"  There  is  but  this  means  alone,"  wrote  Jeannin1  to  Villeroy,
"  that  can  content  him,  although  hitherto  he  has  done  like
the  rowers,  who  never  look  toward  the  place  whither  they
wish  to  go." 2  The  attempt  of  the  Prince  to  sound  Barne-
veld  on  this  subject  through  the  Princess-Dowager  has
already  been  mentioned,  and  has  much  intrinsic  probability.
Thenceforward,  the  republican  form  of  government,  the
municipal  oligarchies,  began  to  consolidate  their  power.  Yet
although  the  people  as  such  were  not  sovereigns,  but
subjects,  and  rarely  spoken  of  by  the  aristocratic  magis-
trates save  with  a  gentle  and  patronizing  disdain,  they
enjoyed  a  larger  liberty  than  was  known  anywhere  else  in
the  world.  Buzenval  was  astonished  at  the  "infinite  and
almost  unbridled  freedom"  which  he  witnessed  there  during
his  embassy,  and  which  seemed  to  him  however  "without
peril  to  the  state." 3

The  extraordinary  means  possessed  by  Aerssens  to  be
important  and  useful  vanished  with  the  King's  death.  His
secret  despatches,  painting  in  sombre  and  sarcastic  colours
the  actual  condition  of  affairs  at  the  French  court,  were  sent
back  in  copy  to  the  French  court  itself.  It  was  not  known
who  had  played  the  Ambassador  this  vilest  of  tricks,  but
it  was  done  during  an  illness  of  Barneveld,  and  without  his
knowledge.  Early  in  the  year  1613  Aerssens  resolved,  not  to
take  his  final  departure,  but  to  go  home  on  leave  of  absence.
