Military Operations in the Netherlands--Designs of the Spanish
Commander--Siege of Orsoy--Advance upon Rheinberg--Murder of the
Count of Broeck and his garrison--Capture of Rees and Emmerich--
Outrages of the Spanish soldiers in the peaceful provinces--
Inglorious attempt to avenge the hostilities--State of trade in the
Provinces--Naval expedition under van der Does--Arrival of Albert
and Isabella at Brussels--Military operations of Prince Maurice--
Negotiation between London and Brussels--Henry's determination to
enact the Council of Trent--His projected marriage--Queen Elizabeth
and Envoy Caron--Peace proposals of Spain to Elizabeth--Conferences
at Gertruydenberg--Uncertain state of affairs.
The military operations in the Netherlands during the whole year 1598
were on a comparatively small scale and languidly conducted. The States
were exhausted by the demands made upon the treasury, and baffled by the
disingenuous policy of their allies. The cardinal-archduke, on the other
hand, was occupied with the great events of his marriage, of his
father-in-law's death, and of his own succession in conjunction with his
wife to the sovereignty of the provinces.
In the autumn, however, the Admiral of Arragon, who, as has been stated,
was chief military commander during the absence of Albert, collected an
army of twenty-five thousand foot and two thousand cavalry, crossed the
Meuse at Roermond, and made his appearance before a small town called
Orsoy, on the Rhine. It was his intention to invade the duchies of
Clever, Juliers, and Berg, taking advantage of the supposed madness of
the duke, and of the Spanish inclinations of his chief counsellors, who
constituted a kind of regency. By obtaining possession of these important
provinces--wedged as they were between the territory of the republic, the
obedient Netherlands, and Germany--an excellent military position would
be gained for making war upon the rebellious districts from the east, for
crushing Protestantism in the duchies, for holding important passages of
the Rhine, and for circumventing the designs of the Protestant
sons-in-law and daughters of the old Duke of Cleves. Of course, it was
the determination of Maurice and the States-General to frustrate these
operations. German and Dutch Protestantism gave battle on this neutral
ground to the omnipotent tyranny of the papacy and Spain.
Unfortunately, Maurice had but a very slender force that autumn at his
command. Fifteen hundred horse and six thousand infantry were all his
effective troops, and with these he took the field to defend the borders
of the republic, and to out-manoeuvre, so far as it might lie in his
power, the admiral with his far-reaching and entirely unscrupulous
designs.
With six thousand Spanish veterans, two thousand Italians, and many
Walloon and German regiments under Bucquoy, Hachincourt, La Bourlotte,
Stanley, and Frederic van den Berg, the admiral had reached the frontiers
of the mad duke's territory. Orsoy was garrisoned by a small company of
"cocks' feathers," or country squires, and their followers.
Presenting himself in person before the walls of the town, with a priest
at his right hand and a hangman holding a bundle of halters at the other,
he desired to be informed whether the governor would prefer to surrender
or to hang with his whole garrison. The cock feathers surrendered. The
admiral garrisoned and fortified Orsoy as a basis and advanced upon
Rheinberg, first surprising the Count of Broeck in his castle, who was at
once murdered in cold blood with his little garrison.
He took Burik on the 11th October, Rheinberg on the 15th of the same
month, and compounded with Wesel for a hundred and twenty thousand
florins. Leaving garrisons in these and a few other captured places, he
crossed the Lippe, came to Borhold, and ravaged the whole country side.
His troops being clamorous for pay were only too eager to levy black-mail
on this neutral territory. The submission of the authorities to this
treatment brought upon them a reproach of violation of neutrality by the
States-General; the Governments of Munster and of the duchies being
informed that, if they aided and abetted the one belligerent, they must
expect to be treated as enemies by the other.
The admiral took Rees on the 30th October, and Emmerich on the 2nd
November--two principal cities of Cleves. On the 8th November he crossed
into the territory of the republic and captured Deutekom, after a very
short siege. Maurice, by precaution, occupied Sevenaer in Cleves. The
prince--whose difficult task was to follow up and observe an enemy by
whom he was outnumbered nearly four to one, to harass him by skirmishes,
to make forays on his communications, to seize important points before he
could reach them, to impose upon him by an appearance of far greater
force than the republican army could actually boast, to protect the
cities of the frontier like Zutphen, Lochem, and Doesburg, and to prevent
him from attempting an invasion of the United Provinces in force, by
crossing any of the rivers, either in the autumn or after the winter's
ice had made them passable for the Spanish army-succeeded admirably in
all his strategy. The admiral never ventured to attack him, for fear of
risking a defeat of his whole army by an antagonist whom he ought to have
swallowed at a mouthful, relinquished all designs upon the republic,
passed into Munster, Cleves, and Berg, and during the whole horrible
winter converted those peaceful provinces into a hell. No outrage which
even a Spanish army could inflict was spared the miserable inhabitants.
Cities and villages were sacked and burned, the whole country was placed
under the law of black-mail. The places of worship, mainly Protestant,
were all converted at a blow of the sword into Catholic churches. Men
were hanged, butchered, tossed in sport from the tops of steeples,
burned, and buried alive. Women of every rank were subjected by thousands
to outrage too foul and too cruel for any but fiends or Spanish soldiers
to imagine.
Such was the lot of thousands of innocent men and women at the hands of
Philip's soldiers in a country at peace with Philip, at the very moment
when that monarch was protesting with a seraphic smile on his expiring
lips that he had never in his whole life done injury to a single human
being.
In vain did the victims call aloud upon their sovereign, the Emperor
Rudolph. The Spaniards laughed the feeble imperial mandates to scorn, and
spurned the word neutrality. "Oh, poor Roman Empire!" cried John
Fontanus, "how art thou fallen! Thy protector has become thy despoiler,
and, although thy members see this and know it, they sleep through it
all. One day they may have a terrible awakening from their slumbers . . .
. . . . The Admiral of Arragon has entirely changed the character of the
war, recognizes no neutrality, saying that there must be but one God, one
pope, and one king, and that they who object to this arrangement must be
extirpated with fire and sword, let them be where they may."
The admiral, at least, thoroughly respected the claims of the dead Philip
to universal monarchy.
Maurice gained as much credit by the defensive strategy through which he
saved the republic from the horrors thus afflicting its neighbours, as he
had ever done by his most brilliant victories. Queen Elizabeth was
enchanted with the prowess of the prince, and with the sagacious
administration of those republican magistrates whom she never failed to
respect, even when most inclined to quarrel with them. "Never before was
it written or heard of," said the queen, "that so great an extent of
country could be defended with so few troops, that an invasion of so
superior a hostile force could be prevented, especially as it appeared
that all the streams and rivers were frozen." This, she added, was owing
to the wise and far-seeing counsels of the States-General, and to the
faithful diligence of their military commander, who now, as she declared,
deserved the title of the first captain of all Christendom.
A period of languor and exhaustion succeeded. The armies of the States
had dwindled to an effective force of scarcely four or five thousand men,
while the new levies came in but slowly. The taxation, on the other hand,
was very severe. The quotas for the provinces had risen to the amount of
five million eight hundred thousand florins for the year 1599, against an
income of four millions six hundred thousand, and this deficit went on
increasing, notwithstanding a new tax of one-half per cent. on the
capital of all estates above three thousand florins in value, and another
of two and a half per cent. on all sales of real property. The finances
of the obedient provinces were in a still worse condition, and during the
absence of the cardinal-archduke an almost universal mutiny, occasioned
by the inability of the exchequer to provide payment for the troops,
established itself throughout Flanders and Brabant. There was much
recrimination on the subject of the invasion of the Rhenish duchies, and
a war of pamphlets and manifestos between the archduke's Government and
the States-General succeeded to those active military operations by which
so much misery had been inflicted on the unfortunate inhabitants of that
border land. There was a slight attempt on the part of the Princes of
Brunswick, Hesse, and Brandenburg to counteract and to punish the
hostilities of the Spanish troops committed upon German soil. An
army--very slowly organized, against the wishes of the emperor, the
bishops, and the Catholic party--took the field, and made a feeble
demonstration upon Rheinberg and upon Rees entirely without result and
then disbanded itself ingloriously.
Meantime the admiral had withdrawn from German territory, and was amusing
himself with a variety of blows aimed at vital points of the republic. An
excursion into the Isle of Bommel was not crowned with much success. The
assault on the city was repulsed. The fortress of Crevecoeur was,
however, taken, and the fort of St. Andrew constructed--in spite of the
attempts of the States to frustrate the design--at a point commanding the
course of both the Waal and the Meuse. Having placed a considerable
garrison in each of those strongholds, the admiral discontinued his
labours and went into winter-quarters.
The States-General for political reasons were urgent that Prince Maurice
should undertake some important enterprise, but the stadholder, sustained
by the opinion of his cousin Lewis William, resisted the pressure. The
armies of the Commonwealth were still too slender in numbers and too
widely scattered for active service on a large scale, and the season for
active campaigning was wisely suffered to pass without making any attempt
of magnitude during the year.
The trade of the provinces, moreover, was very much hampered, and their
revenues sadly diminished by the severe prohibitions which had succeeded
to the remarkable indulgence hitherto accorded to foreign commerce.
Edicts in the name of the King of Spain and of the Archdukes Albert and
Isabella, forbidding all intercourse between the rebellious provinces and
the obedient Netherlands or any of the Spanish possessions, were met by
countervailing decrees of the States-General. Free trade with its enemies
and with all the world, by means of which the commonwealth had prospered
in spite of perpetual war, was now for a season destroyed, and the
immediate results were at once visible in its diminished resources. To
employ a portion of the maritime energies of the Hollanders and
Zeelanders, thus temporarily deprived of a sufficient field, a naval
expedition of seventy-five war vessels under Admiral van der Does was
fitted out, but met with very trifling success. They attacked and
plundered the settlements and forts of the Canary Islands, inflicted much
damage on the inhabitants, sailed thence to the Isle of St. Thomas, near
the equator, where the towns and villages were sacked and burned, and
where a contagious sickness broke out in the fleet, sweeping off in a
very brief period a large proportion of the crew. The admiral himself
fell a victim to the disease and was buried on the island. The fleet put
to sea again under Admiral Storm van Wena, but the sickness pursued the
adventurers on their voyage towards Brazil, one thousand of them dying at
sea in fifteen days. At Brazil they accomplished nothing, and, on their
homeward voyage, not only the new commander succumbed to the same
contagion, but the mortality continued to so extraordinary an extent
that, on the arrival of the expedition late in the winter in Holland,
there were but two captains left alive, and, in many of the vessels, not
more than six sound men to each. Nothing could be more wretched than this
termination of a great and expensive voyage, which had occasioned such
high hopes throughout the provinces; nothing more dismal than the
political atmosphere which surrounded the republic during the months
which immediately ensued. It was obvious to Barneveld and the other
leading personages, in whose hands was the administration of affairs,
that a great military success was absolutely indispensable, if the
treacherous cry of peace, when peace was really impossible, should not
become universal and fatal.
Meantime affairs were not much more cheerful in the obedient provinces.
Archduke Albert arrived with his bride in the early days of September,
1599, at Brussels, and was received with great pomp and enthusiastic
rejoicings. When are pomp and enthusiasm not to be obtained by imperial
personages, at brief notice and in vast quantities, if managers
understand their business? After all, it may be doubted whether the
theatrical display was as splendid as that which marked the beginning of
the Ernestian era. Schoolmaster Houwaerts had surpassed himself on that
occasion, and was no longer capable of deifying the new sovereign as
thoroughly as he had deified his brother.
Much real discontent followed close upon the fictitious enthusiasm. The
obedient provinces were poor and forlorn, and men murmured loudly at the
enormous extravagance of their new master's housekeeping. There were one
hundred and fifty mules, and as many horses in their sovereign's stables,
while the expense of feeding the cooks; lackeys, pages, and fine
gentlemen who swelled the retinue of the great household, was estimated,
without, wages or salaries, at two thousand florins a day. Albert had
wished to be called a king, but had been unable to obtain the
gratification of his wish. He had aspired to be emperor, and he was at
least sufficiently imperial in his ideas of expense. The murmurers were
loftily rebuked for their complaints, and reminded of the duty of
obedient provinces to contribute at least as much for the defence of
their masters as the rebels did in maintenance of their rebellion. The
provincial estates were summoned accordingly to pay roundly for the
expenses of the war as well as of the court, and to enable the new
sovereigns to suppress the military mutiny, which amid the enthusiasm
greeting their arrival was the one prominent and formidable fact.
The archduke was now thirty-nine years of age, the Infanta Isabella six
years younger. She was esteemed majestically beautiful by her courtiers,
and Cardinal Bentivoglio, himself a man of splendid intellect, pronounced
her a woman of genius, who had grown to be a prodigy of wisdom, under the
tuition of her father, the most sagacious statesman of the age. In
attachment to the Roman faith and ritual, in superhuman loftiness of
demeanour, and in hatred of heretics, she was at least a worthy child of
that sainted sovereign. In a moral point of view she was his superior.
The archdukes--so Albert and Isabella were always designated--were a
singularly attached couple, and their household, if extravagant and
imperial, was harmonious. They loved each other--so it was believed--as
sincerely as they abhorred heretics and rebels, but it does not appear
that they had a very warm affection for their Flemish subjects. Every
characteristic of their court was Spanish. Spanish costume, Spanish
manners, the Spanish tongue, were almost exclusively predominant, and
although the festivals, dances, banquets, and tourneys, were all very
magnificent, the prevailing expression of the Brabantine capital
resembled that of a Spanish convent, so severely correct, so stately, and
so grim, was the demeanour of the court.
The earliest military operations of the stadholder in the first year of
the new century were successful. Partly by menace; but more effectually
by judicious negotiation. Maurice recovered Crevecoeur, and obtained the
surrender of St. Andrew, the fort which the admiral had built the
preceding year in honour of Albert's uncle. That ecclesiastic, with whom
Mendoza had wrangled most bitterly during the whole interval of Albert's
absence, had already taken his departure for Rome, where he soon
afterwards died. The garrisons of the forts, being mostly Walloon
soldiers, forsook the Spanish service for that of the States, and were
banded together in a legion some twelve hundred strong, which became
known as the "New Beggars," and were placed under the nominal command of
Frederick Henry of Nassau, youngest child of William the Silent. The next
military event of the year was a mad combat, undertaken by formal cartel,
between Breaute, a young Norman noble in the service of the republic, and
twenty comrades, with an equal number of Flemish warriors from the
obedient provinces, under Grobbendonck. About one half of the whole
number were killed, including the leaders, but the encounter, although
exciting much interest at the time, had of course no permanent
importance.
There was much negotiation, informal and secret, between Brussels and
London during this and a portion of the following year. Elizabeth,
naturally enough, was weary of the war, but she felt, after all, as did
the Government of France, that a peace between the United Netherlands and
Spain would have for its result the restoration of the authority of his
most Catholic Majesty over all the provinces. The statesmen of France and
England, like most of the politicians of Europe, had but slender belief
in the possibility of a popular government, and doubted therefore the
continued existence of the newly-organized republic. Therefore they
really deprecated the idea of a peace which should include the States,
notwithstanding that from time to time the queen or some of her
counsellors had so vehemently reproached the Netherlanders with their
unwillingness to negotiate. "At the first recognition that these people
should make of the mere shadow of a prince," said Buzanval, the keenly
observing and experienced French envoy at the Hague, "they lose the form
they have. All the blood of the body would flow to the head, and the game
would be who should best play the valet. . . . The house of Nassau
would lose its credit within a month in case of peace." As such statesmen
could not imagine a republic, they ever dreaded the restoration in the
United Provinces of the subverted authority of Spain.
France and England were jealous of each other, and both were jealous of
Spain. Therefore even if the republican element, the strength and
endurance of which was so little suspected, had been as trifling a factor
in the problem, as was supposed, still it would have been difficult for
any one of these powers to absorb the United Netherlands. As for France,
she hardly coveted their possession. "We ought not to flatter ourselves,"
said Buzanval, "that these maritime peoples will cast themselves one day
into our nets, nor do I know that it would be advisable to pull in the
net if they should throw themselves in."
Henry was full of political schemes and dreams at this moment--as much as
his passion for Mademoiselle d'Entraigues, who had so soon supplanted the
image of the dead Gabrielle in his heart, would permit. He was very well
disposed to obtain possession of the Spanish Netherlands, whenever he
should see his way to such an acquisition, and was even indulging in
visions of the imperial crown.
He was therefore already, and for the time at least, the most intense of
papists. He was determined to sacrifice the Huguenot chiefs, and
introduce the Council of Trent, in order, as he told Du Plessis, that all
might be Christians. If he still retained any remembrance of the ancient
friendship between himself and the heretic republic, it was not likely to
exhibit itself, notwithstanding his promises and his pecuniary
liabilities to her, in anything more solid than words. "I repeat it,"
said the Dutch envoy at Paris; "this court cares nothing for us, for all
its cabals tend to close union with Rome, whence we can expect nothing
but foul weather. The king alone has any memory of our past services."
But imperturbable and self-confident as ever, Henry troubled himself
little with fears in regard to the papal supremacy, even when his
Parliament professed great anxiety in regard to the consequences of the
Council of Trent, if not under him yet under his successors. "I will so
bridle the popes," said he, cheerfully, "that they will never pass my
restrictions. My children will be still more virtuous and valiant than I.
If I have none, then the devil take the hindmost. Nevertheless I choose
that the council shall be enacted. I desire it more ardently than I
pressed the edict for the Protestants." Such being the royal humour at
the moment, it may well be believed that Duplessis Mornay would find but
little sunshine from on high on the occasion of his famous but forgotten
conferences with Du Perron, now archbishop of Evreux, before the king and
all the court at Fontainebleau. It was natural enough that to please the
king the king's old Huguenot friend should be convicted of false
citations from the fathers; but it would seem strange, were the motives
unknown, that Henry should have been so intensely interested in this most
arid and dismal of theological controversies. Yet those who had known and
observed the king closely for thirty years, declared that he had never
manifested so much passion, neither on the eve of battles nor of amorous
assignations, as he then did for the demolition of Duplessis and his
deductions. He had promised the Nuncius that the Huguenot should be
utterly confounded, and with him the whole fraternity, "for," said the
king, "he has wickedly and impudently written against the pope, to whom I
owe as much as I do to God."
These were not times in which the Hollanders, battling as stoutly against
Spain and the pope as they had done during the years when the republic
stood shoulder to shoulder with Henry the Huguenot, could hope for aid
and comfort from their ancient ally.
It is very characteristic of that age of dissimulation and of reckless
political gambling, that at the very moment when Henry's marriage with
Marie de Medicis was already arranged, and when that princess was soon
expected in Lyons, a cabal at the king's court was busy with absurd
projects to marry their sovereign to the Infanta of Spain. It is true
that the Infanta was already the wife of the cardinal-archduke, but it
was thought possible--for reasons divulged through the indiscretions or
inventions of the father confessor--to obtain the pope's dispensation on
the ground of the nullity of the marriage. Thus there were politicians at
the French court seriously occupied in an attempt to deprive the archduke
of his wife, of his Netherland provinces, and of the crown of, the holy
Roman empire, which he still hoped to inherit. Yet the ink was scarcely
dry with which Henry had signed the treaty of amity with Madrid and
Brussels.
The Queen of England, on the other hand--although often listening to
secret agents from Brussels and Madrid who offered peace, and although
perfectly aware that the great abject of Spain in securing peace with
England was to be able to swoop down at once upon the republic, thus
deprived of any allies was beside herself with rage, whenever she
suspected, with or without reason, that Brussels or Madrid had been
sending peace emissaries to the republic.
"Before I could get into the room," said Caron, on one such occasion,
"she called out, 'Have you not always told me that the States never
could, would, or should treat for peace with the enemy? Yet now it is
plain enough that they have proceeded only too far in negotiations.' And
she then swore a big oath that if the States were to deceive her she
meant to take such vengeance that men should talk of it for ever and
ever." It was a long time before the envoy could induce her to listen to
a single word, although the perfect sincerity of the States in their
attitude to the queen and to Spain was unquestionable, and her ill-humour
on the subject continued long after it had been demonstrated how much she
had been deceived.
Yet it was impossible in the nature of things for the States to play her
false, even if no reliance were to be placed on their sagacity and their
honour. Even the recent naval expedition of the republic against the
distant possessions of Spain--which in its result had caused so much
disappointment to the States, and cost them so many lives, including that
of the noble admiral whom every sailor in the Netherlands adored had been
of immense advantage to England. The queen acknowledged that the Dutch
Navy had averted the storm which threatened to descend upon her kingdom
out of Spain, the Spanish ships destined for the coast of Ireland having
been dispersed and drawn to the other aide of the world by these
demonstrations of her ally. For this she vowed that she would be
eternally grateful, and she said as much in "letters full of sugar and
honey"--according to the French envoy--which she sent to the States by
Sir Francis Vere. She protested, in short, that she had been better and
more promptly served in her necessities by the Netherlands than by her
own subjects.
All this sugar and honey however did not make the mission of Envoy
Edmonds less bitter to the States. They heard that he was going about
through half the cities of the obedient Netherlands in a sort of
triumphal procession, and it was the general opinion of the politicians
and financiers of the continent that peace between Spain and England was
as good as made. Naturally therefore, notwithstanding the exuberant
expressions of gratitude on the part of Elizabeth, the republican
Government were anxious to know what all this parleying meant. They could
not believe that people would make a raree-show of the English envoy
except for sufficient reason. Caron accordingly presented himself before
the queen, with respectful inquiries on the subject. He found her in
appearance very angry, not with him, but with Edmonds, from whom she had
received no advices. "I don't know what they are doing with him," said
her Majesty, "I hear from others that they are ringing the church bells
wherever he goes, and that they have carried him through a great many
more places than was necessary. I suppose that they think him a monster,
and they are carrying him about to exhibit him. All this is done," she
continued, "to throw dust in the eyes of the poor people, and to put it
into their heads that the Queen of England is suing for peace, which is
very wide of the mark."
She further observed that, as the agents of the Spanish Government had
been perpetually sending to her, she had been inclined once for all to
learn what they had to say. Thus she should make manifest to all the
world that she was not averse to a treaty such as might prove a secure
peace for herself and for Christendom; otherwise not.
It subsequently appeared that what they had to say was that if the queen
would give up to the Spanish Government the cautionary towns which she
held as a pledge for her advances to the republic, forbid all traffic and
intercourse between her subjects and the Netherlanders, and thenceforth
never allow an Englishman to serve in or with the armies of the States, a
peace might be made.
Surely it needed no great magnanimity on the queen's part to spurn such
insulting proposals, the offer of which showed her capable, in the
opinion of Verreycken, the man who made them, of sinking into the very
depths of dishonour. And she did spurn them. Surely, for the ally, the
protrectress, the grateful friend of the republic, to give its chief
seaports to its arch-enemy, to shut the narrow seas against its ships, so
that they never more could sail westward, and to abandon its whole
population to their fate, would be a deed of treachery such as history,
full of human baseness as it is, has rarely been obliged to record.
Before these propositions had been made by Verreycken Elizabeth protested
that, should he offer them, she would send him home with such an answer
that people should talk of it for some time to come. "Before I consent to
a single one of those points," said the queen, "I wish myself taken from
this world. Until now I have been a princess of my word, who would rather
die than so falsely deceive such good people as the States." And she made
those protestations with such expression and attitude that the Dutch
envoy believed her incapable at that moment of dissimulation.
Nevertheless her indignation did not carry her so far as to induce her to
break off the negotiations. The answer of which mankind was to talk in
time to come was simply that she would not send her commissioners to
treat for peace unless the Spanish Government should recede from the
three points thus offered by Verreycken. This certainly was not a very
blasting reply, and the Spanish agents were so far from losing heart in
consequence that the informal conferences continued for a long time, much
to the discomfort of the Netherlanders.
For more than an hour and a half on one occasion of an uncommonly hot
afternoon in April did Noel de Caron argue with her Majesty against these
ill-boding negotiations, and ever and anon, oppressed by the heat of the
weather and the argument, did the queen wander from one room of the
palace to the other in search of cool air, still bidding the envoy follow
her footsteps. "We are travelling about like pilgrims," said Elizabeth,
"but what is life but a pilgrimage?"
Yet, notwithstanding this long promenade and these moral reflections,
Caron could really not make out at the end of the interview whether or no
she intended to send her commissioners. At last he asked her the question
bluntly.
"Hallo! Hallo!" she replied. "I have only spoken to my servant once, and
I must obtain more information and think over the matter before I decide.
Be assured however that I shall always keep you informed of the progress
of the negotiations, and do you inform the States that they may build
upon me as upon a rock."
After the envoy had taken his leave, the queen said to him in Latin,
"Modicae fidei quare dubitasti?" Caron had however so nearly got out of
the door that he did not hear this admonition.
This the queen perceived, and calling him by name repeated, "O Caron!
modicae fidei quare dubitasti?" adding the injunction that he should
remember this dictum, for he well knew what she meant by it.
Thus terminated the interview, while the negotiations with Spain, not for
lack of good-will on her part, and despite the positive assertions to the
contrary of Buzanval and other foreign agents, were destined to come to
nothing.
At a little later period, at the time of certain informal and secret
conferences at Gertruydenberg, the queen threatened the envoy with her
severest displeasure, should the States dare to treat with Spain without
her permission. "Her Majesty called out to me," said Caron, "as soon as I
entered the room, that I had always assured her that the States neither
would nor could make peace with the enemy. Yet it was now looking very
differently, she continued, swearing with a mighty oath that if the
States should cheat her in that way she meant to revenge herself in such
a fashion that men would talk of it through all eternity."
The French Government was in a similar state of alarm in consequence of
the Gertruydenberg conferences.
The envoy of the archdukes, Marquis d'Havre, reported on the other hand
that all attempts to negotiate had proved fruitless, that
Olden-Barneveld, who spoke for all his colleagues, was swollen with
pride, and made it but too manifest that the States had no intention to
submit to any foreign jurisdiction, but were resolved to maintain
themselves in the form of a republic.
ETEXT EDITOR'S BOOKMARKS:
Children who had never set foot on the shore
Done nothing so long as aught remained to do
Fed on bear's liver, were nearly poisoned to death
Inhabited by the savage tribes called Samoyedes
ETEXT EDITOR'S BOOKMARKS, ENTIRE 1590-99 UNITED NETHERLANDS:
A pusillanimous peace, always possible at any period
A despot really keeps no accounts, nor need to do so
Accustomed to the faded gallantries
Alexander's exuberant discretion
All Italy was in his hands
All fellow-worms together
Allow her to seek a profit from his misfortune
Anatomical study of what has ceased to exist
Artillery
At length the twig was becoming the tree
Auction sales of judicial ermine
Being the true religion, proved by so many testimonies
Beneficent and charitable purposes (War)
Bomb-shells were not often used although known for a century
Burning of Servetus at Geneva
Certainly it was worth an eighty years' war
Chief seafaring nations of the world were already protestant
Children who had never set foot on the shore
Chronicle of events must not be anticipated
Conceding it subsequently, after much contestation
Conformity of Governments to the principles of justice
Considerable reason, even if there were but little justice
Constant vigilance is the price of liberty
Continuing to believe himself invincible and infallible
Court fatigue, to scorn pleasure
Deal with his enemy as if sure to become his friend
Decline a bribe or interfere with the private sale of places
Disciple of Simon Stevinus
Divine right of kings
Done nothing so long as aught remained to do
Eat their own children than to forego one high mass
Ever met disaster with so cheerful a smile
Every one sees what you seem, few perceive what you are
Evil has the advantage of rapidly assuming many shapes
Famous fowl in every pot
Fed on bear's liver, were nearly poisoned to death
Fellow worms had been writhing for half a century in the dust
Fled from the land of oppression to the land of liberty
For his humanity towards the conquered garrisons (censured)
For us, looking back upon the Past, which was then the Future
French seem madmen, and are wise
Future world as laid down by rival priesthoods
German Highland and the German Netherland
God of wrath who had decreed the extermination of all unbeliever
Had industry been honoured instead of being despised
Hanging of Mary Dyer at Boston
Hardly an inch of French soil that had not two possessors
He spent more time at table than the Bearnese in sleep
Henry the Huguenot as the champion of the Council of Trent
Highest were not necessarily the least slimy
His invectives were, however, much stronger than his arguments
Historical scepticism may shut its eyes to evidence
History is but made up of a few scattered fragments
History is a continuous whole of which we see only fragments
Holy institution called the Inquisition
Hugo Grotius
Humanizing effect of science upon the barbarism of war
Idle, listless, dice-playing, begging, filching vagabonds
Ignorance is the real enslaver of mankind
Imagining that they held the world's destiny in their hands
Imposed upon the multitudes, with whom words were things
Impossible it was to invent terms of adulation too gross
In times of civil war, to be neutral is to be nothing
Inevitable fate of talking castles and listening ladies
Infinite capacity for pecuniary absorption
Inhabited by the savage tribes called Samoyedes
Innocent generation, to atone for the sins of their forefathers
Intelligence, science, and industry were accounted degrading
Invaluable gift which no human being can acquire, authority
King was often to be something much less or much worse
King had issued a general repudiation of his debts
Labour was esteemed dishonourable
Leading motive with all was supposed to be religion
Life of nations and which we call the Past
Little army of Maurice was becoming the model for Europe
Loud, nasal, dictatorial tone, not at all agreeable
Luxury had blunted the fine instincts of patriotism
Magnificent hopefulness
Man had no rights at all He was property
Maritime heretics
Matters little by what name a government is called
Meet around a green table except as fencers in the field
Mondragon was now ninety-two years old
Moral nature, undergoes less change than might be hoped
More catholic than the pope
Myself seeing of it methinketh that I dream
Names history has often found it convenient to mark its epochs
National character, not the work of a few individuals
Nothing cheap, said a citizen bitterly, but sermons
Obscure were thought capable of dying natural deaths
Octogenarian was past work and past mischief
Often necessary to be blind and deaf
One-third of Philip's effective navy was thus destroyed
Past was once the Present, and once the Future
Patriotism seemed an unimaginable idea
Peace would be destruction
Philip II. gave the world work enough
Picturesqueness of crime
Placid unconsciousness on his part of defeat
Plea of infallibility and of authority soon becomes ridiculous
Portion of these revenues savoured much of black-mail
Proceeds of his permission to eat meat on Fridays
Rarely able to command, having never learned to obey
Religion was rapidly ceasing to be the line of demarcation
Repudiation of national debts was never heard of before
Rich enough to be worth robbing
Righteous to kill their own children
Road to Paris lay through the gates of Rome
Royal plans should be enforced adequately or abandoned entirely
Sacked and drowned ten infant princes
Sages of every generation, read the future like a printed scroll
Seems but a change of masks, of costume, of phraseology
Self-assertion--the healthful but not engaging attribute
Selling the privilege of eating eggs upon fast-days
Sentiment of Christian self-complacency
Sewers which have ever run beneath decorous Christendom
Shift the mantle of religion from one shoulder to the other
Slain four hundred and ten men with his own hand
So often degenerated into tyranny (Calvinism)
Some rude lessons from that vigorous little commonwealth
Spain was governed by an established terrorism
Spaniards seem wise, and are madmen
Strangled his nineteen brothers on his accession
Such a crime as this had never been conceived (bankruptcy)
That unholy trinity--Force; Dogma, and Ignorance
The history of the Netherlands is history of liberty
The great ocean was but a Spanish lake
The divine speciality of a few transitory mortals
The Alcoran was less cruel than the Inquisition
The nation which deliberately carves itself in pieces
The most thriving branch of national industry (Smuggler)
The record of our race is essentially unwritten
There are few inventions in morals
They liked not such divine right nor such gentle-mindedness
They had come to disbelieve in the mystery of kingcraft
Thirty thousand masses should be said for his soul
Thirty-three per cent. interest was paid (per month)
Those who argue against a foregone conclusion
Three or four hundred petty sovereigns (of Germany)
To attack England it was necessary to take the road of Ireland
Toil and sacrifices of those who have preceded us
Tranquil insolence
Under the name of religion (so many crimes)
Unproductive consumption was alarmingly increasing
Upon their knees, served the queen with wine
Use of the spade
Utter want of adaptation of his means to his ends
Utter disproportions between the king's means and aims
Valour on the one side and discretion on the other
Walk up and down the earth and destroy his fellow-creatures
We have the reputation of being a good housewife
Weapons
Whether murders or stratagems, as if they were acts of virtue
While one's friends urge moderation
Whole revenue was pledged to pay the interest, on his debts
Wish to sell us the bear-skin before they have killed the bear
Worn nor caused to be worn the collar of the serf
Wrath of that injured personage as he read such libellous truths