the French, but for various reasons the conquest of the country was delayed until 1795. In the closing months of 1794 Piehegru. at the head of a large and v1ctor1ous army, invaded the Provinces The very severe frost of that winter gave his troops an easy passage over all the rivers and low-lving daring invasion of Napoleon, however, afforded the Dutch and Belgian contingents of the allied army the opportunity to fight side by side under the command of William, prince of Orange, eldest son of the new king, who highly distinguished himself by his gallantry at Quatre Bras, and afterwards at Waterloo where lands, town after town fell before him, he occupied grrow of Amsterdam, and crossing the ice with his cavalry took the Dutch fleet, as it lay frost-bound at the “at” Texel. The s tad holder and his family fled to England, and the disorganized remnants of the allied forces under the duke of York retreated into Germany. The “ patriots, ” as the anti-Orange republicans still styled themselves, Flight of . .
W, ,, , am V received the French with open arms and public rejoicings, and the government was reorganized so as to bring it into close harmon with tfat of Paris The stad u. y I .
holder ate, the offices of captain and admiral-general, and all the ancient organization of the United Netherlands were abolished, and were transformed into the Batavian Republic, in closing alliance with France. But the Dutch had soon cause ggfavlan to regret their Ievolutionary ardour. French alliance Re, ,, ,, ,, ;¢ meant French domination, and participation in the wars of the Revolution. Its consequences were the total ruin of Dutch commerce, and the seizure of all the Dutch colonies by the English. Internally one change of government succeeded another; after the States-General came a national convention; then in 1798 a constituent offiovern-
e, ,¢ assembly with an executive directory, then chambers of representatives, then a return to the eailier systems under the names of the eight provincial and one central Commissions (1801). These changes were the outcome of a gradual reaction in a conservative direction.
The peace of Amiens gave the country a little rest, and the Dutch got back the Cape of Good Hope and their West Indian C colonies, it was, however, but the brief and deceptive Changes
°”s“ Interlude between two storms- when war began tutlon of
1805. again England once more took possession of all she had restored. In 1805 the autocratic will of Napoleon Bonaparte imposed upon them a new constitution, and Rutger Ian Schimmelpenninck (I7OS'1825) was made, under the ancient title of grand pensionary, head of the government. In the next year the French emperor added Holland, as the United Provinces were now named, to the ring of dependent sovereign ties, by means of which he sought to build up a universal empire, and he forced his brother Louis to be the unwilling king of an unwilling people. The new Lads king was a man of excellent Intentions and did his Bonaparte best to promote the interest of l11s subjects, but finding Kinzvf himself unable to protect them from the despotic "°”"d' over lordship of his brother, after a four years' reign, Louis abdicated. In 1810 the Northern Netherlands by decree of Napoleon were incorporated in the French empire, and had to bear the burdens of conscription and of a crushing weight of taxation. The defeat of Leipzig in 1813 was the signal for a general revolt in the Netherlands, the prince of Orange (son of William V) was recalled, and amidst eneral he was wounded (see WILLIAM II., king of the Netherlands). The Congress of Vienna confirmed the;f '1€i"';'d';" arrangements made by the treaty of London, and B, ,, sse|s William I. was crowned king of the Netherlands at Brussels on the 27th of September 1815. Under the constitution the king, as hereditary sovereign, possessed full executive powers, and the initiative in proposing laws. He had Const, the power of appointing his own council of state. ¢, ,¢1, ,, , The legislative body bore the time-honoured title of vfihf States-General, and was divided into an Upper gfggr Chamber nominated by the king, and a Lower Chamber elected by the people. Freedom of worship, freedom of the press, and political equality were principles of the con guaranteed to all
stitution,
The union of the Dutch and Belgian provinces, like so many of the territorial arrangements of the Congress of Vienna, was an attempt to create a strong state out of diverse Difference
and Jairing elements. It was an art1fic1al union, between which nothing but consummate tact and statesman- Ulf Dvivh ship could have 1endered permanent and solid. North #Hd B°w° provinces.
and south were divided from one another by religious belief, by laws alld usages, by material interests and 7
by two centuries and a half of widely severed national life. The Belgians were strict Catholics, the Dutch Calvinistic Protestants. The Dutch were chiefly a commercial and seafaring people, with interests in distant lands and colonial possessions, the Belgians were agriculturists, except where their abundance of minerals made them manufacturers. The national traits of the Dutch were a blend of German and English, the national leaning of the Belgians was towards France and French ideals. Nevertheless the materials were there out of which a really broad-m1nded and conciliatory handling of religion and racial difficulties might have gradually bu1lt up a Netherland nation able to hold from its population and resources a considerable place among European powers. For it must not be forgotten that some two-thirds of the Belgian people are by origin and language of the same race as the Dutch. But when difficulties and differences arose between North and South, as they were sure to arise, they were not dealt with wisely. The king had good intentions, but his mind was warped by Dutch William I, kmg of the Netherlands (see WILLIAM I, 8
gjerelgn rejoicing accepted at Amsterdam the offer of the p, .;, , ce sovereignty under a free constitution (Dec. 1, 1813), with the title of sovereign prince. On the downfall of Napoleon the great powers determined to create in the Low Countries a pow erful state, and by the treaty of London (June Creation 14, 1814) the Belgians were united with the Dutch Mme provinces to form the kingdom of the Netherlands, Kingdom w hich was also to include the bishopric of Liege and 01012 the duchy of Bouillon, and the prince of Orange was placed upon the throne on the 15th of March 1815 as kmg of the Netherlands). The ancestral possessions of the House of Nassau were exchanged for Luxemburg, of which territory King William in his personal capacity ""'”""' b dd L Th ° f 11 1
d, edDa, , s ecame gran u e. e carrying out 0 the reaty was delayed by the Hundred Days' campaign, which for a short time threatened its very existence The prejudices, and he was ill-advised and acted unadvisedly. The consequences were the Belgian Revolution of 1830, The which ended in the intervention of the great powers, Belgian and the setting up, in 1831, of Belgium as an indepen- R"°l“ dent kingdom. The final settlement of outstanding "°" questions between the two countries was not reached till 1839 (for an account of the Belgian Revolut ion, see BELGIUM). King W1lliamI Inthefollowingyear, having become unpopular through his resistance to reform, resigned his crown to sggggf his son William II., who reigned in peace till his " death in 1849, when he was succeeded by his eldest son William III. (see WILLIAM III., king of the Netherlands). His accession marked the beginning of constitutional ment in the Netherlands. William I. had been to govern-
a large extent a personal ruler, but William II., glizczfsof though for a time following in his father's steps, had W”U"1" been moved by the revolutionary outbreaks of 1848 m to concede a revision of the constitution. The fundamental law of 1848 enacted that the first chamber of the States-General should be elected by the Provincial Estates instead of being appointed by the king, and that the 222 second chamber should be elected directly by all of|343 persons paying a certain amount in taxation. Ministers were declared responsible to the States-General, and a liberal measure of self-government was also granted. During the long reign of William III. (1849-1890) the chief struggles of parties
in the Netherlands centred round religious education. On