ommittee of seven, headed by the Advocate as chairman and spokesman,
held a conference with the ambassadors of France and England, at four
o'clock in the afternoon of the same day and another at ten o'clock next
morning.

The States were not very well pleased with the ratification. What
especially moved their discontent was the concluding clause, according to
which it was intimated that if the pretensions of Spain in regard to
religion were not fulfilled in the final treaty, the ratification was
waste-paper and the king would continue to claim all his rights.

How much more loudly would they have vociferated, could they have looked
into Friar John's wallet and have seen ratification number one! Then they
would have learned that, after nearly a year of what was called
negotiation, the king had still meant to demand the restoration of the
Catholic worship before he would even begin to entertain the little
fiction that the provinces were free.

As to the signature, the paper, and the Spanish language, those were
minor matters. Indeed, it is difficult to say why the King of Spain
should not issue a formal document in Spanish. It is doubtful whether,
had he taken a fancy to read it, he could have understood it in any other
tongue. Moreover, Spanish would seem the natural language for Spanish
state-papers. Had he, as King of Jerusalem, America, or India, chosen the
Hebrew, Aztec, or Sanscrit, in his negotiations with the United
Provinces, there might have been more cause for dissatisfaction.

Jeannin, who was of course the leading spirit among the foreign members
of the conference, advised the acceptance of the ratification.
Notwithstanding the technical objections to its form, he urged that in
substance it was in sufficient conformity to the draught furnished by the
States. Nothing could be worse, in his opinion, for the provinces than to
remain any longer suspended between peace and war. They would do well,
therefore, to enter upon negotiations so soon as they had agreed among
themselves upon three points.

They must fix the great indispensable terms which they meant to hold, and
from which no arguments would ever induce them to recede. Thus they would
save valuable time and be spared much frivolous discourse.

Next, they ought to establish a good interior government.

Thirdly, they should at once arrange their alliances and treaties with
foreign powers, in order to render the peace to be negotiated a durable
one.