any steps which might give umbrage to England, and he was successful in his efforts.  The Achin trouble was, however, still a cause of much embarrassment.  Worst of all was the series of bereavements which at this time befell the House of Orange-Nassau.  In 1877 Queen Sophie died, affectionately remembered for her interest in art and science, and her exemplary life.  The king’s brother, Henry, for thirty years Stadholder of Luxemburg, died childless early in 1879; and shortly afterwards in June the Prince of Orange, who had never married, passed away suddenly at Paris.  The two sons of William III’s uncle Frederick predeceased their father, whose death took place in 1881.  Alexander, the younger son of the king, was sickly and feeble-minded; and with his decease in 1884, the male line of the House of Orange-Nassau became extinct.  Foreseeing such a possibility in January, 1879, the already aged king took in second wedlock the youthful Princess Emma of Waldeck-Pyrmont.  Great was the joy of the Dutch people, when, on August 31, 1880, she gave birth to a princess, Wilhelmina, who became from this time forth the hope of a dynasty, whose history for three centuries had been bound up with that of the nation.

The Van Lynden administration, having steered its way through many parliamentary crises for four years, was at last beaten upon a proposal to enlarge the franchise, and resigned (February 26, 1883).  To Heemskerk was confided the formation of a coalition ministry of a neutral character; and this experienced statesman became for the third time first minister of the crown.  The dissensions in the liberal party converted the Second Chamber into a meeting-place of hostile factions; and Heemskerk was better fitted than any other politician to be the head of a government which, having no majority to support it, had to rely upon tactful management and expediency.  The rise of a socialist party under the enthusiastic leadership of a former Lutheran pastor, Domela Nieuwenhuis, added to the perplexities of the position.  It soon became evident that a revision of the Fundamental Law and an extension of the franchise, which the king no longer opposed, was inevitable.  Meanwhile the death of Prince Alexander and the king’s growing infirmities made it necessary to provide, by a bill passed on August 2,1884, that Queen Emma should become regent during her daughter’s minority.

Everything conspired to beset the path of the Heemskerk ministry with hindrances to administrative or legislative action.  The bad state of the finances (chiefly owing to the calls for the Achin war) the subdivision of all parties into groups, the socialist agitation and the weak health of the king, created something like a parliamentary deadlock.  A revision of the constitution became more and more pressing as the only remedy, though no party was keenly in its favour.  Certain proposals for revision were made by the government (March, 1885), but the anti-revolutionaries, the Catholics