dmiral Ruyter, with a hundred vessels of war and
fifty fire-ships, repaired to the coasts of England in search of his
foes. He met the allied fleet on the 7th of June, 1672, and in the
heroic naval battle of Solbaie disabled and dispersed it. This gave
Holland the entire supremacy on the sea. Thus suddenly Louis XIV.
found himself checked, and no farther progress was possible.

The Prince of Orange gave all his private revenues to the state, and
entered into negotiations with other powers, who were already alarmed
by the encroachments of the French king. The Emperor of Germany, the
Spanish court, and Flanders, entered into an alliance with the heroic
prince. He even compelled Charles II. to withdraw from that union with
Louis XIV. which was opposed to the interests of England, and into
which his court had been reluctantly dragged. Troops from all quarters
were hurrying forward for the protection of Holland.

The villainy of Louis XIV. was thwarted. Chagrined at seeing his
conquest at an end, but probably with no compunctions of conscience
for the vast amount of misery his crime had caused, he left his
discomfited army under the command of Turenne and the other generals,
and returned to his palaces in France.

The troops which remained in Holland committed outrages which rendered
the very name of the French detested. Louis, from the midst of the
pomp and pleasure of his palaces, still displayed extraordinary
energies. Agents were dispatched to all the courts of Europe with
large sums of money for purposes of bribery. By his diplomatic
cunning, Hungary was roused against Austria. Gold was lavished upon
the King of England to induce him, notwithstanding the opposition of
the British Parliament, to continue in alliance with France. Several
of the petty states of Germany were bought over. Louis greatly
increased his naval force. He soon had forty ships of war afloat,
besides a large number of fire-ships.

But Europe had been so alarmed by his encroachments and his menaces
that, notwithstanding his efforts at diplomacy and intrigue, he was
compelled to abandon his enterprise, and withdraw his troops from the
provinces he had overrun.

[Illustration: PORTE ST. DENIS.]

In the early part of his campaign, Louis, flushed with victory and
assured of entire success, had commenced building, as a monument of
his great achievement, the arch of triumph at the gate of St. Denis.
The structure was scarcely completed ere he was com