The Orange restoration, however, and the efforts of Van de Spiegel to strengthen its bases by salutary reforms were doomed to be short-lived.  The council-pensionary, in spite of his desire to relinquish office at the end of his quinquennial term, was reelected by the Estates of Holland on December 6, 1792, and yielded to the pressure put upon him to continue his task.  A form of government, which had been imposed against their will on the patriot party by the aid of foreign bayonets, was certain to have many enemies; and such prospect of permanence as it had lay in the goodwill and confidence inspired by the statesmanlike and conciliatory policy of Van de Spiegel.  But it was soon to be swept away in the cataclysm of the French Revolution now at the height of its devastating course.

In France extreme revolutionary ideas had made rapid headway, ending in the dethronement and imprisonment of the king on August 10, 1792.  The invasion of France by the Prussian and Austrian armies only served to inflame the French people, intoxicated by their new-found liberty, to a frenzy of patriotism.  Hastily raised armies succeeded in checking the invasion at Valmy on September 20, 1792; and in their turn invading Belgium under the leadership of Dumouriez, they completely defeated the Austrians at Jemappes on November 6.  The whole of Belgium was overrun and by a decree of the French Convention was annexed.  The fiery enthusiasts, into whose hands the government of the French Republic had fallen, were eager to carry by force of arms the principles of liberty, fraternity and equality to all Europe, declaring that “all governments are our enemies, all peoples are our friends.”  The southern Netherlands having been conquered, it was evident that the northern Republic would speedily invite attack.  The Dutch government, anxious to avoid giving any cause for hostilities, had carefully abstained from offering any encouragement to the emigrants or support to the enemies of the French Republic.  Van de Spiegel had even expressed to De Maulde, the French ambassador, a desire to establish friendly relations with the Republican government.  But the Jacobins looked upon the United Provinces as the dependent of their enemies England and Prussia; and, when after the execution of the king the English ambassador was recalled from Paris, the National Convention immediately declared war against England and at the same time against the stadholder of Holland “because of his slavish bondage to the courts of St James and Berlin.”

Dumouriez at the head of the French army prepared to enter the United Provinces at two points.  The main body under his own command was to cross the Moerdijk to Dordrecht and then advance on Rotterdam, the Hague, Leyden and Haarlem.  He was accompanied by the so-called Batavian legion, enlisted from the patriot exiles under Colonel Daendels, once the fiery anti-Orange advocate of Hattem.  General Miranda, who was besieging Maestricht, was to march