for it was the determination of Orange not to make enemies, at that
juncture, of France and England in the same breath. They had foes enough
already, and it seemed obvious at that moment, to all persons most
observant of the course of affairs, that a matrimonial alliance was soon
to unite the two crowns. The probability of Anjou's marriage with
Elizabeth was, in truth, a leading motive with Orange for his close
alliance with the Duke. The political structure, according to which he
had selected the French Prince as protector of the Netherlands, was
sagaciously planned; but unfortunately its foundation was the shifting
sandbank of female and royal coquetry. Those who judge only by the
result, will be quick to censure a policy which might have had very
different issue. They who place themselves in the period anterior to
Anjou's visit to England, will admit that it was hardly human not to be
deceived by the apolitical aspects of that moment. The Queen, moreover,
took pains to upbraid the states-general, by letter, with their
disrespect and ingratitude towards the Duke of Anjou--behaviour with
which he had been "justly scandalized." For her own part, she assured
them of her extreme displeasure at learning that such a course of conduct
had been held with a view to her especial contentment--"as if the person
of Monsieur, son of France, brother of the King, were disagreeable to
her, or as if she wished him ill;" whereas, on the contrary, they would
best satisfy her wishes by showing him all the courtesy to which his high
degree and his eminent services entitled him.
The estates, even before receiving this letter, had, however, acted in
its spirit. They had addressed elaborate apologies and unlimited
professions to the Duke. They thanked him heartily for his achievements,
expressed unbounded regret at his departure, with sincere hopes for his
speedy return, and promised "eternal remembrance" of his heroic virtues.
They assured him, moreover, that should the first of the following March
arrive without bringing with it an honorable peace with his Catholic
Majesty, they should then feel themselves compelled to declare that the
King had forfeited his right to the sovereignty of these provinces. In
this case they concluded that, as the inhabitants would be then absolved
from their allegiance to the Spanish monarch, it would then be in their
power to treat with his Highness of Anjou concerning the sovereignty,
according to the contract already existing.
These assurances were ample, but the states, knowing the vanity of the
man, offered other inducements, some of which seemed sufficiently
puerile. They promised that "his statue, in copper, should be placed in
the public squares of Antwerp and Brussels, for the eternal admiration of
posterity," and that a "crown of olive-leaves should be presented to him
every year." The Duke--not inexorable to such courteous solicitations--
was willing to achieve both immortality and power by continuing his
friendly relations with the states, and he answered accordingly in the
most courteous terms. The result of this interchange of civilities it
will be soon our duty to narrate.
At the close of the year the Count of Bossu died, much to the regret of
the Prince of Orange, whose party--since his release from prison by
virtue of the Ghent treaty--he had warmly espoused. "We are in the
deepest distress in the world," wrote the Prince to his brother, three
days before the Count's death, "for the dangerous malady of M. de Bossu.
Certainly, the country has much to lose in his death, but I hope that God
will not so much afflict us." Yet the calumniators of the day did not
scruple to circulate, nor the royalist chroniclers to perpetuate, the
most senseless and infamous fables on the subject of this nobleman's
death. He died of poison, they said, administered to him "in oysters,"
by command of the Prince of Orange, who had likewise made a point of
standing over him on his death-bed, for the express purpose of sneering
at the Catholic ceremonies by which his dying agonies were solaced. Such
were the tales which grave historians have recorded concerning the death
of Maximilian of Bossu, who owed so much to the Prince. The command of
the states' army, a yearly pension of five thousand florins, granted at
the especial request of Orange but a few months before, and the profound
words of regret in the private letter jest cited, are a sufficient answer
to such slanders.
The personal courage and profound military science of Parma were
invaluable to the royal cause; but his subtle, unscrupulous, and
subterranean combinations of policy were even more fruitful at this
period. No man ever understood the art of bribery more thoroughly
or practised it more skillfully. He bought a politician, or a general,
or a grandee, or a regiment of infantry, usually at the cheapest price
at which those articles could be purchased, and always with the utmost
delicacy with which such traffic could be conducted. Men conveyed
themselves to government for a definite price--fixed accurately in
florins and groats, in places and pensions--while a decent gossamer
of conventional phraseology was ever allowed to float over the nakedness
of unblushing treason. Men high in station, illustrious by ancestry,
brilliant in valor, huckstered themselves, and swindled a confiding
country for as ignoble motives as ever led counterfeiters or bravoes to
the gallows, but they were dealt with in public as if actuated only by
the loftiest principles. Behind their ancient shields, ostentatiously
emblazoned with fidelity to church and king, they thrust forth their
itching palms with the mendicity which would be hardly credible, were it
not attested by the monuments more perennial than brass, of their own
letters and recorded conversations.
Already, before the accession of Parma to power, the true way to dissever
the provinces had been indicated by the famous treason of the Seigneur de
la Motte. This nobleman commanded a regiment in the service of the
states-general, and was Governor of Gravelines. On promise of
forgiveness for all past disloyalty, of being continued in the same
military posts under Philip which he then held for the patriots, and of a
"merced" large enough to satisfy his most avaricious dreams, he went over
to the royal government. The negotiation was conducted by Alonzo Curiel,
financial agent of the King, and was not very nicely handled. The
paymaster, looking at the affair purely as a money transaction--which in
truth it was--had been disposed to drive rather too hard a bargain. He
offered only fifty thousand crowns for La Motte and his friend Baron
Montigny, and assured his government that those gentlemen, with the
soldiers under their command, were very dear at the price. La Motte
higgled very hard for more, and talked pathetically of his services and
his wounds--for he had been a most distinguished and courageous
campaigner--but Alonzo was implacable. Moreover, one Robert Bien-Aime,
Prior of Renty, was present at all the conferences. This ecclesiastic
was a busy intriguer, but not very adroit. He was disposed to make
himself useful to government, for he had set his heart upon putting the
mitre of Saint Omer upon his head, and he had accordingly composed a very
ingenious libel upon the Prince of Orange, in which production, "although
the Prior did not pretend to be Apelles or Lysippus," he hoped that the
Governor-General would recognize a portrait colored to the life. This
accomplished artist was, however, not so successful as he was picturesque
and industrious. He was inordinately vain of his services, thinking
himself, said Alonzo, splenetically, worthy to be carried in a procession
like a little saint, and as he had a busy brain, but an unruly tongue,
it will be seen that he possessed a remarkable faculty of making himself
unpleasant. This was not the way to earn his bishopric. La Motte,
through the candid communications of the Prior, found himself the subject
of mockery in Parma's camp and cabinet, where treachery to one's country
and party was not, it seemed, regarded as one of the loftier virtues,
however convenient it might be at the moment to the royal cause. The
Prior intimated especially that Ottavio Gonzaga had indulged in many
sarcastic remarks at La Motte's expense. The brave but venal warrior,
highly incensed at thus learning the manner in which his conduct was
estimated by men of such high rank in the royal service, was near
breaking off the bargain. He was eventually secured, however, by still
larger offers--Don John allowing him three hundred florins a month,
presenting him with the two best horses in his stable, and sending him an
open form, which he was to fill out in the most stringent language which
he could devise, binding the government to the payment of an ample and
entirely satisfactory "merced." Thus La Motte's bargain was completed
a crime which, if it had only entailed the loss of the troops under his
command, and the possession of Gravelines, would have been of no great
historic importance. It was, however, the first blow of a vast and
carefully sharpened treason, by which the country was soon to be cut in
twain for ever--the first in a series of bargains by which the noblest
names of the Netherlands were to be contaminated with bribery and fraud.
While the negotiations with La Notte were in progress, the government of
the states-general at Brussels had sent Saint Aldegonde to Arras. The
states of Artois, then assembled in that city, had made much difficulty
in acceding to an assessment of seven thousand florins laid upon them by
the central authority. The occasion was skillfully made use of by the
agents of the royal party to weaken the allegiance of the province, and
of its sister Walloon provinces, to the patriot cause. Saint Aldegonde
made his speech before the assembly, taking the ground boldly, that the
war was made for liberty of conscience and of fatherland, and that all
were bound, whether Catholic or Protestant, to contribute to the sacred
fund. The vote passed, but it was provided that a moiety of the
assessment should be paid by the ecclesiastical branch, and the
stipulation excited a tremendous uproar. The clerical bench regarded
the tax as both a robbery and an affront. "We came nearly to knife-
playing," said the most distinguished priest in the assembly, "and if we
had done so, the ecclesiastics would not have been the first to cry
enough." They all withdrew in a rage, and held a private consultation
upon "these exorbitant and more than Turkish demands." John Sarrasin,
Prior of Saint Yaast, the keenest, boldest, and most indefatigable of the
royal partisans of that epoch, made them an artful harangue. This man
--a better politician than the other prior--was playing for a mitre too,
and could use his cards better. He was soon to become the most
invaluable agent in the great treason preparing. No one could, be more
delicate, noiseless, or unscrupulous, and he was soon recognized both by
Governor-General and King as the individual above all others to whom the
re-establishment of the royal authority over the Walloon provinces was
owing. With the shoes of swiftness on his feet, the coat of darkness on
his back, and the wishing purse in his hand, he sped silently and
invisibly from one great Malcontent chieftain to another, buying up
centurions, and captains, and common soldiers; circumventing Orangists,
Ghent democrats, Anjou partisans; weaving a thousand intrigues,
ventilating a hundred hostile mines, and passing unharmed through the
most serious dangers and the most formidable obstacles. Eloquent, too,
at a pinch, he always understood his audience, and upon this occasion
unsheathed the most incisive, if not the most brilliant weapon which
could be used in the debate. It was most expensive to be patriotic, he
said, while silver was to be saved, and gold to be earned by being loyal.
They ought to keep their money to defend themselves, not give it to the
Prince of Orange, who would only put it into his private pocket on
pretence of public necessities. The Ruward would soon be slinking back
to his lair, he observed, and leave them all in the fangs of their
enemies. Meantime, it was better to rush into the embrace of a bountiful
king, who was still holding forth his arms to them. They were
approaching a precipice, said the Prior; they were entering a labyrinth;
and not only was the "sempiternal loss of body and soul impending over
them, but their property was to be taken also, and the cat to be thrown
against their legs." By this sudden descent into a very common
proverbial expression, Sarrasin meant to intimate that they were getting
themselves into a difficult position, in which they were sure to reap
both danger and responsibility.
The harangue had much effect upon his hearers, who were now more than
ever determined to rebel against the government which they had so
recently accepted, preferring, in the words of the Prior, "to be
maltreated by their prince, rather than to be barbarously tyrannized
over by a heretic." So much anger had been excited in celestial minds
by a demand of thirty-five hundred florins.
Saint Aldegonde was entertained in the evening at a great banquet,
followed by a theological controversy, in which John Sarrasin complained
that "he had been attacked upon his own dunghill." Next day the
distinguished patriot departed on a canvassing tour among the principal
cities; the indefatigable monk employing the interval of his absence in
aggravating the hostility of the Artesian orders to the pecuniary demands
of the general government. He was assisted in his task by a peremptory
order which came down from Brussels, ordering, in the name of Matthias, a
levy upon the ecclesiastical property, "rings, jewels, and reliquaries,"
unless the clerical contribution should be forthcoming. The rage of the
bench was now intense, and by the time of Saint Aldegonde's return a
general opposition had been organized. The envoy met with a chilling
reception; there were no banquets anymore--no discussions of any kind.
To his demands for money, "he got a fine nihil," said Saint Vaast; and
as for polemics, the only conclusive argument for the country would be,
as he was informed on the same authority, the "finishing of Orange and of
his minister along with him." More than once had the Prior intimated to
government--as so many had done before him--that to "despatch Orange,
author of all the troubles," was the best preliminary to any political
arrangement. From Philip and his Governor-General, down to the humblest
partisan, this conviction had been daily strengthening. The knife or
bullet of an assassin was the one thing needful to put an end to this
incarnated rebellion.
Thus matters grew worse and worse in Artois. The Prior, busier than ever
in his schemes, was one day arrested along with other royal emissaries,
kept fifteen days "in a stinking cellar, where the scullion washed the
dishes," and then sent to Antwerp to be examined by the states-general.
He behaved with great firmness, although he had good reason to tremble
for his neck. Interrogated by Leoninus on the part of the central
government, he boldly avowed that these pecuniary demands upon the
Walloon estates, and particularly upon their ecclesiastical branches,
would never be tolerated. "In Alva's time," said Sarrasin, "men were
flayed, but not shorn." Those who were more attached to their skin than
their fleece might have thought the practice in the good old times of the
Duke still more objectionable. Such was not the opinion of the Prior and
the rest of his order. After an unsatisfactory examination and a brief
duresse, the busy ecclesiastic was released; and as his secret labors had
not been detected, he resumed them after his return more ardently than
ever.
A triangular intrigue was now fairly established in the Walloon country.
The Duke of Alencon's head-quarters were at Mons; the rallying-point of
the royalist faction was with La Motte at Gravelines; while the
ostensible leader of the states' party, Viscount Ghent, was governor of
Artois, and supposed to be supreme in Arras. La Motte was provided by
government with a large fund of secret-service money, and was instructed
to be very liberal in his bribes to men of distinction; having a tender
regard, however, to the excessive demands of this nature now daily made
upon the royal purse. The "little Count," as the Prior called Lalain,
together with his brother, Baron Montigny, were considered highly
desirable acquisitions for government, if they could be gained. It was
thought, however, that they had the "fleur-de-lys imprinted too deeply
upon their hearts," for the effect produced upon Lalain, governor of
Hainault, by Margaret of Valois, had not yet been effaced. His brother
also had been disposed to favor the French prince, but his mind was more
open to conviction. A few private conferences with La Motte, and a
course of ecclesiastical tuition from the Prior--whose golden opinions
had irresistible resonance--soon wrought a change in the Malcontent
chieftain's mind. Other leading seigniors were secretly dealt with in
the same manner. Lalain, Heze, Havre, Capres, Egmont, and even the
Viscount of Ghent, all seriously inclined their ears to the charmer, and
looked longingly and lovingly as the wily Prior rolled in his tangles
before them--"to mischief swift." Few had yet declared themselves; but
of the grandees who commanded large bodies of troops, and whose influence
with their order was paramount, none were safe for the patriot cause
throughout the Walloon country.
The nobles and ecclesiastics were ready to join hands in support of
church and king, but in the city of Arras, the capital of the whole
country, there was a strong Orange and liberal party. Gosson, a man of
great wealth, one of the most distinguished advocates in the Netherlands,
and possessing the gift of popular eloquence to a remarkable degree, was
the leader of this burgess faction. In the earlier days of Parma's
administration, just as a thorough union of the Walloon provinces in
favor of the royal government had nearly been formed, these Orangists of
Arras risked a daring stroke. Inflamed by the harangues of Gosson, and
supported by five hundred foot soldiers and fifty troopers under one
Captain Ambrose, they rose against the city magistracy, whose sentiments
were unequivocally for Parma, and thrust them all into prison. They then
constituted a new board of fifteen, some Catholics and some Protestants,
but all patriots, of whom Gosson was chief. The stroke took the town by
surprise; and was for a moment successful. Meantime, they depended upon
assistance from Brussels. The royal and ecclesiastical party was,
however, not so easily defeated, and an old soldier, named Bourgeois,
loudly denounced Captain Ambrose, the general of the revolutionary
movement, as a vile coward, and affirmed that with thirty good men-at-
arms he would undertake to pound the whole rebel army to powder--" a pack
of scarecrows," he said, "who were not worth as many owls for military
purposes."
Three days after the imprisonment of the magistracy, a strong Catholic
rally was made in their behalf in the Fishmarket, the ubiquitous Prior
of Saint Vaast flitting about among the Malcontents, blithe and busy as
usual when storms were brewing. Matthew Doucet, of the revolutionary
faction--a man both martial and pacific in his pursuits, being eminent
both as a gingerbread baker and a swordplayer--swore he would have the
little monk's life if he had to take him from the very horns of the
altar; but the Prior had braved sharper threats than these. Moreover,
the grand altar would have been the last place to look fox him on that
occasion. While Gosson was making a tremendous speech in favor of
conscience and fatherland at the Hotel de Ville, practical John Sarrasin,
purse in hand, had challenged the rebel general, Ambrose to private
combat. In half an hour, that warrior was routed, and fled from the
field at the head of his scarecrows, for there was no resisting the power
before which the Montignys and the La Mottes had succumbed. Eloquent
Gosson was left to his fate. Having the Catholic magistracy in durance,
and with nobody to guard them, he felt, as was well observed by an ill-
natured contemporary, like a man holding a wolf by the ears, equally
afraid to let go or to retain his grasp.
His dilemma was soon terminated. While he was deliberating with his
colleagues--Mordacq, an old campaigner, Crugeot, Bertoul, and others--
whether to stand or, fly, the drums and trumpets of the advancing
royalists were heard. In another instant the Hotel de Ville was swarming
with men-at-arms, headed by Bourgeois, the veteran who had expressed so
alighting an opinion as to the prowess of Captain Ambrose. The tables
were turned, the miniature revolution was at an end, the counter-
revolution effected. Gosson and his confederates escaped out of a back
door, but were soon afterwards arrested. Next morning, Baron Capres, the
great Malcontent seignior, who was stationed with his regiment in the
neighbourhood, and who had long been secretly coquetting with the Prior
and Parma, marched into the city at the head of a strong detachment, and
straightway proceeded to erect a very tall gibbet in front of the Hotel
de Ville. This looked practical in the eyes of the liberated and
reinstated magistrates, and Gosson, Crugeot, and the rest were summoned
at once before them. The advocate thought, perhaps, with a sigh, that
his judges, so recently his prisoners, might have been the fruit for
another gallowstree, had he planted it when the ground was his own; but
taking heart of grace, he encouraged his colleagues--now his fellow-
culprits. Crugeot, undismayed, made his appearance before the tribunal,
arrayed in a corslet of proof, with a golden hilted sword, a scarf
embroidered with pearls and gold, and a hat bravely plumaged with white,
blue, and, orange feathers--the colors of William the Silent--of all
which finery he was stripped, however, as soon as he entered the court.
The process was rapid. A summons from Brussels was expected every hour
from the general government, ordering the cases to be brought before the
federal tribunal; and as the Walloon provinces were not yet ready for
open revolt, the order would be an inconvenient one. Hence the necessity
for haste. The superior court of Artois, to which an appeal from the
magistrates lay, immediately held a session in another chamber of the
Hotel de Ville while the lower court was trying the prisoners, and
Bertoul, Crugeot, Mordacq, with several others, were condemned in a few
hours to the gibbet. They were invited to appeal, if they chose, to the
council of Artois, but hearing that the court was sitting next door, so
that there was no chance of a rescue in the streets, they declared
themselves satisfied with the sentence. Gosson had not been tried, his
case being reserved for the morrow.
Meantime, the short autumnal day had drawn to a close. A wild, stormy,
rainy night then set in, but still the royalist party--citizens and
soldiers intermingled--all armed to the teeth, and uttering fierce cries,
while the whole scene was fitfully illuminated with the glare of
flambeaux and blazing tar-barrels, kept watch in the open square around
the city hall. A series of terrible Rembrandt-like nightpieces
succeeded--grim, fantastic, and gory. Bertoul, an old man, who for years
had so surely felt himself predestined to his present doom that he had
kept a gibbet in his own house to accustom himself to the sight of the
machine, was led forth the first, and hanged at ten in the evening. He
was a good man, of perfectly blameless life, a sincere Catholic, but a
warm partisan of Orange.
Valentine de Mordacq, an old soldier, came from the Hotel de Ville to
the gallows at midnight. As he stood on the ladder, amid the flaming
torches, he broke forth into furious execrations, wagging his long white
beard to and fro, making hideous grimaces, and cursing the hard fate
which, after many dangers on the battle-field and in beleaguered cities,
had left him to such a death. The cord strangled his curses. Crugeot
was executed at three in the morning, having obtained a few hours'
respite in order to make his preparations, which he accordingly occupied
himself in doing as tranquilly as if he had been setting forth upon an
agreeable journey. He looked like a phantom, according to eye-witnesses,
as he stood under the gibbet, making a most pious and, Catholic address
to the crowd.