The first care of Louis XIV. in his operations against Holland was naturally to detach Charles II. from his alliance. In this business he employed his sister-in-law, Madame Henrietta of England, an adroit and agreeable person, tenderly attached both to her brother and to France, without allowing the subjection of Charles to the all-powerful Louis XIV. to wear the appearance of a disgraceful or humiliating fact for his native country. The position of the King of England in his kingdom, in the face of his Parliament, became every day more difficult. The excesses of the court party, their corruption, their flagrant vices, had at last brought about a national reaction which was felt even in Parliament, at one time so passionately and blindly loyal. The country party was formed in opposition to the ministry of the Cabal, which was divided within itself, being now drawn towards the Dutch alliance by the Earl of Arlington, now driven towards France by the Duke of Buckingham. The nation awoke from her ecstatic loyalty, and aspired to resume her share in the government. Shrewd and penetrating under his external appearance of indifference, Charles II. understood better than his ministers the changes of public opinion, and the risk which they compelled him to encounter. The constraint of constitutional government was burdensome to his licentious selfishness, as it had been to the timid pride of his father. {361} He desired to free himself from the trammels which Parliament imposed upon him. But he had no army; a few regiments of guards, silently recruited, were insufficient to sustain a struggle for which he had moreover no pecuniary resources. He could find no support except from abroad; the alliance which his sister had offered him in the name of Louis XIV. assured him the aid of which he stood in need. A secret treaty was concluded at Dover in the month of May, 1670, but signed only by the Catholic advisers of the king. The greater part of the ministers were ignorant of its existence. Secrecy was necessary, and it was advantageous to conceal the conditions. The King of England undertook to declare publicly his return to the Roman Catholic Church as his brother, the Duke of York, had done. Louis XIV. promised to assist him to that end with a sum of two millions of livres, as well as with an annual subsidy of three millions when the two princes should have declared war against Holland. Peace with Spain, always popular in England, Spain being the natural enemy of France, was to be respected by the two sovereigns.