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vote. The nobles also sent deputies, but they had only one vote conjointly. Thus the towns stood against the nobles as six to one, forming a great contrast to the early English parliaments. No measure could be adopted, nor any tax imposed, without the consent of each of the seven bodies represented; and if any new question arose as to which they were uninstructed, the deputies were obliged to postpone decision until after consultation with their principals. In times of peace no particular evil resulted from this extreme states-rights doctrine, but in times of war it became a fertile source of weakness, irresolution, and delay. The powers exercised by the states were of course a shifting quantity, expanding under weak rulers, and shrinking under powerful and arbitrary ones. The most essential, however, that of levying taxes, no sovereign of Holland ever ventured to dispute before the time of Philip II. of Spain. It appears to have been competent for any town to call an assembly, but the more common practice was to petition the count or his council to do so, and he usually convoked them at The Hague, or at some other place in which he was residing.

*

Although the nobles had but one vote in the assembly, there was another body in which they had great power. This was the council of state, or supreme court, formed of the chief members of the nobility, selected by the counts. The council of state assisted the count in the administration of public affairs, guaranteed all treaties with foreign powers, and in its judicial capacity took cognizance of capital offences, both in the towns, unless otherwise provided by their charters, and in the open country. To this court, usually presided over by the

*Davies's "Holland," i. 86.

count in person, lay an appeal in civil causes from all the inferior courts of the province.*

Such, in outline, was the general form of government in the countship of Holland, and that of the other states was much the same in character, although, as I shall show in another place, the system in some of the states still farther north was much more democratic. How essentially it differed from that in England, and how it affected the colonists of America, we shall see hereafter. The seventeen provinces were, as already stated, originally separate and distinct nationalities, lordships, and fiefs; but in the course of time, beginning in 1384, by marriage, purchase, or conquest, all except three gravitated to the House of Burgundy. Still, each state always retained its separate existence, with its individual rights and privileges, its own assembly and council of state, and its own stadtholder, who, appointed by the sovereign, acted as his representative.

In 1477, Charles the Bold, whose fiery passions, chivalric daring, and wild ambition had for ten years bewildered Europe, fell in battle by an unknown hand, leaving but one child, a daughter, Mary, twenty years of age. Louis XI. was on the throne of France, and at once seized the opportunity to take possession of the Duchy of Burgundy, as a lapsed fief, and to lay claim to all the Netherlands. The Duchess Mary was at Ghent, and, under the advice of her guardians, called a grand congress of all the fourteen provinces then belonging to the House of Burgundy, to consider ways and means to resist the French aggressions. This was an important event, for it was the first meeting of the States-General,

*Davies's "Holland," i. 83.

+ Kirk's "Charles the Bold," i. 56.

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or General Congress of the Netherlands, which played so great a part in all the subsequent history of the Low Countries.

It was also important in another aspect. Under the rule of Charles the Bold, as well as under that of his father, Philip the Good, many inroads had been made on the ancient prescriptive rights of the various states. The time had now come to retrieve the past and secure the future, and the keen-witted deputies summoned to the general assembly were not slow to improve their opportunity. The States - General were called together to grant subsidies for the war with France. The deputies expressed a willingness to render every service in their power, but demanded that their grievances should be first redressed. The duchess reluctantly gave way, and the result was a formal charter for the separate provinces, written, sealed, and sanctioned by the oath of the sovereign and her guardians.* The charter granted to Holland, called the "Groot Privilegie," or "Great Privilege," is worthy of particular attention.

Its chief provisions were the following: The duchess should not marry without the consent of the nobles and the states; she should bestow the offices of the country on natives only, no person being allowed to hold two at the same time, and none to be let out to farm. The Council of Holland was thenceforth to consist of eight members besides the stadtholder-six Hollanders and two Zeelanders-and no cause of which the municipal courts had jurisdiction was to be brought before it ex

* Motley, in various places, speaks of the old chartered rights of the provinces. As matter of fact, few, if any of them, had charters before this time. Their rights, unlike those of the cities, rested in prescription.

cept by way of appeal. The right de non evocando, or exemption from prosecution out of their province, was to be preserved to all the inhabitants inviolate. The towns might hold assemblies with each other or with the states, where and as often as they judged necessary. No new tolls or other burdens should be enforced without the consent of the states, and the freedom of trade and commerce should be maintained.* Neither the duchess nor her successors should declare war, offensive or defensive, without the consent of the states; and in case they did so, no one should be bound to serve. No commands of the sovereign should prevail against the privileges of the towns. The Dutch language should be used in all decrees and letters-patent. No coin should be struck, nor any alteration made in the standard of

How carefully and wisely the Netherlanders maintained the freedom of trade can be seen from an incident which occurred so far back as the reign of Edward I. of England. That monarch, in a letter addressed to Robert, Earl of Flanders, states that he has learned of an active intercourse carried on between the Scotch and the Flemings; and as the Scotch had taken part with Robert Bruce, who was in rebellion against him and excommunicated by the pope, he begged that the earl would put a stop to this intercourse, and exclude the Scotch from his dominions. The earl's answer was full of expres sions of respect for the English king, whom he desired to please, but he said frankly, as to the main question: "We must not conceal it from your majesty that our country of Flanders is open to all the world, where every person finds a free admission. Nor can we take away this privilege from persons concerned in commerce without bringing ruin and destruction upon our country. If the Scotch go to our ports, and our subjects go to theirs, it is neither the intention of ourselves nor our subjects to encourage them in their error, but only to carry on our traffic, without taking any part with them.” -Rymer's "Fœdera," iii. 771, quoted Edinburgh Review, July, 1830, p. 421.

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money, without the approbation of the states. The towns should not be forced to contribute to any petition for money, unless they had first consented to it, and the petition should be presented to the states by the sovereign in person.*

This was a pretty broad instrument for the fifteenth century, when freedom was being throttled all over the rest of Europe. The duchess, to be sure, afterwards declared it invalid, as obtained from her when a minor, and her successors repudiated it and disregarded many of its obligations, treating it as the kings of England had treated Magna Charta. But to the people it stood as a memento of the past and a prophecy of the future. They claimed that its provisions were not novel, but that it only summed up the privileges which they possessed before the dukes of Burgundy attempted to introduce the despotic system which prevailed in France.†

The Lady Mary marries the son of the Emperor of Germany, and thus the Netherlands pass to the House of Austria, and so down to Charles V., who acquires the three remaining provinces, including democratic Friesland. In 1548, seven years before the abdication of his father, Philip II. visited the country to receive the homage of his future subjects, and to exchange oaths of mutual fidelity. As he passed from state to state the people swore fealty to their coming sovereign, and he in return swore to respect their various rights and privileges. In Holland he took an oath "well and truly to

*Davies, i. 284, etc.

+ Grotius," De Antiq. Reip. Bat." cap. v.

Grattan. Froissart, who wrote about 1380, said that the Frisians were a very unreasonable race for not recognizing the authority of the great lords.