portion of Westphalia, nearly all of the Lower Rhine region from Mainz to
Aix-la-Chapelle, and Swedish Pomerania, for which Prussia paid some eight
million thalers by way of indemnity.

[Sidenote: Restoration of the Netherlands]

In Holland, the new Stadtholder, Prince William Frederick of Orange-Nassau,
having incorporated Belgium as an integral part of the kingdom of the
Netherlands, set himself to nullify the French racial traits of his Belgian
subjects. A suggestion of future strife on this score could already be
found in Van der Palm's memorial on "The Restoration of the Netherlands,"
published during this year.

[Sidenote: England's commanding position]

[Sidenote: Industrial depression]

[Sidenote: Art and Letters]

The final settlement of Napoleon's great upheaval of Europe left England
feverish and exhausted. The prolonged financial strain of twenty years of
war had saddled Great Britain with a national debt of eight hundred million
pounds. Of material gain there was little to show but the acquisition of
Ceylon and the Cape of Good Hope from the Dutch; of the former French
colony of Mauritius, and of a few West Indian islands. The continued
possession of the Rock of Gibraltar, and of Malta, the old stronghold of
the Knights of Malta, together with the British protectorate over the Ionic
Isles, assured to England her commanding position in the Mediterranean. At
home the pressure of the heavy taxes required to meet the financial
legacies of the war was imbittered by the general distress of the country.
The new tax on the importation of grains resulted in famine prices.
Corresponding tariff restrictions abroad kept British markets overstocked
with goods. Mills and factories had to be shut down, while at the same time
the labor market was glutted with several hundred thousand discharged
sailors and soldiers. The starving working people grew bitter in their
opposition to new labor-saving devices. Thus the appearance of the first
steamship on the Thames and of the earliest ships constructed of iron,
followed shortly by Sir Francis Reynold's invention of an electric
clock-work telegraph and by James Watt's introduction of stereo plates in
book-printing, heightened this feeling. The resentment of laboring men
found expression in riotous meetings at Manchester, Littleport and
Nottingham. The movement spread to London. A great labor meeting was held
there on the Spa fields. The favorite newspaper of the workingmen,