States had supplies in their magazines enough to move 12,000 men, he
proposed to draw upon those, reimbursing the States for what was thus
consumed by his contingent.

With regard to the treaty of close alliance between France, Great
Britain, the princes, and the Republic, which the ambassadors had
proposed, the--Lord Treasurer and his colleagues gave a reply far from
gratifying. His Majesty had not yet decided on this point, they said.
The King of France had already proposed to treat for such an alliance,
but it did not at present seem worth while for all to negotiate together.

This was a not over-courteous hint that the Republic was after all not
expected to place herself at the council-board of kings on even terms of
intimacy and fraternal alliance.

What followed was even less flattering. If his Majesty, it was
intimated, should decide to treat with the King of France, he would not
shut the door on their High Mightinesses; but his Majesty was not yet
exactly informed whether his Majesty had not certain rights over the
provinces 'in petitorio.'

This was a scarcely veiled insinuation against the sovereignty of the
States, a sufficiently broad hint that they were to be considered in a
certain degree as British provinces. To a soldier like Maurice, to a
statesman like Barneveld, whose sympathies already were on the side of
France, such rebuffs and taunts were likely to prove unpalatable. The
restiveness of the States at the continual possession by Great Britain of
those important sea-ports the cautionary towns, a fact which gave colour
to these innuendoes, was sure to be increased by arrogant language on the
part of the English ministers. The determination to be rid of their debt