After remaining fifteen days in London, Mr. Adams sailed, on the 30th of October, for Holland, landed at Hellevoetsluis, and proceeded without delay to the Hague. His reception as the representative of the United States had scarcely been acknowledged by the President of the States General, before Holland was taken possession of by the French, under Pichegru. The Stadtholder fled, the tree of liberty was planted, and the French national flag displayed before the Stadthouse. The people were kept quiet by seventy thousand French soldiers. The Stadtholder, the nobility, and the regencies of the cities, were all abolished, a provincial municipality appointed, and the country received as an ally of France, under the name of the Batavian Republic; the streets being filled with tri-colored cockades, and resounding with the Carmagnole, or the Marseilles Hymn. Mr. Adams was visited by the representatives of the French people, and recognized as the minister of a nation free like themselves, with whom the most fraternal relations should be maintained. In response, he assured them of the attachment of his fellow-citizens for the French people, who felt grateful for the obligations they were under to the French nation, and closed with demanding safety and protection for all American persons and property in the country. Popular societies in Holland were among the most efficient means of the success of the revolution, as they had been in France. Mr. Adams, being solicited to join one of them, declined, considering it improper in a stranger to take part personally in the politics of the country. "It was," he wrote, "unnecessary for me to look out for motives to justify my refusal. I have an aversion to political popular societies in general. To destroy an established power, they are undoubtedly an efficacious instrument, but in their nature they are fit for nothing else. The reign of Robespierre has shown what use they make of power when they obtain it." The station of Mr. Adams at the Hague gave him opportunities to acquaint himself with parties and persons, their motives and principles, of which he availed himself with characteristic industry.