The envoys reached the Hague on May 8, and found the States-General in a more yielding mood than might have been expected from their previous attitude.  Rewbell and Sieyes knew how to play upon the fears of the Provisional Government by representing to them that, if the terms they offered were rejected, their choice lay between French annexation or an Orange restoration.  Four members were appointed by the States-General with full powers to negotiate.  The conferences began on May 11; and in five days an agreement was reached.  The Batavian Republic, recognised as a free and independent State, entered into an offensive and defensive alliance with the French Republic.  But the Dutch had to cede Maestricht, Venloo and Dutch Flanders and to pay an indemnity of 100,000,000 florins.  Flushing was to receive a French garrison, and its harbour was to be used in common by the two powers; 25,000 French troops were to be quartered in the Republic and were to be fed, clothed and paid.  The Dutch were compelled to permit the free circulation of the worthless assignats in their country.

One of the first results of this treaty was a breach with Great Britain.  The Dutch coast was blockaded; British fleets stopped all sea-borne commerce; and the Dutch colonies in the East and West Indies were one after the other captured.  The action of the Prince of Orange made this an easy task.  William placed in the hands of the British commanders letters addressed to the governors of the Dutch colonies ordering them “to admit the troops sent out on behalf of his Britannic Majesty and to offer no resistance to the British warships, but to regard them as vessels of a friendly Power.”  The Cape of Good Hope surrendered to Admiral Rodney; and in quick succession followed Malacca, Ceylon and the Moluccas.  A squadron of nine ships under Rear-Admiral Lucas, sent out to recover the Cape and the other East Indian possessions, was compelled to surrender to the English in Saldanha Bay on August 17, 1796, almost without resistance, owing to the Orange sympathies of the crews.  The West Indian Colonies fared no better.  Demerara, Essequibo and Berbice capitulated in the spring of 1796; Surinam remained in Dutch hands until 1799; Java until 1801.  The occupation by the English of this island, the most important of all the Dutch overseas possessions, made the tale of their colonial losses complete.  The offensive and defensive alliance with France had thus brought upon the Republic, as a trading and colonial power, a ruin which the efforts of the provisional government under French pressure to re-organise and strengthen their naval and military forces had been unable to prevent.  The erstwhile exiles, Daendels and Dumonceau, who had attained the rank of generals in the French service, were on their return entrusted with the task of raising an army of 36,000 men, disciplined and equipped on the French system.  The navy was dealt with by a special Committee, of which Pieter Paulus was the energetic