[Illustration:  “Here is the King of Spain.”——­475]

Great were the surprise and wrath in Europe; William III. felt himself personally affronted.  “I have no doubt,” he wrote to Heinsius, “that this unheard-of proceeding on the part of France has caused you as much surprise as it has me; I never had much confidence in engagements contracted with France, but I confess I never could have supposed that that court would have gone so far as to break, in the face of Europe, so solemn a treaty before it had even received the finishing stroke.  Granted that we have been dupes; but when, beforehand, you are resolved to hold your word of no account, it is not very difficult to overreach your mail.  I shall be blamed perhaps for having relied upon France, I who ought to have known by the experience of the past that no treaty has ever bound her!  Would to God I might be quit for the blame, but I have only too many grounds for fearing that the fatal consequences of it will make themselves felt shortly.  I groan in the very depths of my spirit to see that in this country the majority rejoice to find the will preferred by France to the maintenance of the treaty of partition, and that too on the ground that the will is more advantageous for England and Europe.  This opinion is founded partly on the youth of the Duke of Anjou.  ’He is a child,’ they say; ’he will be brought up in Spain; he will be indoctrinated with the principles of that monarchy, and hee will be governed by the council of Spain;’ but these are surmises which it is impossible for me to entertain, and I fear that we shall before long find out how erroneous they are.  Would it not seem as if this profound indifference with which, in this country, they look upon everything that takes place outside of this island, were a punishment from Heaven?  Meanwhile, are not our causes for apprehension and our interests the same as those of the peoples of the continent?”

William III. was a more far-sighted politician than his subjects either in England or Holland.  The States General took the same view as the English.  “Public funds and shares have undergone a rise at Amsterdam,” wrote Heinsius to the King of Englaiid; “and although this rests on nothing solid, your Majesty is aware how much influence such a fact has.”

Louis XIV. had lost no time in explaining to the powers the grounds of his acceptance.  “The King of Spain’s will,” he said in his manifesto, “establishes the peace of Europe on solid bases.”  “Tallard did not utter a single word on handing me his sovereign’s letter, the contents of which are the same as of that which the states have received,” wrote William to Heinsius.  “I said to him that perhaps I had testified too eager a desire for the preservation of peace, but that, nevertheless, my inclination in that respect had not changed.  Whereupon he replied, ’The king my master, by accepting the will, considers that he gives a similar proof of his desire to maintain peace.’  Thereupon he made me a bow and withdrew.”