cooked under the supervision of the most skilled French cooks, and they were tasted by the connoisseurs of the French Directorate, who had promised to savour the dish personally to make it most palatable to the Dutch taste. Then, sizzling-hot from the French fire, it was carried to Holland and was served to the astonished assembly right in the middle of their endless discussions. Why, reader, this appeal to your culinary senses? I want you to stay for the appearance of this famous _râgout à la Directoire_. But it will not be ready before another chapter. If now I hold out hope of a fine dinner to be served after five or six more pages, I can perhaps make you stay through the next chapter, which will be as gloomy as a rainy Sunday in Amsterdam. IX GLORY ABROAD There was no glory abroad. Naval battles have often been described. Sometimes they are inspiring through the suggestion of superior courage or ability. Frequently they are very dull. Then they belong in a handbook on naval tactics, but not in a popular history. We shall try to make our readers happy by practising the utmost brevity. Paulus was dead, and the new leaders of the navy department were inefficient. They did their best, but private citizens are not changed into successful managers of a navy over night. On paper (patient paper of the eighteenth century, which had contained so many imaginary fleets) there were over sixty Dutch men-of-war. Salaries were officially paid to 17,000 sailors and officers. Of those not more than a score knew their business. The old higher officers were all gone. They were sailing under a Russian flag. They were fighting under the British cross or eking out a penurious half-pay life in little Brunswick, near their old commander-in-chief. As for the sailors, they had had no way of escaping their fate. Poverty had forced them to stay where they were or starve, and they had been obliged to take the new oath of allegiance to support their families. Their quarterdeck now was beautiful with the new legend of Fraternity, Equality, and Liberty painted in big golden letters. Their masts still flew the old glorious flag of red, white, and blue, but now adorned with a gaudy picture of the goddess in whose name war was being waged upon the greater part of the civilized world. At times the men could not stand it. Many a morning it was discovered that the flag had been ruined over night. A hasty knife had cut the divinity out of her corner and had thrown her overboard. But cloth was cheap. A new flag was soon provided, and the goddess of liberty was sewn in once more. To find the culprit was impossible, for upon such occasions the whole fleet was likely to come forward and confess itself guilty. So there the fleet lay, with mutiny averted by the near presence of a French army, and forced to inactivity by the blockade of the British fleet. The admiral of the Dutch squadron was the same Brigadier General