History of the United Netherlands, 1608b | Page 9

country.
First citizen of Holland, perpetual chairman of a board of ambitious
shopkeepers who purposed to dictate laws to the world from their
counting-house table, with an unerring eye for the interests of the
commonwealth and his own, with much vision, extraordinary
eloquence, and a magnificent will, he is as good a sample of a great
burgher--an imposing not a heroic figure--as the times had seen.
A vast stride had been taken in the world's progress. Even monopoly

was freedom compared to the sloth and ignorance of an earlier epoch
and of other lands, and although the days were still far distant when the
earth was to belong to mankind, yet the modern republic was leading,
half unconsciously, to a period of wider liberty of government,
commerce, and above all of thought.
Meantime, the period assigned for the departure of the Spanish
commissioners, unless they brought a satisfactory communication from
the king, was rapidly approaching.
On the 24th September Verreyken returned from Brussels, but it was
soon known that he came empty handed. He informed the French and
English ambassadors that the archdukes, on their own responsibility,
now suggested the conclusion of a truce of seven years for Europe only.
This was to be negotiated with the States-General as with free people,
over whom no pretensions of authority were made, and the hope was
expressed that the king would give his consent to this arrangement.
The ambassadors naturally refused to carry the message to the States.
To make themselves the mouthpieces of such childish suggestions was
to bring themselves and their masters into contempt. There had been
trifling enough, and even Jeannin saw that the storm of indignation
about to burst forth would be irresistible. There was no need of any
attempt on the part of the commissioners to prolong their stay if this
was the result of the fifteen days' grace which had so reluctantly been
conceded to them. To express a hope that the king might perhaps give
his future approval to a proceeding for which his signed and sealed
consent had been exacted as an indispensable preliminary, was carrying
effrontery further than had yet been attempted in these amazing
negotiations.
Prince Maurice once more addressed the cities of Holland, giving vent
to his wrath in language with which there was now more sympathy than
there had been before. "Verreyken has come back," he said, "not with a
signature, but with a hope. The longer the enemy remains in the
country the more he goes back from what he had originally promised.
He is seeking for nothing more than, in this cheating way and in this
pretence of waiting for the king's consent--which we have been
expecting now for more than eighteen months--to continue the ruinous
armistice. Thus he keeps the country in a perpetual uncertainty, the
only possible consequence of which is our complete destruction. We

adjure you therefore to send a resolution in conformity with our late
address, in order that through these tricks and snares the fatherland may
not fall into the clutch of the enemy, and thus into eternal and
intolerable slavery. God save us all from such a fate!"
Neither Barneveld nor Jeannin attempted to struggle against the almost
general indignation. The deputies of Zeeland withdrew from the
assembly of the States-General, protesting that they would never appear
there again so long as the Spanish commissioners remained in the
country. The door was opened wide, and it was plain that those
functionaries must take their departure. Pride would not allow them to
ask permission of the States to remain, although they intimated to the
ambassadors their intense desire to linger for ten or twelve days longer.
This was obviously inadmissible, and on the 30th September they
appeared before the Assembly to take leave.
There were but three of them, the Genoese, the Spaniard, and the
Burgundian--Spinola, Mancicidor; and Richardot. Of the two
Netherlanders, brother John was still in Spain, and Verreyken found it
convenient that day to have a lame leg.
President Richardot, standing majestically before the States-General,
with his robes wrapped around his tall, spare form, made a solemn
farewell speech of mingled sorrow, pity, and the resentment of injured
innocence. They had come to the Hague, he said, sent by the King of
Spain and the archdukes to treat for a good and substantial peace,
according to the honest intention of his Majesty and their Highnesses.
To this end they had sincerely and faithfully dealt with the gentlemen
deputed for that purpose by their High Mightinesses the States, doing
everything they could think of to further the cause of peace. They
lamented that the issue had not been such as they had hoped,
notwithstanding that the king and archdukes had so far derogated from
their reputation as to send their commissioners into the