throughout the country may, however, be swiftly threaded. From the time
of the first Dirk to the close of the thirteenth century there were
nearly four hundred years of unbroken male descent, a long line of Dirks
and Florences. This iron-handed, hot-headed, adventurous race, placed as
sovereign upon its little sandy hook, making ferocious exertions to swell
into larger consequence, conquering a mile or two of morass or barren
furze, after harder blows and bloodier encounters than might have
established an empire under more favorable circumstances, at last dies
out. The courtship falls to the house of Avennes, Counts of Hainault.
Holland, together with Zeland, which it had annexed, is thus joined to
the province of Hainault. At the end of another half century the
Hainault line expires. William the Fourth died childless in 1355. His
death is the signal for the outbreak of an almost interminable series of
civil commotions. Those two great, parties, known by the uncouth names
of Hook and Kabbeljaw, come into existence, dividing noble against noble,
city against city, father against son, for some hundred and fifty years,
without foundation upon any abstract or intelligible principle. It may
be observed, however, that, in the sequel, and as a general rule, the
Kabbeljaw, or cod-fish party, represented the city or municipal faction,
while the Hooks (fish-hooks), that were to catch and control them, were
the nobles; iron and audacity against brute number and weight.

Duke William of Bavaria, sister's son--of William the Fourth, gets
himself established in 1354. He is succeeded by his brother Albert;
Albert by his son William. William, who had married Margaret of
Burgundy, daughter of Philip the Bold, dies in 1417. The goodly heritage
of these three Netherland provinces descends to his daughter Jacqueline,
a damsel of seventeen. Little need to trace the career of the fair and
ill-starred Jacqueline. Few chapters of historical romance have drawn
more frequent tears. The favorite heroine of ballad and drama, to