d and
uninterrupted; and for that cause the foresaid Lord Protector and
Commonwealth have been pleased to send their Extraordinary Ambassador
unto us: therefore we have commanded, and do by these presents, in the
best form, command and commit unto the most illustrious our sincerely
faithful and beloved the Lord Axel Oxenstiern, Chancellor and Senator of
us and the kingdom of Sweden, etc., and also to Lord Eric Oxenstiern of
Axel, likewise a Senator of us and of the Kingdom of Sweden, etc., that
they do treat, agree, and conclude with the before-named Ambassador and
Plenipotentiary about the making of a league concerning the foresaid
matters and other things thereunto pertaining. Whatsoever therefore our
said Plenipotentiary Commissioners shall act, conclude, and appoint with
the before-named Ambassador, we shall hold the same ratified and
confirmed by force of these presents; in witness and strengthening
whereof, we have commanded these presents, subscribed with our hand, to
be corroborated with our great seal of the kingdom. Given in our castle
of Upsal, the fourteenth day of March, in the year one thousand six
hundred fifty and four. CHRISTINA."

[193] [No sooner had Cromwell assumed the Protectorate than his foreign
policy took a more definite shape, and was steadily directed to two great
objects--peace with Holland, and the union of the Protestant States. The
conclusion of the Dutch peace was however not an easy matter. Cromwell
himself had declared in favour of the daring project of a union of the
two Republics, and the Dutch alliance was hated by many of his stoutest
military supporters. Moreover he required of the Dutch, as a condition
_sine qua non_, that they should engage never to make the young Prince of
Orange or his descendants their Stadtholder, or to give him the command
of their forces. This was the secret article against which the States
General most vehemently protested, and Cromwell was at length obliged to
content himself with an engagement of the province of Holland to exclude
the House of Orange. Even this pretension was strongly opposed by De
Witt, but Cromwell insisted. The public treaty of peace was signed on the
5th of April, 1654; but it was not until the 5th of June following that
the secret article was ratified. The King of Denmark, the Swiss
Protestant cantons, the Hanseatic towns, and some of the Protestant
Princes of North Germany were included in the treaty, which formed the
complement o