lands of the Empire and of the French kingdom where the authority of either over-lord was weakest, and which had long been tending to form themselves into a separate political system distinct from both. The results of this complicated position, as worked out, whether by the prudence of Philip the Good or by the daring of Charles the Bold, form the history of the Dukes of Burgundy of the House of Valois. ♦Imperial and French fiefs in the Netherlands.♦ The lands which we are accustomed to group together under the name of the _Netherlands_ or _Low Countries_ lay chiefly within the bounds of the Empire; but the county of Flanders had always been a fief of France. ♦Fief of the Counts of Flanders within the Empire.♦ Part however of the dominions of its counts, the north-eastern corner of their dominions, the lands of _Alost_ and _Waas_, were held of the Empire. ♦Zealand.♦ These lands, together with the neighbouring islands of _Zealand_, formed a ground of endless disputes between the Counts of Flanders and their northern neighbours the Counts of _Holland_. ♦County of Holland.♦ This last county gradually disentangles itself from the general mass of the Frisian lands which lie along the whole coast from the mouth of the Scheld to the mouth of the Weser. ♦Inroads of the sea. 1219, 1282.♦ And those great inroads of the sea in the thirteenth century which gave the Zuyder-Zee its present extent helped to give the country a natural boundary, and to part it off from the Frisian lands to the north-east. ♦Disputes with the free Frisians.♦ Towards the end of the thirteenth century Friesland west of the Zuyder-Zee had become part of the dominions of the Counts. ♦Independence of West Friesland. 1417-1447. | County of East Friesland. 1454.♦ The land immediately east of the gulf established its freedom, while _East Friesland_ passed to a line of counts, under whom its fortunes parted off from those of the Netherlands. Part of its later history has been already given in the character of a more purely German state. ♦The Bishops of Utrecht.♦ Both the counts and the free Frisians had also dangerous neighbours in the Bishops of _Utrecht_, the great ecclesiastical princes of this region, who held a large temporal sovereignty lying apart from their city on the eastern side of the gulf. These disputes went on, as also disputes with the Dukes of Geldern, without any final settlement, almost to the time when all these lands began to be united under the Burgundian power. But before this time, the Counts of Holland had become closely connected with lands much further to the south. ♦Duchy of Brabant.♦ Among a number of states in this region, the most powerful was the Duchy of _Brabant_, which represented the Duchy of the Lower Lotharingia, and whose princes held the mark of _Antwerp_ and the cities of _Brussels_, _Löwen_ or _Louvain_, and _Mechlin_. ♦County of Hennegau or Hainault united with Holland. 1299.♦ To the South of them lay the county of _Hennegau_ or _Hainault_.