Everyone in Versailles rejoiced, except for the Dutch.

These were former generals, former officials, once the heart and mind of the Netherlands, but in the final analysis, they were still merchants, who once thought that they could solve their present predicament by the usual means, and they established a government in exile in New Amsterdam. Although it was the new York in 67, the Duke of York of England returned to London and was placed under house arrest in the Tower of London by a son, Charles II, an heir, who had no time to care for his overseas possessions, which were thousands of miles away, and hurried to Paris, then to Versailles, hoping to receive Louis XIV's pardon.

They even carefully discussed how much more they could pay - territory? There was no doubt that the Dutch could cede a part of their territory to France, and wars and marriages between nations often led to changes in borders, and France should be no exception, as long as His Majesty was willing to give back the province of North Holland, where Amsterdam was located, Utrecht, the heart of the Netherlands, and they were willing to give up South Holland or Zeelland, or Gelderland...... In short, they agreed that as long as the 10,000 Dutch merchant ships were still cruising the seas, they could even buy the Netherlands back little by little, or take the opportunity to provoke other countries to wage war against France, and they could be fishermen.

- Ships, though the Duke of La Rochefowaulze had only taken hundreds of great ships from the Netherlands, would such an ambitious king think that there were too many ships? Absolutely not, they could sell the ships to the French at an incomparably low price, and then let them go and continue the previous war with the British—after the Hundred Years' War, this should also be a rekindle for the enemy, and for the Dutch, whether they lost or who won, of course, it was better to lose both, and it was a good thing for them.

Although Amsterdam's assets and parliamentarians were cut off before they left the North Sea, the East and West Indian Companies were still there, their trade routes, their colonies, their slave trade were bringing in a lot of wealth every day, and they could still afford to pay Louis XIV more than three million to five million livres in compensation, and even exempt the king from interest on his loans— Don't forget that Louis XIV borrowed money from Dutch bankers during his conquest of Flanders and the Netherlands, and although this loan has been repaid, the days of his majesty's generosity to borrow from them again are numbered.

It would be difficult to garrison troops in the Netherlands, to collect taxes on Dutch merchants, or to demand the conversion of the Dutch people to Catholicism, but the Dutch government-in-exile in New Amsterdam had given these emissaries the greatest authority to return to the Netherlands......

The Dutch envoys bribed the Swiss envoy with a thousand louis for a thousand gold to say only a word, for they had not been qualified to meet Louis XIV at Versailles, nay, or anywhere, they were like a swarm of flies in a glass case, buzzing and bumping about in order to accomplish their mission, but everywhere they went there were transparent and solid walls, and even the most money-hungry Cardinal, Monsieur de la Rivière, did not allow them to step into his hall.

But the result of a thousand louis, ah, they would rather that such a thing had never happened at all—they had not bribed the foolish envoy, and he had not mentioned Holland to Louis XIV—and in their most embarrassing scenario, the King of France might have rebuked the Swiss envoy and once again rejected the request of the Dutch, but Louis XIV answered far more than they had imagined.

The Netherlands is finished.

When they heard this, they replied even earlier than the Swiss envoys, for though they could not buy off the royal family, the ministers, and the generals, some of the less knowledgeable servants were willing to exchange a sentence or two for the clanging golden louis—and now even the most cunning, shrewd, and eloquent of them were so frightened by fear that they could not make a sound.

"Is there no hope?" asked one of the messengers.

"Yes," said another emissary, "and right now, folks, in Versailles, the whole of Europa is here—whatever they have to do before, what Louis XIV is going to do, we can try to win them over to our side, or rather, we can win by standing against France!"

"The problem is, we don't have a lot of leverage anymore. The previous messenger pondered for a moment and shook his head slightly.

"We also have Suriname and the Andreas Islands (South America), Batavia, Sumatra, the Spice Islands, Malacca and Ceylon, we also have some strongholds in the Far East, the Cape of Good Hope in Aferriga, the Hudson River Valley in North America, and the ...... with New Amster."

"That is our last fiefdom," said the third messenger, "we need them for our merchant ships and convoys." ”

"Without the Netherlands, they would be trees without roots. The second messenger who spoke said: "If they can be exchanged for the Netherlands, even if only a part of them, it is enough, as long as there is the Netherlands, we can look for new colonies, and you guys, Amerika is very large, and Aferiga is also very large." ”

"We will be arrested and hanged by the angry people," the emissary at the head did not approve of the young man's radical statement: "We have all seen what happened to the Witte brothers, the parliament and the government have not given us such power, and if we do our own thing, they will throw them out as scapegoats, even if we have to go back to Holland." ”

Everyone else nodded in agreement, and the young messenger looked around, but there was not a single supporter, and he fell back into his chair in a daze, and now he finally understood what his father meant before leaving, his father did not think that they could get anything out of this time, and he said that since the death of Prime Minister Werther, the Netherlands had lost its head and heart, and then General Reut also died, and the backbone of the Netherlands was broken, and all that remained was good meat waiting for the tiger and wolf to bite.

At that time, the young man neither agreed nor believed, but now he had to admit that his father had sharper eyes than he did.

"Take a rest in the inn for the next few days," said the messenger at the head, "drink some champagne, find a girl, and don't worry too much, this is not a situation that we can reverse." ”

The young messenger's eyes widened: "You want to imprison me?"

"Don't say that," said the lead messenger, "I just think we should be more cautious." ”

——————

But for these Dutchmen, neither prudence nor radicality, could have any effect on the present situation, although it was said to be celebrated for fifteen days, and in fact on the third day there were unstoppable envoys who came to tempt them—to the Duke of Orleans, to the Prince of Condé, to the Duchess of Montpensier, and in any case to anyone who could hear the movements and thoughts of Louis XIV—and they could not wait to cut a piece of the fruit of this incomparably fruitful victory in France.

Of course, Louis XIV can be said to be like a gamble, putting the fate of the whole country on the scales, throwing the last bargaining chip, and it must not be possible to seek only three or five million livres, which is not even enough for his military expenditure in the past three years, mainly because he got Flanders and the Netherlands, in addition to a large piece of rich territory, that is, the ports brought by the long coastline, the shipping routes and the vast territorial waters- At this time, although there was no complete and unified concept of maritime sovereignty, some people said that it should be the horizon as far as the eye can see; in 52 years, the jurist Rosennius advocated in the book "Maritime Law" that the width of the sea area owned by the country should be the distance of two days' voyage; later, the Dutch jurist Binkshoek proposed that the width of a country's territorial sea should be based on the longest range of artillery, that is, "where the weapon power terminates, the land power ends"—— These arguments are not rigorous enough, not to mention that the speed of different ships is different based on the range of the standard, and it is even more impossible to use the limit of vision as the standard, because each person's eyesight is also different, and as for the range of the cannon as the standard, although it is very much in line with the wishes of some people, it has proved that this is not feasible.

The Anglo-Dutch War has appeared three times in a row, and it is inseparable from maritime sovereignty - The North Sea and Malacca are almost the knot that the British and the Dutch can not untie, which is why Charles II is willing to form an alliance with Louis XIV, although it is unlikely to get North Holland and South Holland, but Charles II believes that even if you can get Zeeland, it can also open England's dilemma in the North Sea, although Louis XIV's victory also means that between France and England, in addition to the English Channel, the Calais (Dover) Strait, there is another North Sea, but Charles II has a William III here.

Among the envoys who gathered together, there was one person who attracted the most attention, this person was the envoy of England, Edward Hyde, Earl of Clarendon, he was very loyal to Charles II, when Charles II was still the Duke of Cornwall, he followed him when he was in exile, Charles II also generously gave corresponding rewards after the restoration, not only let his brother the Duke of York marry Hyde's daughter, but also promoted him to be his Minister of the Navy, and later because of the parliament's questioning and persecution of Charles II, Hyde was forced to step down from this position, and this position was given to the Duke of York, it's just that the Duke of York made a lot of mistakes - He first disgusted Hyde's daughter, who could not bring him more benefits, and let her die in depression, and then believed the sweet words of Charles II, and married the daughter of a Catholic, which made the Protestant parliamentarians who supported him waver, and when he went on his expedition, Charles II used the means of wizards to make the queen give birth to his own heir, and the Duke of York finally lost his last arm, and as soon as he returned to London, he was arrested and became a neighbor of William III in the Tower of London.

It is ironic that Edward Hyde was re-promoted to his original position, and that he had been so pleased to give this position to his son-in-law several years earlier, and he was rewarded with the death of his daughter in the coldness and dissatisfaction of her husband, and the Duke of York probably did not expect that he would finally start to dream of a big dream, and he was imprisoned in the Tower of London, not because Charles II's son was still a baby.

And Edward Hyde, who was regarded by the Duke of York as a useless old waste, not only became Lord Chancellor once again, but was also appointed as an envoy by Charles II, and undertook the most important mission of the thirty years, to Paris and Versailles.

Hyde was surrounded by a young man who always wore a mask, and he was always quiet and unhappy, but Hyde had always respected him very much, and some people inquired about his identity, but the English envoys were as serious and rigid as Edward Hyde, and they could only guess that this might be an illegitimate son of Charles II, which was not surprising given that Charles II did have many illegitimate children, and that he was forty-two years old.

Today, Edward Hyde unravels the mystery – it was none other than William III of House Orange.

William III sometimes wondered how he could still be alive, to endure such humiliation and torment, yes, he still had a glimmer of hope, in the Tower of London, or on the ships bound for France, or in Paris, or in Versailles, he waited, waited for his loyal subjects to take him away from the enemy, and he would take them to the Cape of Good Hope, to New Amsterdam, to the Spice Islands, to any place where the Dutch could still gain a foothold, and he would lead them to fight until the last moment, like his father, his grandfather。

But he didn't wait, he was like he had been forgotten.

The young future monarch raised his head, and the meeting concerning the Netherlands, to be precise, the complete dismemberment of the country was held by the king in the Jupiter Room, although he had always called himself the Sun King, but it was undoubtedly the most appropriate to hold such a meeting in this hall named after the father of the gods, where the greedy gods gathered to make the final judgment on the foolish mortals.

Although this hall is also dominated by milky white stone, the ceiling and the paintings on the walls are made of a large amount of lapis lazuli powder—the boundless heavenly dome, the robes of the gods, the deep sea— LeBlanc used gold threads to outline the orbits of the stars, cochineal to decorate the cheeks and lips of the gods, pearl powder to show their flawless skin, and in the Pantheon picture, Jupiter and Juno are only in the distance, standing among the gods, the sun god with a harp in his arms and a bow and arrow is the center of attention.

If one looks down, one will find that at the bottom of the picture is the canopy of His Majesty the King, under which is a royal blue velvet curtain embroidered with golden lilies, and in front of the curtain is the throne that belongs only to Louis XIV.

The king was also in his thirties, but William III seemed to him even younger than he was in the mirror, or that was the difference between a winner and a loser.