ht in which the
subtle Franciscan had first stolen into the prince's cabinet down to this
autumn evening, not a step of real progress could be recorded as the
result of the intolerable quantity of speech-making and quill-driving.
There were boat-loads of documents, protocols, and notes, drowsy and
stagnant as the canals on which they were floated off towards their tombs
in the various archives. Peace to the dust which we have not wantonly
disturbed, believing it to be wholesome for the cause of human progress
that the art of ruling the world by doing nothing, as practised some
centuries since, should once and again be exhibited.

Not in vain do we listen to those long-bearded, venerable, very tedious
old presidents, advocates, and friars of orders gray, in their high
ruffs, taffety robes or gowns of frieze, as they squeak and gibber, for a
fleeting moment, to a world which knew them not. It is something to learn
that grave statesmen, kings, generals, and presidents could negotiate for
two years long; and that the only result should be the distinction
between a conjunction, a preposition, and an adverb. That the provinces
should be held as free States, not for free States--that they should be
free in similitude, not in substance--thus much and no more had been
accomplished.

And now to all appearance every chance of negotiation was gone. The
half-century war, after this brief breathing space, was to be renewed for
another century or so, and more furiously than ever. So thought the
public. So meant Prince Maurice. Richardot and Jeannin knew better.

The departure of the commissioners was recorded upon the register of the
resolutions of Holland, with the ominous note: "God grant that they may
not have sown, evil seed here; the effects of which will one day be
visible in the ruin of this commonwealth."

Hardly were the backs of the commissioners turned, before the
indefatigable Jeannin was ready with his scheme for repatching the
rupture. He was at first anxious that the deputies of Zeeland should be
summoned again, now that the country was rid of the Spaniards. Prince
Maurice, however, was wrathful when the president began to talk once more
of truce. The proposition, he said, was simply the expression of a wish
to destroy the State. Holland and Zeeland would never agree to any such
measure, and they would find means to compel the other provinces to
follow their example. If there were but three or four cities in the whol