS In troth I think you love us as you do yours That a King of England who will be the MAN of People is the greatest King in the world but if he will be something more he is nothing at all And I will be the MAN of my people Birdlime never catches great Birds * Whence come you It answer'd From Marinnâ—n The Prince to whom do you belong The Parrot To a Portugez Prince What do you there I look after the Chickens The Prince laugh'd and said You look after the Chickens The Parrot answered Yes I and I know well enough how to do it With Blows That there are some wounds among you that will bleed still if there be not care taken of them What do you intend then Sirs to make us be torn in pieces by the Rabble * The Lilly shall Invade the Land of the Lion bearing wild Beasts in its Arms the Eagle shall move its Wings and the Son of Man shall come to his assistance from the South then there shall be great War throughout the World but after four Years Peace shall shine forth and the Son of Man be deliver'd by those from whom his ruin was expected 1. That for avoiding the Inconvenient that may happen by the great number of Coaches in the streets that are so narrow and the Corners so incommodious the Ambassadors Mediators propose Not to make any Visits tho' they be Visits of Ceremony with more than Two Pages and Four Lackeys to each Ambassador and to have but one Coach with two Horses and not to go to the Place of Conference or other publick places with more than one Page and two Lackeys to every Ambassador 2. That when Coaches meet in these narrow places where there is not room to pass by one another every one instead of contending for Place or precedency shall mind rather to make the passage easie to one another and stop the first if he have the first notice that the Pass is too strait and also give place to the other if it be more easily done on his side than on the other side 3. That no Lackey shall carry either sword staff or stick in the streets nor Pages any more than a little stick 4. That the Ambassador upon any Crime committed against the publick Peace by any of their Domesticks shall renounce all Protection of the said Domesticks and deliver them up into the hands of the Justice of the City desiring and authorizing them to proceed against them according to their ordinary rules 5. That in case any insult or quarrel should be made by the Domesticks of one Ambassador with those of another Ambassador or any other publick Minister the Ambassadors will deliver up such of their Domesticks into the hands of the Master of the Party offended to be punisht at his discretion That the Mediation was always on foot for to go on with its business Full Powers Like able Men. Their Strength and their Weakness And in this distress of their State by so long a War All means were first to be tried An incurable Wound As a Storm that has ceased after it had threatned much and made but little alterations in the World To push the business on as far as it is possible The Will of the King Whipt Cream And when one is at High Mass one is at it Had been wanting in respect to the King their Master Rascal I 'll set a mark on thee at least that I may hang thee afterwards Of a sound mind A sorry wight That he had still life for one half hour of Conversation The French Fools are dead An easie Governess Unseasonably Right of Decency