It is no exaggeration to say that the establishments of opulent merchants of the Low Countries at this period could match and sometimes even outshine those of princely courts. Life was very dull in Belgium at the court of the Austrian princess who ruled the Netherlands when George II came to the throne. Marie Elizabeth was forty-five when her brother gave her the rule of the Low Countries in 1725. She was very pious, and eschewed all gaiety. The only description of a festival given during her reign is that of the _Fête de l’oiseau_ given in Brussels, October 10, 1729, on the occasion of the birth of Monseigneur le Dauphin (born September 4, 1729), and was written by the minister from France, Chaillon de Joinville, who arranged it, to the Marquis de Chauvelin. After the ball they went to supper at half-past ten, and we learn that “In the ‘_grande gallerie_’ there was a long table of ninety covers with two large buffets at the two ends, and in the balcony of the ‘_gallerie_’ there were four trumpeters and a drummer, who played all through supper; and there were eighteen instrumental players for the ball.” The Flemish tapestries of the eighteenth century are of slight importance, for the great workshops of the Low Countries have now fallen into evil days. At the beginning of this century, Brussels has only eight manufacturers, fifty-three looms and about a hundred and fifty workmen, and by 1768 only one manufacturer is left—Jacques van der Borcht. The last loom perishes at his death in 1794. The Oudenarde looms are stilled for ever in 1772, and those of Ghent about the same time. Flemish workmen are, however, still employed at Beauvais, of which Oudry becomes director in 1726; and their services are valued throughout Europe. Adrian Neusse of Oudenarde, a former workman at Beauvais, establishes a workshop at Gisors in 1703, and Jean Baert and his son one at Cambrai in 1724. Until 1738, when Boucher takes charge of them, Lille’s workshops are directed by Wernier of Brussels. When the first high-warp loom was established at Madrid in 1720, the first director was Jacques van der Goten, a tapestry-weaver of Antwerp, who aided in founding that of Seville in the same year; and the tapestry manufactory, founded by Peter the Great in St. Petersburg, employed workmen from Brussels in 1777–8.