THREE:During this year the Americans continued to hope for relief to themselves from the progress of the Armed Neutrality, but derived little good from it, though, through their exertions, they beheld Holland added to the open enemies of England. The Dutch Government, flattering themselves that, with nearly all the world against her, England must succumb, had long been secretly in negotiation with the insurgent subjects of England, and their treachery was now suddenly, by a singular circumstance, brought to light. Captain Keppel, cruising in the Vestal frigate off the banks of Newfoundland, in the month of September, captured one of the American packets. On the approach of the British boats to the packet, it was observed that something was hastily flung overboard. A sailor leaped from one of the boats into the sea, and succeeded in securing this something before it had sunk beyond reach. It turned out to be a box, which had been weighted with lead, but not sufficiently to render it so rapid in its descent as to prevent its seizure by the British tar. On being opened, it revealed a mass of papers belonging to an American emissary to the Court of Holland, and opened up a long course of negotiations, and an eventual treaty of peace and commerce between Holland and our American colonies. The bearer of these papers was discovered on board the packet, in the person of Henry Laurens, late president of the American Congress. These most important papers, together with their bearer, were sent with all speed to England. Copies were forwarded to Sir Joseph Yorke, our Ambassador at the Hague, who was instructed to demand from the States General the disavowal of the negotiations. The States General, confounded by the discovery of their clandestine negotiations, remained silent for a week, and then only replied by advancing complaints of violence committed by the British navy on their traders, and of its having insulted the Dutch flag by seizing some American privateers in the port of the island of St. Martin, under the very guns of the fort. Sir Joseph did not allow himself to be diverted from his demand, but again, on the 12th of December, a month after the presentation of his memorial, demanded an answer. No answer was returned. England was thus compelled to declare war against Holland on the 20th of December, Sir Joseph Yorke being recalled by the king, and Count Welderen receiving his passports in London.
THREE:Glad to hear you think the hoodoo is busted, Jeff commented. Me, I dont care. Ive taken my last hop in that-there crate. Im shaking like a leaf, even now.Catherine of Russia, thus rid of the only two monarchs who were likely to trouble her with scruples, hastened her grand design of absorbing Poland. She professed to be much scandalised and alarmed at the proceedings of the king, who had attended a dinner given by the municipality of Warsaw on the anniversary of the passing of their new Constitution, at which he had not only responded to the toast of his health by drinking to the nation and the municipality, thus sanctioning them as great powers, as the French had done, but had sat complacently amid the loud cries of "Long live Liberty! Long live the nation, and our citizen king, the friend of the Rights of Man!" The Poles had certainly become enthusiastic imitators of the French; they had[397] established clubs in imitation of the clubs of Paris, had sent a deputation to congratulate the French on their Revolution, and had passed various decrees of a Jacobin character. Neither did she lack a sanction from the Poles themselves. There had always been violent parties in that kingdom; and at this time a number of nobles, who opposed the new Constitution, sent a deputation with a memorial to the Empress, at St. Petersburg, inviting her to assist them in restoring the old Constitution. Catherine gave them a ready promise, and, on the 14th of May, Felix Potocki, Branicki, Rzewinski, and eleven other nobles, met at Targowica, and entered into a confederacy for this purpose. This confederacy was followed, only four days after its signing, by a protest issued by Bulgakoff, the Russian Minister, at Warsaw, against the whole of the new institutions and decrees. On the 18th of May, the same day that this proclamation was issued at Warsaw, a hundred thousand Russian troops marched over the Polish frontiers, attended by some of the pro-Russian confederates, and assumed the appearance of an army of occupation.
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