This eBook was produced by David Widger
[NOTE: There is a short list of bookmarks, or pointers, at the end of the
file for those who may wish to sample the author's ideas before making an
entire meal of them. D.W.]
MOTLEY'S HISTORY OF THE NETHERLANDS, Project Gutenberg Edition, Vol. 34
THE RISE OF THE DUTCH REPUBLIC, 1582-1584
By John Lothrop Motley
1855
CHAPTER VI.
Parma recals the foreign troops--Siege of Oudenarde--Coolness of
Alexander--Capture of the city and of Nineve--Inauguration of Anjou
at Ghent--Attempt upon his life and that of Orange--Lamoral Egmont's
implication in the plot--Parma's unsuccessful attack upon Ghent--
Secret plans of Anjou--Dunkirk, Ostend, and other towns surprised by
his adherents--Failure at Bruges--Suspicions at Antwerp--Duplicity
of Anjou--The "French Fury"--Details of that transaction--
Discomfiture and disgrace of the Duke--His subsequent effrontery--
His letters to the magistracy of Antwerp, to, the Estates, and to
Orange--Extensive correspondence between Anjou and the, French Court
with Orange and the Estates--Difficult position of the Prince--His
policy--Remarkable letter to the States-general--Provisional
arrangement with Anjou--Marriage of the Archbishop of Cologne--
Marriage of Orange with Louisa de Coligny--Movements in Holland,
Brabant, Flanders, and other provinces, to induce the Prince to
accept sovereignty over the whole country--His steady refusal--
Treason of Van den Berg in Gueldres--Intrigues of Prince Chimay and
Imbize in Flanders--Counter efforts of Orange and the patriot party
--Fate of Imbize--Reconciliation of Bruges--Death of Anjou
During the course of the year 1582, the military operations on both sides
had been languid and desultory, the Prince of Parma, not having a large
force at his command, being comparatively inactive. In consequence,
however, of the treaty concluded between the United states and Anjou,
Parma had persuaded the Walloon provinces that it had now become
absolutely necessary for them to permit the entrance of fresh Italian and
Spanish troops. This, then, was the end of the famous provision against
foreign soldiery in the Walloon treaty of reconciliation. The Abbot of
Saint Vaast was immediately despatched on a special mission to Spain, and
the troops, by midsummer, had already begun to pour, into the
Netherlands.
In the meantime, Farnese, while awaiting these reinforcements, had not
been idle, but had been quietly picking up several important cities.
Early in the spring he had laid siege to Oudenarde, a place of
considerable importance upon the Scheld, and celebrated as the birthplace
of his grandmother, Margaret van Geest. The burghers were obstinate; the
defence was protracted; the sorties were bold; the skirmishes frequent
and sanguinary: Alexander commanded personally in the trenches,
encouraging his men by his example, and often working with the mattock,
or handling a spear in the assault, Like a private pioneer or soldier.
Towards the end of the siege, he scarcely ever left the scene of
operation, and he took his meals near the outer defences, that he might
lose no opportunity of superintending the labors of his troops. One day
his dinner was laid for himself and staff in the open air, close to the
entrenchment. He was himself engaged in planting a battery against a
weak point in the city wall, and would on no account withdraw for all
instant. The tablecloth was stretched over a number of drum-heads,
placed close together, and several, nobles of distinction--Aremberg,
Montigny, Richebourg, La Motte, and others, were his guests at dinner.
Hardly had the repast commenced, when a ball came flying over the table,
taking off the head of a, young Walloon officer who was sitting near
Parma, and, who was earnestly requesting a foremost place in the.
morrow's assault. A portion of his skull struck out the eye of another
gentleman present. A second ball from the town fortifications, equally
well directed, destroyed two more of the guests as they sat at the
banquet--one a German captain, the other the Judge-Advocate-General.
The blood and brains of these unfortunate individuals were strewn over
the festive board, and the others all started to their feet, having
little appetite left for their dinner. Alexander alone remained in his
seat, manifesting no discomposure. Quietly ordering the attendants to
remove the dead bodies, and to bring a clean tablecloth, he insisted
that his guests should resume their places at the banquet which had been
interrupted in such ghastly fashion. He stated with very determined
aspect that he could not allow the heretic burghers of Oudenarde the
triumph of frightening him from his dinner, or from the post of danger.
The other gentlemen could, of course, do no less than imitate the
impassibility of their chief, and the repast was accordingly concluded
without further interruption. Not long afterwards, the city, close
pressed by so determined a commander, accepted terms, which were more
favorable by reason of the respect which Alexander chose to render to his
mother's birthplace. The pillage was commuted for thirty thousand,
crowns, and on the 5th of July the place was surrendered to Parma almost
under the very eyes of Anjou, who was making a demonstration of relieving
the siege.
Ninove, a citadel then belonging to the Egmont family, was next reduced.
Here, too, the defence was more obstinate than could have been expected
from the importance of the place, and as the autumn advanced, Parma's
troops were nearly starved in their trenches, from the insufficient
supplies furnished them. They had eaten no meat but horseflesh for
weeks, and even that was gone. The cavalry horses were all consumed, and
even the chargers of the officers were not respected. An aid-de-camp of
Parma fastened his steed one day at the door of the Prince's tent, while
he entered to receive his commander's instructions. When he came out
again, a few minutes afterwards, he found nothing but the saddle and
bridle hanging where he had fastened the horse. Remonstrance was
useless, for the animal had already been cut into quarters, and the only
satisfaction offered to the aid-de-camp was in the shape of a steak. The
famine was long familiarly known as the "Ninove starvation," but
notwithstanding this obstacle, the place was eventually surrendered.
An attempt upon Lochum, an important city, in Gelderland, was
unsuccessful, the place being relieved by the Duke of Anjou's forces, and
Parma's troops forced to abandon the siege. At Steenwyk, the royal arms
were more successful, Colonel Tassis, conducted by a treacherous Frisian
peasant, having surprised the city which had so, long and so manfully
sustained itself against Renneberg during the preceding winter. With
this event the active operations under Parma closed for the year. By the
end of the autumn, however, he had the satisfaction of numbering, under
his command, full sixty thousand well-appointed and disciplined troops,
including the large reinforcements recently despatched: from Spain and
Italy. The monthly expense of this army-half of which was required for
garrison duty, leaving only the other moiety for field Operations--was
estimated at six hundred and fifty thousand florins. The forces under
Anjou and the united provinces were also largely increased, so that the
marrow of the land was again in fair way of being thoroughly exhausted by
its defenders and its foes.
The incidents of Anjou's administration, meantime, during the year 1582,
had been few and of no great importance. After the pompous and elaborate
"homage-making" at Antwerp, he had, in the month of July, been formally
accepted, by writing, as Duke of Guelders and Lord of Friesland. In the
same month he had been ceremoniously, inaugurated at Bruges as Count of
Flanders--an occasion upon which the Prince of Orange had been present.
In that ancient and stately city there had been, accordingly, much
marching about under triumphal arches, much cannonading and haranguing,
much symbol work of suns dispelling fogs, with other cheerful emblems,
much decoration of ducal shoulders with velvet robes lined with weasel
skin, much blazing of tar-barrels and torches. In the midst of this
event, an attempt was made upon the lives both of Orange and Anjou. An
Italian, named Basa, and a Spaniard, called Salseda, were detected in a
scheme to administer poison to both princes, and when arrested, confessed
that they had been hired by the Prince of Parma to compass this double
assassination. Basa destroyed himself in prison. His body was, however,
gibbeted, with an inscription that he had attempted, at the instigation
of Parma, to take the lives of Orange and Anjou. Salseda, less
fortunate, was sent to Paris, where he was found guilty, and executed.
by being torn to pieces by four horses. Sad to relate, Lamoral Egmont,
younger son and namesake of the great general, was intimate with Salseda,
and implicated in this base design. His mother, on her death-bed, had
especially recommended the youth to the kindly care of Orange. The
Prince had ever recognized the claim, manifesting uniform tenderness for
the son of his ill-started friend; and now the youthful Lamoral--as if
the name of Egmont had not been sufficiently contaminated by the elder
brother's treason at Brussels--had become the comrade of hired
conspirators against his guardian's life. The affair was hushed up,
but the story was current and generally believed that Egmont had himself
undertaken to destroy the Prince at his own table by means of poison
which he kept concealed in a ring. Saint Aldegonde was to have been
taken off in the same way, and a hollow ring filled with poison was said
to have been found in Egmont's lodgings.
The young noble was imprisoned; his guilt was far from doubtful; but the
powerful intercessions of Orange himself, combined with Egmont's near
relationship to the French Queen saved his life, and he was permitted,
after a brief captivity, to take his departure for France.
The Duke of Anjou, a month later, was received with equal pomp, in the
city of Ghent. Here the ceremonies were interrupted in another manner.
The Prince of Parma, at the head of a few regiments of Walloons, making
an attack on a body of troops by which Anjou had been escorted into
Flanders, the troops retreated in good order, and without much loss,
under the walls of Ghent, where a long and sharp action took place, much
to the disadvantage of Parma, The Prince, of Orange and the Duke; of
Anjou were on the city walls during the whole skirmish giving orders and
superintending the movements of their troops, and at nightfall Parma was
forced, to retire, leaving a large number of dead behind him.
The 15th day of December, in this year was celebrated according to the
new ordinance of Gregory the Thirteenth--as Christmas. It was the
occasion of more than usual merry-making among the Catholics of Antwerp,
who had procured, during the preceding summer, a renewed right of public
worship from Anjou and the estates. Many nobles of high rank came from
France, to pay their homage to the new Duke of Brabant. They secretly
expressed their disgust, however, at the close constitutional bonds in
which they found their own future sovereign imprisoned by the provinces.
They thought it far beneath the dignity of the "Son of France" to play
the secondary part of titular Duke of Brabant, Count of Flanders, Lord of
Friesland, and the like, while the whole power of government was lodged
with the states. They whispered that it was time to take measures for
the incorporation of the Netherlands into France, and they persuaded the
false and fickle Anjou that there would never be any hope of his royal
brother's assistance, except upon the understanding that the blood and
treasure of Frenchmen were to be spent to increase the power, not of
upstart and independent provinces, but of the French crown.
They struck the basest chords of the Duke's base nature by awakening his
jealousy of Orange. His whole soul vibrated to the appeal. He already
hated the man by whose superior intellect he was overawed, and by whose
pure character he was shamed. He stoutly but secretly swore that he
would assert his own rights; and that he would no longer serve as a
shadow, a statue, a zero, a Matthias. It is needless to add, that
neither in his own judgment nor in that of his mignons, were the
constitutional articles which he had recently sworn to support, or the
solemn treaty which he had signed and sealed at Bordeaux, to furnish any
obstacles to his seizure of unlimited power, whenever the design could be
cleverly accomplished. He rested not, day or night, in the elaboration
of his plan.
Early in January, 1583, he sent one night for several of his intimate
associates, to consult with him after he had retired to bed. He
complained of the insolence of the states, of the importunity of the
council which they had forced upon him, of the insufficient sums which
they furnished both for him and his troops, of the daily insults offered
to the Catholic religion. He protested that he should consider himself
disgraced in the eyes of all Christendom, should he longer consent to
occupy his present ignoble position. But two ways were open to him, he
observed; either to retire altogether from the Nether lands, or to
maintain his authority with the strong hand, as became a prince. The
first course would cover him with disgrace. It was therefore necessary
for him to adopt the other. He then unfolded his plan to his confidential
friends, La Fougere, De Fazy, Palette, the sons of Marechal Biron, and
others. Upon the same day, if possible, he was determined to take
possession, with his own troops, of the principal cities in Flanders.
Dunkirk, Dixmuyde, Denremonde, Bruges, Ghent, Vilvoorde, Alost, and other
important places, were to be simultaneously invaded, under pretext of
quieting tumults artfully created and encouraged between the burghers and
the garrisons, while Antwerp was reserved for his own especial
enterprise. That important capital he would carry by surprise at the
same moment in which the other cities were to be secured by his
lieutenants.
The plot was pronounced an excellent one by the friends around his bed--
all of them eager for Catholic supremacy, for the establishment of the
right divine on the part of France to the Netherlands, and for their
share in the sacking of so many wealthy cities at once. These worthless
mignons applauded their weak master to the echo; whereupon the Duke
leaped from his bed, and kneeling on the floor in his night-gown, raised
his eyes and his clasped hands to heaven, and piously invoked the
blessing of the Almighty upon the project which he had thus announced.
He added the solemn assurance that; if favored with success in his
undertaking, he would abstain in future from all unchastity, and forego
the irregular habits by which his youth had been stained. Having thus
bribed the Deity, and received the encouragement of his flatterers, the
Duke got into bed again. His next care was to remove the Seigneur du
Plessis, whom he had observed to be often in colloquy with the Prince of
Orange, his suspicious and guilty imagination finding nothing but
mischief to himself in the conjunction of two such natures. He therefore
dismissed Du Plessis, under pretext of a special mission to his sister,
Margaret of Navarre; but in reality, that he might rid himself of the
presence of an intelligent and honorable countryman.
On the a 15th January, 1583, the day fixed for the execution of the plot,
the French commandant of Dunkirk, Captain Chamois, skillfully took
advantage of a slight quarrel between the citizens and the garrison,
to secure that important frontier town. The same means were employed
simultaneously, with similar results, at Ostend, Dixmuyde, Denremonde,
Alost, and Vilvoorde, but there was a fatal delay at one important city.
La Fougere, who had been with Chamois at Dunkirk, was arrested on his way
to Bruges by some patriotic citizens who had got wind of what had just
been occurring in the other cities, so that when Palette, the provost of
Anjou, and Colonel la Rebours, at the head of fifteen hundred French
troops, appeared before the gates, entrance was flatly refused. De
Grijse, burgomaster of Bruges, encouraged his fellow townsmen by words
and stout action, to resist the nefarious project then on foot against
religious liberty and free government, in favor of a new foreign tyranny.
He spoke to men who could sympathize with, and second his courageous
resolution, and the delay of twenty-four hours, during which the burghers
had time to take the alarm, saved the city. The whole population was on
the alert, and the baffled Frenchmen were forced to retire from the
gates, to avoid being torn to pieces by the citizens whom they had
intended to surprise.
At Antwerp, meanwhile, the Duke of Anjou had been rapidly maturing his
plan, under pretext of a contemplated enterprise against the city of
Endhoven, having concentrated what he esteemed a sufficient number of
French troops at Borgerhout, a village close to the walls of Antwerp.
On the 16th of January, suspicion was aroused in the city. A man in a
mask entered the main guard-house in the night, mysteriously gave warning
that a great crime was in contemplation, and vanished before he could be
arrested. His accent proved him to be a Frenchman. Strange rumors flew
about the streets. A vague uneasiness pervaded the whole population as
to the intention of their new master, but nothing was definitely known,
for of course there was entire ignorance of the events which were just
occurring in other cities. The colonels and captains of the burgher
guard came to consult the Prince of Orange. He avowed the most entire
confidence in the Duke of Anjou, but, at the same time; recommended that
the chains should be drawn, the lanterns hung out, and the drawbridge
raised an hour earlier than usual, and that other precautions; customary
in the expectation of an attack, should be duly taken. He likewise sent
the Burgomaster of the interior, Dr. Alostanus, to the Duke of Anjou, in
order to communicate the suspicions created in the minds of the city
authorities by the recent movements of troops.
Anjou, thus addressed, protested in the most solemn manner that nothing
was farther from his thoughts than any secret enterprise against Antwerp.
He was willing, according to the figure of speech which he had always
ready upon every emergency, "to shed every drop of his blood in her
defence." He swore that he would signally punish all those who had dared
to invent such calumnies against himself and his faithful Frenchmen,
declaring earnestly, at the same time, that the troops had only been
assembled in the regular course of their duty. As the Duke was so loud
and so fervent; as he, moreover, made no objections to the precautionary
measures which had been taken; as the burgomaster thought, moreover, that
the public attention thus aroused would render all evil designs futile,
even if any had been entertained; it was thought that the city might
sleep in security for that night at least.
On the following, morning, as vague suspicions were still entertained by
many influential persons, a deputation of magistrates and militia
officers waited upon the Duke, the Prince of Orange--although himself
still feeling a confidence which seems now almost inexplicable--
consenting to accompany them. The Duke was more vehement than ever in
his protestations of loyalty to his recent oaths, as well as of deep
affection for the Netherlands--for Brabant in particular, and for Antwerp
most of all, and he made use of all his vivacity to persuade the Prince,
the burgomasters, and the colonels, that they had deeply wronged him by
such unjust suspicions. His assertions were accepted as sincere, and the
deputation withdrew, Anjou having first solemnly promised--at the
suggestion of Orange--not to leave the city during the whole day, in
order that unnecessary suspicion might be prevented.
This pledge the Duke proceeded to violate almost as soon as made.
Orange returned with confidence to his own house, which was close to the
citadel, and therefore far removed from the proposed point of attack, but
he had hardly arrived there when he received a visit from the Duke's
private secretary, Quinsay, who invited him to accompany his Highness on
a visit to the camp. Orange declined the request, and sent an earnest
prayer to the Duke not to leave the city that morning. The Duke dined as
usual at noon. While at dinner he received a letter; was observed to
turn pale on reading it, and to conceal it hastily in a muff which he
wore on his left arm. The repast finished, the Duke ordered his horse.
The animal was restive, and so, strenuously resisted being mounted that,
although it was his usual charger; it was exchanged for another. This
second horse started in such a flurry that the Duke lost his cloak, and
almost his seat. He maintained his self-possession, however, and placing
himself at the head of his bodyguard and some troopers, numbering in all
three hundred mounted men, rode out of the palace-yard towards the
Kipdorp gate.
This portal opened on the road towards Borgerhout, where his troops were
stationed, and at the present day bears the name of that village: It is
on the side of the city farthest removed from and exactly opposite the
river. The town was very quiet, the streets almost deserted; for it was
one o'clock, the universal dinner-hour, and all suspicion had been
disarmed by the energetic protestations of the Duke. The guard at the
gate looked listlessly upon the cavalcade as it approached, but as soon
as Anjou had crossed the first drawbridge, he rose in his stirrups and
waved his hand. "There is your city, my lads," said he to the troopers
behind him; "go and take possession of it!"
At the same time he set spurs to his horse, and galloped off towards the
camp at Borgerhout. Instantly afterwards; a gentleman of his suite,
Count Bochepot, affected to have broken his leg through the plunging of
his horse, a circumstance by which he had been violently pressed, against
the wall as he entered the gate. Kaiser, the commanding officer at the
guard-house, stepped kindly forward to render him assistance, and his
reward was a desperate thrust from the Frenchman's rapier. As he wore a
steel cuirass, he fortunately escaped with a slight wound.
The expression, "broken leg," was the watch-word, for at one and the same
instant, the troopers and guardsmen of Anjou set upon the burgher watch
at the gate, and butchered every man. A sufficient force was left to
protect the entrance thus easily mastered, while the rest of the
Frenchmen entered the town at full gallop, shrieking "Ville gaignee,
ville gaignee! vive la messe! vive le Due d'Anjou!" They were followed
by their comrades from the camp outside, who now poured into the town at
the preconcerted signal, at least six hundred cavalry and three thousand
musketeers, all perfectly appointed, entering Antwerp at once. From the
Kipdorp gate two main arteries--the streets called the Kipdorp and the
Meer--led quite through the heart of the city, towards the townhouse and
the river beyond. Along these great thoroughfares the French soldiers
advanced at a rapid pace; the cavalry clattering furiously in the van,
shouting "Ville gaignee, ville gaignee! vive la messe, vive la messe!
tue, tue, tue!"
The burghers coming to door and window to look for the cause of all this
disturbance, were saluted with volleys of musketry. They were for a
moment astonished, but not appalled, for at first they believed it to be
merely an accidental tumult. Observing, however, that the soldiers,
meeting with but little effective resistance, were dispersing into
dwellings and warehouses, particularly into the shops of the goldsmiths
and lapidaries, the citizens remembered the dark suspicions which had
been so rife, and many recalled to mind that distinguished French
officers had during, the last few days been carefully examining the
treasures of the jewellers, under pretext of purchasing, but, as it now
appeared, with intent to rob intelligently.
The burghers, taking this rapid view of their position, flew instantly to
arms. Chains and barricades were stretched across the streets; the
trumpets sounded through the city; the municipal guards swarmed to the
rescue. An effective rally was made, as usual, at the Bourse, whither a
large detachment of the invaders had forced their way. Inhabitants of
all classes and conditions, noble and simple, Catholic and Protestant,
gave each other the hand, and swore to die at each other's side in
defence of the city against the treacherous strangers. The gathering was
rapid and enthusiastic. Gentlemen came with lance and cuirass, burghers
with musket and bandoleer, artisans with axe, mallet, and other
implements of their trade. A bold baker, standing by his oven-stark
naked, according to the custom of bakers at that day--rushed to the
street as the sound of the tumult reached his ear. With his heavy bread
shovel, which he still held in his hand, he dealt a French cavalry,
officer, just riding and screaming by, such a hearty blow that he fell
dead from his horse. The baker seized the officer's sword, sprang all
unattired as he was, upon his steed, and careered furiously through the
streets, encouraging his countrymen everywhere to the attack, and dealing
dismay through the ranks of the enemy. His services in that eventful
hour were so signal that he was publicly thanked afterwards by the
magistrates for his services, and rewarded with a pension of three
hundred florins for life.
The invaders had been forced from the Bourse, while another portion of
them had penetrated as far as the Market-place. The resistance which
they encountered became every instant more formidable, and Fervacques,
a leading French officer, who was captured on the occasion, acknowledged
that no regular troops could have fought more bravely than did these
stalwart burghers. Women and children mounted to roof and window, whence
they hurled, not only tiles and chimney pots, but tables, ponderous
chairs, and other bulky articles, upon the heads of the assailants, while
such citizens as had used all their bullets, loaded their pieces with the
silver buttons from their doublets, or twisted gold and silver coins with
their teeth into ammunition. With a population so resolute, the four
thousand invaders, however audacious, soon found themselves swallowed up.
The city had closed over them like water, and within an hour nearly a
third of their whole number had been slain. Very few of the burghers had
perished, and fresh numbers were constantly advancing to the attack. The
Frenchmen, blinded, staggering, beaten, attempted to retreat. Many threw
themselves from the fortifications into the moat. The rest of the
survivors struggled through the streets--falling in large numbers at
every step-towards the point at which they had so lately entered the
city. Here at the Kipdorp gate was a ghastly spectacle, the slain being
piled up in the narrow passage full ten feet high, while some of the
heap, not quite dead, were striving to extricate a hand or foot, and
others feebly thrust forth their heads to gain a mouthful of air.
From the outside, some of Anjou's officers were attempting to climb over
this mass of bodies in order to enter the city; from the interior, the
baffled and fugitive remnant of their comrades were attempting to force
their passage through the same horrible barrier; while many dropped at,
every instant upon the heap of slain, under the blows of the unrelenting
burghers. On the other hand, Count Rochepot himself, to whom the
principal command of the enterprise had been entrusted by Anjou, stood
directly in the path of his fugitive soldiers, not only bitterly
upbraiding them with their cowardice, but actually slaying ten or twelve
of them with his own hands, as the most effectual mode of preventing
their retreat. Hardly an hour had elapsed from the time when the Duke of
Anjou first rode out of the Kipdorp gate, before nearly the whole of the
force which he had sent to accomplish his base design was either dead or
captive. Two hundred and fifty nobles of high rank and illustrious name
were killed; recognized at once as they lay in the streets by their
magnificent costume. A larger number of the gallant chivalry of France
had been sacrificed--as Anjou confessed--in this treacherous and most
shameful enterprise, than had often fallen upon noble and honorable
fields. Nearly two thousand of the rank and file had perished, and the
rest were prisoners. It was at first asserted that exactly fifteen
hundred and eighty-three Frenchmen had fallen, but this was only because
this number happened to be the date of the year, to which the lovers of
marvellous coincidences struggled very hard to make the returns of the
dead correspond. Less than one hundred burghers lost their lives.
Anjou, as he looked on at a distance, was bitterly reproached for his
treason by several of the high-minded gentlemen about his person, to whom
he had not dared to confide his plot. The Duke of Montpensier protested
vehemently that he washed his hands of the whole transaction, whatever
might be the issue. He was responsible for the honor of an illustrious
house, which should never be stained, he said, if he could prevent it,
with such foul deeds. The same language was held by Laval, by
Rochefoucauld, and by the Marechal de Biron, the last gentleman, whose
two sons were engaged in the vile enterprise, bitterly cursing the Duke
to his face, as he rode through the gate after revealing his secret
undertaking.
Meanwhile, Anjou, in addition to the punishment of hearing these
reproaches from men of honor, was the victim of a rapid and violent
fluctuation of feeling. Hope, fear, triumph, doubt, remorse, alternately
swayed him. As he saw the fugitives leaping from the walls, he shouted
exultingly, without accurately discerning what manner of men they were,
that the city was his, that four thousand of his brave soldiers were
there, and were hurling the burghers from the battlements. On being made
afterwards aware of his error, he was proportionably depressed; and when
it was obvious at last that the result of the enterprise was an absolute
and disgraceful failure, together with a complete exposure of his
treachery, he fairly mounted his horse, and fled conscience-stricken from
the scene.
The attack had been so unexpected, in consequence of the credence
that had been rendered by Orange and the magistracy to the solemn
protestations of the Duke, that it had been naturally out of any one's
power to prevent the catastrophe. The Prince was lodged in apart of the
town remote from the original scene of action, and it does not appear
that information had reached him that anything unusual was occurring,
until the affair was approaching its termination. Then there was little
for him to do. He hastened, however, to the scene, and mounting the
ramparts, persuaded the citizens to cease cannonading the discomfited
and retiring foe. He felt the full gravity of the situation, and the
necessity of diminishing the rancor of the inhabitants against their
treacherous allies, if such a result were yet possible. The burghers
had done their duty, and it certainly would have been neither in his
power nor his inclination to protect the French marauders from
expulsion and castigation.
Such was the termination of the French Fury, and it seems sufficiently
strange that it should have been so much less disastrous to Antwerp than
was the Spanish Fury of 1576, to which men could still scarcely allude
without a shudder. One would have thought the French more likely to
prove successful in their enterprise than the Spaniards in theirs. The
Spaniards were enemies against whom the city had long been on its guard.
The French were friends in whose sincerity a somewhat shaken confidence
had just been restored. When the Spanish attack was made, a large force
of defenders was drawn up in battle array behind freshly strengthened
fortifications. When the French entered at leisure through a scarcely
guarded gate, the whole population and garrison of the town were quietly
eating their dinners. The numbers of the invading forces on the two
occasions did not materially differ; but at the time of the French Fury
there was not a large force of regular troops under veteran generals to
resist the attack. Perhaps this was the main reason for the result,
which seems at first almost inexplicable. For protection against the
Spanish invasion, the burghers relied on mercenaries, some of whom proved
treacherous, while the rest became panic-struck. On the present occasion
the burghers relied on themselves. Moreover, the French committed the
great error of despising their enemy. Recollecting the ease with which
the Spaniards had ravished the city, they believed that they had nothing
to do but to enter and take possession. Instead of repressing their
greediness, as the Spaniards had done, until they had overcome
resistance, they dispersed almost immediately into by-streets, and
entered warehouses to search for plunder. They seemed actuated by a fear
that they should not have time to rifle the city before additional troops
should be sent by Anjou to share in the spoil. They were less used to
the sacking of Netherland cities than were the Spaniards, whom long
practice had made perfect in the art of methodically butchering a
population at first, before attention should be diverted to plundering,
and supplementary outrages. At any rate, whatever the causes, it is
certain that the panic, which upon such occasions generally decides the
fate of the day, seized upon the invaders and not upon the invaded,
almost from the very first. As soon as the marauders faltered in their
purpose and wished to retreat, it was all over with them. Returning was
worse than advance, and it was the almost inevitable result that hardly
a man escaped death or capture.
The Duke retreated the same day in the direction of Denremonde, and on
his way met with another misfortune, by which an additional number of his
troops lost their lives. A dyke was cut by the Mechlin citizens to
impede his march, and the swollen waters of the Dill, liberated and
flowing across the country which he was to traverse, produced such an
inundation, that at least a thousand of his followers were drowned.
As soon as he had established himself in a camp near Berghem, he opened
a correspondence with the Prince of Orange, and with the authorities of
Antwerp. His language was marked by wonderful effrontery. He found
himself and soldiers suffering for want of food; he remembered that he
had left much plate and valuable furniture in Antwerp; and he was
therefore desirous that the citizens, whom he had so basely outraged,
should at once send him supplies and restore his property. He also
reclaimed the prisoners who still remained in the city, and to obtain all
this he applied to the man whom he had bitterly deceived, and whose life
would have been sacrificed by the Duke, had the enterprise succeeded.
It had been his intention to sack the city, to re-establish exclusively
the Roman Catholic worship, to trample upon the constitution which he had
so recently sworn to maintain, to deprive Orange, by force, of the
Renversal by which the Duke recognized the Prince as sovereign of
Holland; Zealand; and Utrecht, yet notwithstanding that his treason had-
been enacted in broad daylight, and in a most deliberate manner, he had
the audacity to ascribe the recent tragic occurrences to chance. He had
the farther originality to speak of himself as an aggrieved person, who
had rendered great services to the Netherlands, and who had only met with
ingratitude in return. His envoys, Messieurs Landmater and Escolieres,
despatched on the very day of the French Fury to the burgomasters and
senate of Antwerp, were instructed to remind those magistrates that the
Duke had repeatedly exposed his life in the cause of the Netherlands.
The affronts, they were to add, which he had received, and the
approaching ruin of the country, which he foresaw, had so altered his
excellent nature, as to engender the present calamity, which he
infinitely regretted. Nevertheless, the senate was to be assured that
his affection for the commonwealth was still so strong, as to induce a
desire on his part to be informed what course was now to be pursued with,
regard to him. Information upon that important point was therefore to be
requested, while at the same time the liberation of the prisoners at
Antwerp, and the restaration of the Duke's furniture and papers, were to
be urgently demanded.
Letters of similar, import were also despatched by the Duke to the states
of the Union, while to the Prince of Orange; his application was brief
but brazen. "You know well,--my cousin," said he "the just and frequent
causes of offence which this people has given me. The insults which I,
this morning experienced cut me so deeply to the heart that they are the
only reasons of the misfortune which has happened today. Nevertheless,
to those who desire my friendship I shall show equal friendship and
affection. Herein I shall follow the counsel you have uniformly given
me, since I know it comes from one who has always loved me. Therefore I
beg that you will kindly bring it to pass, that I may obtain some
decision, and that no injury may be inflicted upon my people. Otherwise
the land shall pay for it dearly."
To these appeals, neither the Prince nor the authorities of Antwerp
answered immediately in their own names. A general consultation was,
however, immediately held with the estates-general, and an answer
forthwith despatched to the Duke by the hands of his envoys. It was
agreed to liberate the prisoners, to restore the furniture, and to send
a special deputation for the purpose of making further arrangements with
the Duke by word of mouth, and for this deputation his Highness was
requested to furnish a safe conduct.
Anjou was overjoyed when he received this amicable communication.
Relieved for a time from his fears as to the result of his crime, he
already assumed a higher ground. He not only spoke to the states in a
paternal tone, which was sufficiently ludicrous, but he had actually the
coolness to assure them of his forgiveness. "He felt hurt," he said,
"that they should deem a safe conduct necessary for the deputation which
they proposed to send. If they thought that he had reason on account of
the past, to feel offended, he begged them to believe that he had
forgotten it all, and that he had buried the past in its ashes, even as
if it had never been." He furthermore begged them--and this seemed the
greatest insult of all--"in future to trust to his word, and to believe
that if any thing should be attempted to their disadvantage, he would be
the very first to offer himself for their protection."
It will be observed that in his first letters the Duke had not affected
to deny his agency in the outrage--an agency so flagrant that all
subterfuge seemed superfluous. He in fact avowed that the attempt had
been made by his command, but sought to palliate the crime on the ground
that it had been the result of the ill-treatment which he had experienced
from the states. "The affronts which I have received," said he, both to
the magistrates of Antwerp and to Orange, "have engendered the present
calamity." So also, in a letter written at the same time to his brother,
Henry the Third, he observed that "the indignities which were put upon
him, and the manifest intention of the states to make a Matthias of him,
had been the cause of the catastrophe."
He now, however, ventured a step farther. Presuming upon the indulgence
which he had already experienced; and bravely assuming the tone of
injured innocence, he ascribed the enterprise partly to accident, and
partly to the insubordination of his troops. This was the ground which
he adopted in his interviews with the states' commissioners. So also,
in a letter addressed to Van der Tympel, commandant of Brussels, in which
he begged for supplies for his troops, he described the recent invasion
of Antwerp as entirely unexpected by himself, and beyond his control.
He had been intending, he said, to leave the city and to join his army.
A tumult had accidentally arisen between his soldiers and the guard at
the gate. Other troops rushing in from without, had joined in the
affray, so that to, his great sorrow, an extensive disorder had arisen.
He manifested the same Christian inclination to forgive, however, which
he had before exhibited. He observed that "good men would never grow
cold in his regard, or find his affection diminished." He assured Van
der Tympel, in particular, of his ancient goodwill, as he knew him to be
a lover of the common weal.
In his original communications he had been both cringing and threatening
but, at least, he had not denied truths which were plain as daylight.
His new position considerably damaged his cause. This forgiving spirit
on the part of the malefactor was a little more than the states could
bear, disposed as they felt, from policy, to be indulgent, and to smooth
over the crime as gently as possible. The negotiations were interrupted,
and the authorities of Antwerp published a brief and spirited defence of
their own conduct. They denied that any affront or want of respect on
their part could have provoked the outrage of which the Duke had been
guilty. They severely handled his self-contradiction, in ascribing
originally the recent attempt to his just vengeance for past injuries,
and in afterwards imputing it to accident or sudden mutiny, while they
cited the simultaneous attempts at Bruges, Denremonde, Alost, Digmuyde,
Newport, Ostend, Vilvoorde, and Dunkirk, as a series of damning proofs of
a deliberate design.
The publication of such plain facts did not advance the negotiations when
resumed. High and harsh words were interchanged between his Highness and
the commissioners, Anjou complaining, as usual, of affronts and
indignities, but when pushed home for particulars, taking refuge in
equivocation. "He did not wish," he said, "to re-open wounds which had
been partially healed." He also affected benignity, and wishing to
forgive and to forget, he offered some articles as the basis of a fresh
agreement. Of these it is sufficient to state that they were entirely
different from the terms of the Bordeaux treaty, and that they were
rejected as quite inadmissible.
He wrote again to the Prince of Orange, invoking his influence to bring
about an arrangement. The Prince, justly indignant at the recent
treachery and the present insolence of the man whom he had so profoundly
trusted, but feeling certain that the welfare of the country depended at
present upon avoiding, if possible, a political catastrophe, answered the
Duke in plain, firm, mournful, and appropriate language. He had ever
manifested to his Highness, he said, the most uniform and sincere
friendship. He had, therefore, the right to tell him that affairs were
now so changed that his greatness and glory had departed. Those men in
the Netherlands, who, but yesterday, had been willing to die at the feet
of his Highness, were now so exasperated that they avowedly preferred an
open enemy to a treacherous protector. He had hoped, he said, that after
what had happened in so many cities at the same moment, his Highness
would have been pleased to give the deputies a different and a more
becoming answer. He had hoped for some response which might lead to an
arrangement. He, however, stated frankly, that the articles transmitted
by his Highness were so unreasonable that no man in the land would dare
open his mouth to recommend them. His Highness, by this proceeding, had
much deepened the distrust. He warned the Duke accordingly, that he was
not taking the right course to reinstate himself in a position of honor
and glory, and he begged him, therefore, to adopt more appropriate means.
Such a step was now demanded of him, not only by the country, but by all
Christendom.
This moderate but heartfelt appeal to the better nature of the Duke, if
he had a better nature, met with no immediate response.
While matters were in this condition, a special envoy arrived out of
France, despatched by the King and Queen-mother, on the first reception
of the recent intelligence from Antwerp. M. de Mirambeau, the
ambassador, whose son had been killed in the Fury, brought letters of
credence to the states of the; Union and to the Prince of Orange. He
delivered also a short confidential note, written in her own hand, from
Catherine de Medici to the Prince, to the following effect:
"My COUSIN,--The King, my son, and myself, send you Monsieur de
Mirambeau, to prove to you that we do not believe--for we esteem you an
honorable man--that you would manifest ingratitude to my son, and to
those who have followed him for the welfare of your country. We feel
that you have too much affection for one who has the support of so
powerful a prince as the King of France, as to play him so base a trick.
Until I learn the truth, I shall not renounce the good hope which I have
always indulged--that you would never have invited my son to your
country, without intending to serve him faithfully. As long as you do
this, you may ever reckon on the support of all who belong to him.
"Your good Cousin,
"CATHERINE."