href="@public@vhost@g@gutenberg@html@files@38595@[email protected]#national_83" class="pginternal" tag="{http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml}a">The National Assembly
The speaker of the Assembly welcoming the French minister
Invasion of the British
Dutch troops rushing to the defence of the coast
Armed bark of the year 1801
The executive council of the East India Company
Dutch ships frozen in the ice
Batavia—the fashionable quarter
A country place
Skating on the River Maas at Rotterdam
Trades: Printer, Bookbinder, Diamond Cutter, The Mint
Schimmelpenninck
Schimmelpenninck arrives at The Hague
Louis Napoleon
Napoleon visits Amsterdam
Departure of Gardes D'Honneur from Amsterdam
Gysbert Karel van Hogendorp
Proclamation of the new government
Arrival of William I in Scheveningen
Lieutenant Van Speyck blows up his ship
King William II
Line maps in text on pages 17, 25, 94, 207, 216, 217, 252

DRAMATIS PERSONÆ

DRAMATIS PERSONÆ (in order of their appearance).

CURTAIN: December, 1795.

William V: Last hereditary Stadholder, futile, well-meaning, but without any conception of the events which during the latter half of the eighteenth century brought about the new order of things. Unable to institute the highly necessary centralization of the country and emancipate the middle classes, which for the last three centuries have been cut totally out of all political power. He is driven out by the French Revolution more than by his own discontented countrymen. Dies, forgotten, on his country estates in Germany.

The Patriots: Mildly revolutionary party, since the middle of the eighteenth century working for a more centralized and somewhat more representative government. Belong almost without exception to the professional and higher middle classes. Represented in the new Batavian Assemblies mostly under the name of Unionists.

The Regents: The old plutocratic oligarchy. Disappear with the triumph of the Patriots. Continue opposition to the centralizing process, but for all intents and purposes they have played their little rôle when the old republic ceases to be.

The Federalists: Combine all the opposition elements in the new Batavian Republic which work to maintain the old decentralization.

Daendels: Lawyer, cart-tail orator, professional exile. Fallen hero of the Patriotic struggles; flees to Belgium when the Prussians in 1787 restore William V to his old dignities. Returns in 1795 as quite a hero and a French major-general. Later with French help organizes a number of coups d'état which finally remove the opposing Federalists and give the power to the Unionists. A capable man in many ways. An enthusiast who spared others as little as he did himself.

Krayenhoff: Doctor, physicist, experiments in new medical theories with same cheer he does in the new science of politics. Able and efficient in everything he undertakes. Too much of a man of principle and honesty to make much of a career during revolutionary days.

Pieter Paulus: The sort of man who twenty years before might have saved the Republic if only the Stadholder had known how to avail himself of such a simple citizen possessed of so much common sense. Trained thoroughly in the intricate working of the Republic's government.