During the last twenty years of the seventeenth century, the French Protestant emigration into Holland rose to a political event, and the first ‘Dragonades’ gave the signal in 1681.  The Burgomasters of Amsterdam soon perceived the golden advantages which the Hollanders would derive from the fatal policy of Louis XIV.  The city of Amsterdam announced to the refugees all the rights of citizenship, with an exemption from taxes for three years.  The States of Holland soon followed the example of Amsterdam, and by a public declaration, discharged all refugees who should settle there, from all taxes for twelve years.  In less than eight days all the Protestants of France were informed of this favorable proclamation, which gave impulse to new emigration.  In all the Dutch provinces and towns collections were taken up for the benefit of the French refugees, and a general fast proclaimed for Wednesday, November 21st, 1685, and all Protestants were invited to thank God for the grace he gave them to worship Him in liberty, and to entreat him to touch the heart of the French King, who had inflicted such cruel persecutions on true believers.

The Prince of Orange attached two preachers to his person from the church of Paris, and the Huguenot ladies found a noble protectress in the Princess of Orange.  Thanks to her most generous care, more than one hundred ladies of noble birth, who had lost all they possessed in France, and had seen their husbands or fathers thrown into dungeons, now found comfortable homes at Harlaem, Delft, and the Hague.  At the Hague, the old convent of preaching monks was turned into an establishment for French women.  At Nort, a boarding-house for young ladies of quality received an annual benefaction of two thousand florins from her liberal hands.  Nor did she forget these pious asylums, after the British Parliament had decreed her the crown.  Most of the refugees came from the Southern provinces—­brave officers, rich merchants of Amiens, Rouen, Bourdeaux, and Nantes, artisans of Brittany and Normandy, with agriculturists from Provence, the shores of Languedoc, Roussillon, and La Guienne.  Thus were transported into hospitable Holland, gentlemen and ladies of noble birth, with polished minds and refined manners, simple mechanics and ministers of high renown, and all more valuable than the golden mines of India or Peru.  Thus Holland, of all lands, received most of the French refugees, and Bayle calls it ’the grand ark of the refugees.’  No documents exist, by which their numbers can be correctly computed, but they have been estimated from fifty-five to seventy-five thousand souls, and the greatest number were to be found at Amsterdam, Rotterdam, and the Hague.  In 1686, there were not less than sixteen French pastors to the Walloon churches at Amsterdam.