436 The Netherlands. [OCT. 



before a year was over, he had lost his army, his conquests, and when 

 on the point of deservedly losing his head, made his escape to the 

 enemy. The French again poured into the Netherlands in 179.3, again 

 beat the Austrians, were beaten by the English under the Duke of 

 York, again poured in their enormous population, hunted the allies 

 from river to river, and from ditch to ditch, till they cleared the land 

 of Englishman, Austrian, Russian, and German, dukes, counts, and 

 governors ; and then sat down tranquilly to the second part of republican 

 prowess, universal robbery. 



The first fraternal demand of France upon her new relative in liberty, 

 Holland, was one hundred millions of florins ! In return, she gave her 

 a new constitution, with permission to hang all emigrants, Orangists, 

 and pensioners of the old government. Holland had three constitutions 

 in as many years, and tried the successive wisdom of a States General, 

 a National Assembly, and a Directory. But, to qualify these varieties 

 of freedom, she saw her fleet shattered into fragments by the English 

 at Camperdown, in 1 797* and her territory the scene of a succession of 

 ravage and battle between her old allies and her new ; Englishmen and 

 Frenchmen slaughtering each other, and each and all living on the 

 Dutchman. But the consummation of the fraternal system was reserved 

 for one greater than all the Dumouriez. Napoleon sent his commands 

 to regenerated Holland, that she should thenceforth be exalted into the 

 nobler name of France ; that she should be bankrupt for three-fourths of 

 her national debt ; that the Berlin and Milan decrees should shut up her 

 warehouses, burn her merchandize, and consign her ships to rot in her 

 harbours, and that she should have the conscription, and contribute one 

 half of her population of the age of twenty, every year, or as much 

 oftener as might be expedient, to the armies of France ! 



But the Dutch had still other causes to remember Napoleon. That 

 keen inquirer into the hearts of men knew that the people bore his 

 arrangements sulkily ; and to prevent disturbance, he adopted the 

 Turkish contrivance of hostages. The sons of all the leading families 

 were instantly ordered to equip themselves as dragoons, and follow the 

 emperor to the field. No profession, pursuit, or taste was suffered to 

 stand in the way of the sovereign will. The doctor, the lawyer, the 

 clergyman, the manufacturer, the merchant, found themselves, to their 

 astonishment, galloping side by side, under the orders of a French 

 marshal, riding into the mouths of cannon, and squares of bayonets, and 

 charging every thing from the Pyrenees to the Pole. 



Napoleon's finance was as vigorous as his tactics. Every foot of 

 Dutch land paid twenty-five per cent, of the actual rent, and every 

 house thirty per cent, to the Imperial treasury. All things else, move- 

 able and immoveable, were loaded with taxation. Holland was beggared, 

 starved/ in rags, but glorious. The population was thinned by the thou- 

 sand ; they could not emigrate, for on one side was the English fleet, 

 and on the other the French bayonet; but they died. The Seven 

 Provinces were one vast mass of pauperism, where the only place of 

 secure food was a prison or a barrack. All was disease, discontent, and 

 " looped and windowed nakedness ;" but in recompense, they learned 

 French, and had the Code Napoleon. 



Belgium followed, step by step, with the United States, down the 

 slope of universal beggary. The taxes tore away the coat from the 



