by surprise,
utterly defenceless, and apparently without resource. Envy of
his uncommon merit aggravated the just complaints against his
error. But, above all things, the popular affection to the young
prince threatened, in some great convulsion, the overthrow of
the pensionary, who was considered eminently hostile to the
illustrious House of Orange.

[Illustration: A HOLLAND BEAUTY]

William III., prince of Orange, now twenty-two years of age,
was amply endowed with those hereditary qualities of valor and
wisdom which only required experience to give him rank with the
greatest of his ancestors. The Louvenstein party, as the adherents
of the House of Orange were called, now easily prevailed in their
long-conceived design of placing him at the head of affairs,
with the titles of captain-general and high admiral. De Witt,
anxious from personal considerations, as well as patriotism, to
employ every means of active exertion, attempted the organization
of an army, and hastened the equipment of a formidable fleet of
nearly a hundred ships of the line and half as many fire-ships.
De Ruyter, now without exception the greatest commander of the
age, set sail with this force in search of the combined fleets
of England and France, commanded by the duke of York and Marshal
D'Etrees. He encountered them, on the 6th of May, 1672, at Solebay.
A most bloody engagement was the result of this meeting. Sandwich,
on the side of the English, and Van Ghent, a Dutch admiral, were
slain. The glory of the day was divided; the victory doubtful;
but the sea was not the element on which the fate of Holland
was to be decided.

The French armies poured like a torrent into the territories
of the republic. Rivers were passed, towns taken, and provinces
overrun with a rapidity much less honorable to France than
disgraceful to Holland. No victory was gained--no resistance
offered; and it is disgusting to look back on the fulsome panegyrics
with which courtiers and poets lauded Louis for those facile
and inglorious triumphs. The Prince of Orange had received the
command of a nominal army of seventy thousand men; but with this
undisciplined and discouraged mass he could attempt nothing. He
prudently retired into the province of Holland, vainly hoping
that the numerous fortresses on the frontiers would have offered
some resistance to the enemy. Guelders, Overyssel and Utrecht
were already in Louis's hands. Groningen and Friesland were
threatened. Ho