organized this affembly, that forty-four fuffrages should to all efficient purposes conftitute the majority of one hundred and forty-four. The affembly was with this view divided into seven sections or chambers, over each of which a prince of the blood prefided. Voting by fections, the majority of four would of course be accounted as the majority of the whole, although had the votes been individually taken, the majority might very poffibly be converted into an infignificant minority. Notwithstanding thefe precautions, fo difficult of restraint are the spirit of ambition and the love of power, that the NOTABLES foon difpleyed a very refractory difpofition. Numerous objections were started to the plan laid before them. To the new territorial impoft they positively refused their concurrence, unless the accounts and eftimates of the government were fubmitted to their infpection. This was refused with disdain; and the king caufed it to be fignified to them, "that he was determined to introduce the impôt territorial, and that it therefore became them to debate, not the principle of the measure, but the most equitable form it could affume." This only rendered the difcontent of the affembly violent and general. It was faid, that the minifter had convoked them merely to ferve as a battery, from which to play off his artillery against the parliaments, and oblige them to register the plans he adopted. The enemies of M. de Calonne feized with eagerness this favorable opportunity to effect his ruin. The count de Vergennes, who had powerfully fupported in the cabinet the authority and credit of M. Necker, had expired a few days only before the meeting of the NOTABLES. The marefchal de Caftries, minister of the marine, the baron de Breteuil, master of the household, and M. de Miromefnil, keeper of the feals, all of the queen's party, were active in the design, in which they were zealously affifted by the numerous friends of Mr. Necker. In the midst of their investigations, and while M. de Calonne was apparently

parently unfufpicious of danger, the affembly was adjourned from the 5th to the 12 of April for the Eafter recess: and on the 8th that minister was difmiffed from his employments. Nevertheless, that the triumph of his enemies might, not be complete, M. de Miromefnil was at the fame time, conformably to the weak and wavering policy of the monarch, commanded to refign the feals. The public clamor and odium rifing high against M. de Calonne, whom it was now the fashion to reprefent as the most extravagant and profligate of minifters, he was exiled by the king to his eftate in Lorraine; and he foon afterwards thought it expedient to take refuge in foreign parts from the inveterate rage of his enemies.

M. de Calonne was fucceeded, after a fhort interval, by M. Lomenie de Brienne, archbishop of Toulouse-a leading member of the affembly of notables, and of great popularity in the kingdom at large, as an undaunted advocate and affertor of the principles of univerfal liberty. The facrifice of M. de Calonne produced no conceffions in favor of the court. The affembly of notables, in their fubfequent fitting, declared themfelves utterly incompetent cither to fuggeft different taxes, or to adopt and fanction thofe which had been propofed. The views of the court being thus finally fruftrated, the affembly was dif folved (May 25, 1787), with a cold acknowledgment from the fovereign of the fervices which they had rendered to the public; and the archbishop of Toulouse entered upon his office with the profpect of encountering difficulties ftill more infuperable than thofe which had proved too mighty to be overcome by the far fuperior ability of his celebrated predeceffor.

It is not wonderful that, things being thus circumftanced, no vigorous measures were adopted by France to counteract the united interference of England and Pruffia in the affairs of Holland. In the month of July (1787), the ftates of Holland prefented to the ftates general a propofition for foliciting the meVOL. II. Bb diation

diation of the court of Versailles; foon after which, the French ambaffador prefented also a memorial to the ftates general, declaring the king his mafter to be highly fenfible of this mark of the confidence of the republic, and ready to co-operate by every means in his power for the restoration of harmony and peace. So late as the month of September, France tardily profeffed her intention of affifting the Dutch, in cafe they were attacked by any foreign power. This only animated the court of London to act with the greater spirit and decifion, and vigorous naval preparations were made to fupport the king of Pruffia, in opposition to the menacing declarations of France. But the object of the Pruffian expedition being accomplished in a much shorter space of time than could have been previously imagined, the court of Verfailles found itself, probably not without a fecret fatisfaction, difengaged from all obligations. The duke of Dorset, ambassador at Paris, in confequence of the events which had taken place, prefented (October 27th) a memorial to the king of France, fignifying, that "no fubject of difcuffion, much lefs of conteft, now remaining between the two courts, he was authorised to ask, whether it was the intention of his moft chriftian majefty to carry into effect the notification made by his most chriftian majefty's plenipotentiary, which, by announcing that fuccors would be given to Holland, had occafioned the naval armaments on the part of his Britannic majefty, which armaments have been reciprocal. If the court of Verfailles is difpofed to explain herself fatisfactorily on this subject, the ambaffador proposes, that all warlike preparations fhould be discontinued, and that the navies of the two nations fhould be again placed on the footing of the peace establishment, as it stood on the ift of January of the prefent year." To this memorial the count de Montmorin, the new minifter for foreign affairs in France, replied on the very fame day, in a ftyle of ex

emplary

emplary forbearance and moderation, "that the intention of his majefty not being, and never having been, to interfere by force in the affairs of Holland, the communication made to the court of London, on the 16th of last month, having had no other object than to announce to that court an intention, the motives of which no longer exift, efpecially fince the king of Pruffia has imparted his refolution; his majefty makes no fcruple to declare, that he will not give any effect to the declaration above mentioned; and agrees with pleasure to the propofal of mutually dif arming, made on the part of his Britannic majesty."

Thus happily and honorably for England did this important bufinefs terminate. Foreign powers were astonished to fee that country, which had a few years fince been apparently reduced to the verge of ruin under an adminiftration pre-eminently odious and contemptible, re-asfuming her rank among the nations of Europe, and attaining to a visible fuperiority over that haughty and ambitious rival, whofe recent fuccefs was now feen to be dearly purchased by her confequent alarming and inextricable embarraffments.

The parliament of Great Britain affembled on the 27th of Nov. 1787. The king remarked, "that at the clofe of the laft feffion he had informed them of the concern with which he obferved the difputes unhappily fubfifting in the republic of the united provinces. Their fituation foon afterwards became more critical and alarming. The king of Pruffia having demanded fatisfaction for the infult offered to the princefs of Orange his fifter, the party which had USURPED the government applied to the moft chriftian king for affiftance; and that prince having notified to his majefty his intention of granting their requeft, the king did not hesitate to declare that he could not remain a quiet fpectator, and gave immediate orders for augmenting his forces both by fea and land; and in the courfe of this tranfaction he had concluded a fubfidiary treaty

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treaty with the landgrave of Heffe Caffel. In the mean time the rapid fuccefs of the duke of Brunswick enabled the provinces to deliver themselves from the OPPRESSION under which they labored; and all subjects of contest being thus removed, an amicable explanation had taken place between the courts of London and Verfailles."

This was the language rather of a zealous partifan of the house of Orange, than of a great monarch, who, by a dignified and feasonable interpofition, had rescued a country from ruin. It is inconceivable how the exifting. government of Holland could with any color of justice be ftigmatized as an ufurpation; for by the conftitution of that country the prince of Orange as ftadtholder was not a fovereign, but a fubject poffeffing no fhare of the legislative power; and though by the formula of 1747 the office was declared hereditary, it was not therefore irrevocable any more than the hereditary offices of earl marfhal or great chamberlain under the English conftitution. And the oppreffions alluded to in the speech were plainly nothing elfe than the usual feverities inflicted upon thofe who prefumed to refift the mandates of the fupreme government. But in the recent measures adopted by the English court there were, notwithstanding this flagrant impropriety of language, fo much energy, and at the fame time fo much practical wifdom, that leffer objections were abforbed and loft in the general merit of the tranfaction. To the grand propofition" that it is contrary to the rights of nations, and a violation of the fundamental principles of political justice, for one nation to interfere in the internal concerns of another"-it muft fuffice to reply that however incontrovertible this maxim may be deemed as a general truth, an interference attended with confequences thus eminently beneficial must be allowed, like other neceffary exceptions from general rules, to deferve not pardon merely, but praife.

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