1567 [Part III., ALVA, CHAPTER 1.]

Continued dissensions in the Spanish cabinet--Ruy Gomez and Alva--

Conquest of the Netherlands entrusted to the Duke--Birth, previous

career and character of Alva--Organization of the invading army--

Its march to the provinces--Complaints of Duchess Margaret--Alva

receives deputations on the frontier--Interview between the Duke and

Egmont--Reception of Alva by the Duchess of Parma--Circular letters

to the cities requiring their acceptance of garrisons--Margaret's

secret correspondence--Universal apprehension--Keys of the great

cities demanded by Alva--Secret plans of the government, arranged

before the Duke's departure--Arrest of Orange, Egmont, Horn, and

others, determined upon--Stealthy course of the government towards

them--Infatuation of Egmont--Warnings addressed to him by De Billy

and others--Measures to entrap Count Horn--Banquet of the Grand

Prior--The Grand Prior's warning to Egmont--Evil counsels of

Noircarmes--Arrests of Egmont, Horn, Bakkerzeel and Straalen--

Popular consternation--Petulant conduct of Duchess Margaret--

Characteristic comments of Granvelle--His secret machinations and

disclaimers--Berghen and Montigny--Last moments of Marquis Berghen--

Perfidy of Ruy Gomez--Establishment of the "Blood-Council"--Its

leading features--Insidious behavior of Viglius--Secret

correspondence, concerning the President, between Philip and Alva--

Members of the "Blood-Council"--Portraits of Vargas and Hessels--

Mode of proceeding adopted by the council--Wholesale executions--

Despair in the provinces--The resignation of Duchess Margaret

accepted--Her departure from the Netherlands--Renewed civil war in

France--Death of Montmorency--Auxiliary troops sent by Alva to

France--Erection of Antwerp citadel--Description of the citadel.

The armed invasion of the Netherlands was the necessary consequence of

all which had gone before. That the inevitable result had been so long

deferred lay rather in the incomprehensible tardiness of Philip's

character than in the circumstances of the case. Never did a monarch hold

so steadfastly to a deadly purpose, or proceed so languidly and with so

much circumvolution to his goal. The mask of benignity, of possible

clemency, was now thrown off, but the delusion of his intended visit to

the provinces was still maintained. He assured the Regent that he should

be governed by her advice, and as she had made all needful preparations

to receive him in Zeland, that it would be in Zeland he should arrive.

The same two men among Philip's advisers were prominent as at an earlier

day--the Prince of Eboli and the Duke of Alva. They still represented

entirely opposite ideas, and in character, temper, and history, each was

the reverse of the other. The policy of the Prince was pacific and

temporizing; that of the Duke uncompromising and ferocious. Ruy Gomez was

disposed to prevent, if possible, the armed mission of Alva, and he now

openly counselled the King to fulfil his long-deferred promise, and to

make his appearance in person before his rebellious subjects. The

jealousy and hatred which existed between the Prince and the

Duke--between the man of peace and the man of wrath--were constantly

exploding, even in the presence of the King. The wrangling in the council

was incessant. Determined, if possible; to prevent the elevation of his

rival, the favorite was even for a moment disposed to ask for the command

of the army himself. There was something ludicrous in the notion, that a

man whose life had been pacific, and who trembled at the noise of arms,

should seek to supersede the terrible Alva, of whom his eulogists

asserted, with, Castilian exaggeration, that the very name of fear

inspired him with horror. But there was a limit beyond which the

influence of Anna de Mendoza and her husband did not extend. Philip was

not to be driven to the Netherlands against his will, nor to be prevented

from assigning the command of the army to the most appropriate man in

Europe for his purpose.

It was determined at last that the Netherland heresy should be conquered

by force of arms. The invasion resembled both a crusade against the

infidel, and a treasure-hunting foray into the auriferous Indies,

achievements by which Spanish chivalry had so often illustrated itself.

The banner of the cross was to be replanted upon the conquered

battlements of three hundred infidel cities, and a torrent of wealth,

richer than ever flowed from Mexican or Peruvian mines, was to flow into

the royal treasury from the perennial fountains of confiscation. Who so

fit to be the Tancred and the Pizarro of this bicolored expedition as the

Duke of Alva, the man who had been devoted from his earliest childhood,

and from his father's grave, to hostility against unbelievers, and who

had prophesied that treasure would flow in a stream, a yard deep, from

the Netherlands as soon as the heretics began to meet with their deserts.

An army of chosen troops was forthwith collected, by taking the four

legions, or terzios, of Naples, Sicily, Sardinia, and Lombardy, and

filling their places in Italy by fresh levies. About ten thousand picked

and veteran soldiers were thus obtained, of which the Duke of Alva was

appointed general-in-chief.

Ferdinando Alvarez de Toledo, Duke of Alva, was now in his sixtieth year.

He was the most successful and experienced general of Spain, or of

Europe. No man had studied more deeply, or practised more constantly, the

military science. In the most important of all arts at that epoch he was

the most consummate artist. In the only honorable profession of the age,

he was the most thorough and the most pedantic professor. Since the days

of Demetrius Poliorcetes, no man had besieged so many cities. Since the

days of Fabius Cunctator; no general had avoided so many battles, and no

soldier, courageous as he was, ever attained to a more sublime

indifference to calumny or depreciation. Having proved in his boyhood, at

Fontarabia, and in his maturity: at Muhlberg, that he could exhibit

heroism and headlong courage; when necessary, he could afford to look

with contempt upon the witless gibes which his enemies had occasionally

perpetrated at his expense. Conscious of holding his armies in his hand,

by the power of an unrivalled discipline, and the magic of a name

illustrated by a hundred triumphs, he, could bear with patience and

benevolence the murmurs of his soldiers when their battles were denied

them.

He was born in 1508, of a family which boasted, imperial descent. A

Palaeologus, brother of a Byzantine emperor, had conquered the city of

Toledo, and transmitted its appellation as a family name. The father of

Ferdinando, Don Garcia, had been slain on the isle of Gerbes, in battle

with the Moors, when his son was but four years of age. The child was

brought up by his grandfather, Don Frederic, and trained from his

tenderest infancy to arms. Hatred to the infidel, and a determination to

avenge his father's blood; crying to him from a foreign grave, were the

earliest of his instincts. As a youth he was distinguished for his

prowess. His maiden sword was fleshed at Fontarabia, where, although but

sixteen years of age, he was considered, by his constancy in hardship, by

his brilliant and desperate courage, and by the example of military

discipline which he afforded to the troops, to have contributed in no

small degree to the success of the Spanish arms.

In 1530, he accompanied the Emperor in his campaign against the Turk.

Charles, instinctively recognizing the merit of the youth who was

destined to be the life-long companion of his toils and glories,

distinguished him with his favor at the opening of his career. Young,

brave, and enthusiastic, Ferdinand de Toledo at this period was as

interesting a hero as ever illustrated the pages of Castilian romance.

His mad ride from Hungary to Spain and back again, accomplished in

seventeen days, for the sake of a brief visit to his newly-married wife,

is not the least attractive episode in the history of an existence which

was destined to be so dark and sanguinary. In 1535, he accompanied the

Emperor on his memorable expedition to Tunis. In 1546 and 1547 he was

generalissimo in the war against the Smalcaldian league. His most

brilliant feat of arms-perhaps the most brilliant exploit of the

Emperor's reign--was the passage of the Elbe and the battle of Muhlberg,

accomplished in spite of Maximilian's bitter and violent reproaches, and

the tremendous possibilities of a defeat. That battle had finished the

war. The gigantic and magnanimous John Frederic, surprised at his

devotions in the church, fled in dismay, leaving his boots behind him,

which for their superhuman size, were ridiculously said afterwards to be

treasured among the trophies of the Toledo house.

[Hist. du Due d'Albe, i. 274. Brantome, Hom. Illust., etc.

(ch. v.), says that one of the boots was "large enough to hold a

camp bedstead," p. 11. I insert the anecdote only as a specimen of

the manner in which similar absurdities, both of great and, of

little consequence, are perpetuated by writers in every land and

age. The armor of the noble-hearted and unfortunate John Frederic

may still be seen in Dresden. Its size indicates a man very much

above the average height, while the external length of the iron

shoe, on-the contrary, is less than eleven inches.]

The rout was total. "I came, I saw, and God conquered," said the Emperor,

in pious parody of his immortal predecessor's epigram. Maximilian, with a

thousand apologies for his previous insults, embraced the heroic Don

Ferdinand over and over again, as, arrayed in a plain suit of blue armor,

unadorned save with streaks of his enemies' blood, he returned from

pursuit of the fugitives. So complete and so sudden was the victory, that

it was found impossible to account for it, save on the ground of

miraculous interposition. Like Joshua, in the vale of Ajalon, Don

Ferdinand was supposed to have commanded the sun to stand still for a

season, and to have been obeyed. Otherwise, how could the passage of the

river, which was only concluded at six in the evening, and the complete

overthrow of the Protestant forces, have all been accomplished within the

narrow space of an April twilight? The reply of the Duke to Henry the

Second of France, who questioned him subsequently upon the subject, is

well known. "Your Majesty, I was too much occupied that evening with what

was taking place on the earth beneath, to pay much heed to the evolutions

of the heavenly bodies." Spared as he had been by his good fortune from

taking any part in the Algerine expedition, or in witnessing the

ignominious retreat from Innspruck, he was obliged to submit to the

intercalation of the disastrous siege of Metz in the long history of his

successes. Doing the duty of a field-marshal and a sentinel, supporting

his army by his firmness and his discipline when nothing else could have

supported them, he was at last enabled, after half the hundred thousand

men with whom Charles had begun the siege had been sacrificed, to induce

his imperial master to raise the siege before the remaining fifty

thousand had been frozen or starved to death.

The culminating career of Alva seemed to have closed in the mist which

gathered around the setting star of the empire. Having accompanied Philip

to England in 1554, on his matrimonial-expedition, he was destined in the

following years, as viceroy and generalissimo of Italy, to be placed in a

series of false positions. A great captain engaged in a little war, the

champion of the cross in arms against the successor of St. Peter, he had

extricated himself, at last, with his usual adroitness, but with very

little glory. To him had been allotted the mortification, to another the

triumph. The lustre of his own name seemed to sink in the ocean while

that of a hated rival, with new spangled ore, suddenly "flamed in the

forehead of the morning sky." While he had been paltering with a dotard,

whom he was forbidden to crush, Egmont had struck down the chosen troops

of France, and conquered her most illustrious commanders. Here was the

unpardonable crime which could only be expiated by the blood of the

victor. Unfortunately for his rival, the time was now approaching when

the long-deferred revenge was to be satisfied.

On the whole, the Duke of Alva was inferior to no general of his age. As

a disciplinarian he was foremost in Spain, perhaps in Europe. A

spendthrift of time, he was an economist of blood, and this was, perhaps,

in the eye of humanity, his principal virtue. Time and myself are two,

was a frequent observation of Philip, and his favorite general considered

the maxim as applicable to war as to politics. Such were his qualities as

a military commander. As a statesman, he had neither experience nor

talent. As a man his character was simple. He did not combine a great

variety of vices, but those which he had were colossal, and he possessed

no virtues. He was neither lustful nor intemperate, but his professed

eulogists admitted his enormous avarice, while the world has agreed that

such an amount of stealth and ferocity, of patient vindictiveness and

universal bloodthirstiness, were never found in a savage beast of the

forest, and but rarely in a human bosom. His history was now to show that

his previous thrift of human life was not derived from any love of his

kind. Personally he was stern and overbearing. As difficult of access as

Philip himself, he was even more haughty to those who were admitted to

his presence. He addressed every one with the depreciating second person

plural. Possessing the right of being covered in the presence of the

Spanish monarch, he had been with difficulty brought to renounce it

before the German Emperor. He was of an illustrious family; but his

territorial possessions were not extensive. His duchy was a small one,

furnishing him with not more than fourteen thousand crowns of annual

income, and with four hundred soldiers. He had, however, been a thrifty

financier all his life, never having been without a handsome sum of ready

money at interest. Ten years before his arrival in the Netherlands, he

was supposed to have already increased his income to forty thousand a

year by the proceeds of his investments at Antwerp. As already intimated,

his military character was sometimes profoundly misunderstood. He was

often considered rather a pedantic than a practical commander, more

capable to discourse of battles than to gain them. Notwithstanding that

his long life had been an almost unbroken campaign, the ridiculous

accusation of timidity was frequently made against him. A gentleman at

the court of the Emperor Charles once addressed a letter to the Duke with

the title of "General of his Majesty's armies in the Duchy of Milan in

time of peace, and major-domo of the household in the time of war." It

was said that the lesson did the Duke good, but that he rewarded very

badly the nobleman who gave it, having subsequently caused his head to be

taken off. In general, however, Alva manifested a philosophical contempt

for the opinions expressed concerning his military fame, and was

especially disdainful of criticism expressed by his own soldiers.

"Recollect," said he, at a little later period, to Don John of Austria,

"that the first foes with whom one has to contend are one's own troops;

with their clamors for an engagement at this moment, and--their murmurs,

about results at another; with their 'I thought that the battle should be

fought;' or, 'it was my opinion that the occasion ought not to be lost.'

Your highness will have opportunity enough to display valor, and will

never be weak enough to be conquered by the babble of soldiers."

In person he was tall, thin, erect, with a small head, a long visage,

lean yellow cheek, dark twinkling eyes, a dust complexion, black

bristling hair, and a long sable-silvered beard, descending in two waving

streams upon his breast.

Such being the design, the machinery was well selected. The best man in

Europe to lead the invading force was placed at the head of ten thousand

picked veterans. The privates in this exquisite little army, said the

enthusiastic connoisseur Brantome, who travelled post into Lorraine

expressly to see them on their march, all wore engraved or gilded armor,

and were in every respect equipped like captains. They were the first who

carried muskets, a weapon which very much astonished the Flemings when it

first rattled in their ears. The musketeers, he observed, might have been

mistaken, for princes, with such agreeable and graceful arrogance did

they present themselves. Each was attended by his servant or esquire, who

carried his piece for him, except in battle, and all were treated with

extreme deference by the rest of the army, as if they had been officers.

The four regiments of Lombardy, Sardinia, Sicily, and Naples, composed a

total of not quite nine thousand of the best foot soldiers in Europe.

They were commanded respectively by Don Sancho de Lodiono, Don Gonzalo de

Bracamonte, Julien Romero, and Alfonso de Ulloa, all distinguished and

experienced generals. The cavalry, amounting to about twelve hundred; was

under the command of the natural son of the Duke, Don Ferdinando de

Toledo, Prior of the Knights of St. John. Chiapin Vitelli, Marquis of

Cetona, who had served the King in many a campaign, was appointed

Marechal de camp, and Gabriel Cerbelloni was placed in command of the

artillery. On the way the Duke received, as a present from the Duke of

Savoy, the services of the distinguished engineer, Pacheco, or Paciotti,

whose name was to be associated with the most celebrated citadel of the

Netherlands; and whose dreadful fate was to be contemporaneous with the

earliest successes of the liberal party.

With an army thus perfect, on a small scale, in all its departments, and

furnished, in addition, with a force of two thousand prostitutes, as

regularly enrolled, disciplined, and distributed as the cavalry or the

artillery, the Duke embarked upon his momentous enterprise, on the 10th

of May, at Carthagena. Thirty-seven galleys, under command of Prince

Andrea Doria, brought the principal part of the force to Genoa, the Duke

being delayed a few days at Nice by an attack of fever. On the 2d of

June, the army was mustered at Alexandria de Palla, and ordered to

rendezvous again at San Ambrosio at the foot of the Alps. It was then

directed to make its way over Mount Cenis and through Savoy; Burgundy,

and Lorraine, by a regularly arranged triple movement. The second

division was each night to encamp on the spot which had been occupied

upon the previous night by the vanguard, and the rear was to place itself

on the following night in the camp of the corps de bataille. Thus coiling

itself along almost in a single line by slow and serpentine windings,

with a deliberate, deadly, venomous purpose, this army, which was to be

the instrument of Philip's long deferred vengeance, stole through narrow

mountain pass and tangled forest. So close and intricate were many of the

defiles through which the journey led them that, had one tithe of the

treason which they came to punish, ever existed, save in the diseased

imagination of their monarch, not one man would have been left to tell

the tale. Egmont, had he really been the traitor and the conspirator he

was assumed to be, might have easily organized the means of cutting off

the troops before they could have effected their entrance into the

country which they had doomed to destruction. His military experience,

his qualifications for a daring stroke, his great popularity, and the

intense hatred entertained for Alva, would have furnished him with a

sufficient machinery for the purpose.

Twelve days' march carried the army through Burgundy, twelve more through

Lorraine. During the whole of the journey they were closely accompanied

by a force of cavalry and infantry, ordered upon this service by the King

of France, who, for fear of exciting a fresh Huguenot demonstration, had

refused the Spaniards a passage through his dominions. This reconnoitring

army kept pace with them like their shadow, and watched all their

movements. A force of six thousand Swiss, equally alarmed and uneasy at

the progress of the troops, hovered likewise about their flanks, without,

however, offering any impediment to their advance. Before the middle of

August they had reached Thionville, on the Luxemburg frontier, having on

the last day marched a distance of two leagues through a forest, which

seemed expressly arranged to allow a small defensive force to embarrass

and destroy an invading army. No opposition, however, was attempted, and

the Spanish soldiers encamped at last within the territory of the

Netherlands, having accomplished their adventurous journey in entire

safety, and under perfect discipline.

The Duchess had in her secret letters to Philip continued to express her

disapprobation of the enterprise thus committed to Alva, She had bitterly

complained that now when the country had been pacified by her efforts,

another should be sent to reap all the glory, or perhaps to undo all that

she had so painfully and so successfully done. She stated to her brother,

in most unequivocal language, that the name of Alva was odious enough to

make the whole Spanish nation detested in the Netherlands. She could find

no language sufficiently strong to express her surprise that the King

should have decided upon a measure likely to be attended with such fatal

consequences without consulting her on the subject, and in opposition to

what had been her uniform advice. She also wrote personally to Alva,

imploring, commanding, and threatening, but with equally ill success. The

Duke knew too well who was sovereign of the Netherlands now; his master's

sister or himself. As to the effects of his armed invasion upon the

temper of the provinces, he was supremely indifferent. He came as a

conqueror not as a mediator. "I have tamed people of iron in my day,"

said he, contemptuously, "shall I not easily crush these men of butter?"

At Thionville he was, however, officially waited upon by Berlaymont and

Noircarmes, on the part of the Regent. He at this point, moreover, began

to receive deputations from various cities, bidding him a hollow and

trembling welcome, and deprecating his displeasure for any thing in the

past which might seem offensive. To all such embassies he replied in

vague and conventional language; saying, however, to his confidential

attendants: I am here, so much is certain, whether I am welcome or not is

to me a matter of little consequence. At Tirlemont, on the 22d August, he

was met by Count Egmont, who had ridden forth from Brussels to show him a

becoming respect, as the representative of his sovereign, The Count was

accompanied by several other noblemen, and brought to the Duke a present

of several beautiful horses. Alva received him, however, but coldly, for

he was unable at first to adjust the mask to his countenance as adroitly

as was necessary. Behold the greatest of all the heretics, he observed to

his attendants, as soon as the nobleman's presence was announced, and in

a voice loud enough for him to hear.

Even after they had exchanged salutations, he addressed several remarks

to him in a half jesting, half biting tone, saying among other things,

that his countship might have spared him the trouble of making this long

journey in his old age. There were other observations in a similar strain

which might have well aroused the suspicion of any man not determined,

like Egmont, to continue blind and deaf. After a brief interval, however,

Alva seems to have commanded himself. He passed his arm lovingly over

that stately neck, which he had already devoted to the block, and the

Count having resolved beforehand to place himself, if possible, upon

amicable terms with the new Viceroy--the two rode along side by side in

friendly conversation, followed by the regiment of infantry and three

companies of light horse, which belonged to the Duke's immediate command.

Alva, still attended by Egmont, rode soon afterwards through the Louvain

gate into Brussels, where they separated for a season. Lodgings had been

taken for the Duke at the house of a certain Madame de Jasse, in the

neighborhood of Egmont's palace. Leaving here the principal portion of

his attendants, the Captain-General, without alighting, forthwith

proceeded to the palace to pay his respects to the Duchess of Parma.

For three days the Regent had been deliberating with her council as to

the propriety of declining any visit from the man whose presence she

justly considered a disgrace and an insult to herself. This being the

reward of her eight years' devotion to her brother's commands; to be

superseded by a subject, and one too who came to carry out a policy which

she had urgently deprecated, it could hardly be expected of the Emperor's

daughter that she should graciously submit to the indignity, and receive

her successor with a smiling countenance. In consequence, however, of the

submissive language with which the Duke had addressed her in his recent

communications, offering with true Castilian but empty courtesy, to place

his guards, his army, and himself at her feet, she had consented to

receive his visit with or without his attendants.

On his appearance in the court-yard, a scene of violent altercation and

almost of bloodshed took place between his body-guard and the archers of

the Regent's household, who were at last, with difficulty, persuaded to

allow the mercenaries of the hated Captain-General to pass. Presenting

himself at three o'clock in the afternoon, after these not very

satisfactory preliminaries, in the bedchamber of the Duchess, where it

was her habit to grant confidential audiences, he met, as might easily be

supposed, with a chilling reception: The Duchess, standing motionless in

the centre of the apartment, attended by Berlaymont, the Duke of

Aerachot, and Count Egmont, acknowledged his salutations with calm

severity. Neither she nor any one of her attendants advanced a step to

meet him. The Duke took off his hat, but she, calmly recognizing his

right as a Spanish grandee, insisted upon his remaining covered. A stiff

and formal conversation of half an hour's duration then ensued, all

parties remaining upon their feet. The Duke, although respectful; found

it difficult to conceal his indignation and his haughty sense of

approaching triumph. Margaret was cold, stately, and forbidding,

disguising her rage and her mortification under a veil of imperial pride.

Alva, in a letter to Philip, describing the interview, assured his

Majesty that he had treated the Duchess with as much deference as he

could have shown to the Queen, but it is probable, from other

contemporaneous accounts, that an ill-disguised and even angry arrogance

was at times very visible in his demeanor. The state council had advised

the Duchess against receiving him until he had duly exhibited his powers.

This ceremony had been waived, but upon being questioned by the Duchess

at this interview as to their nature and extent, he is reported to have

coolly answered that he really did not exactly remember, but that he

would look them over, and send her information at his earliest

convenience.

The next day, however, his commission was duly exhibited.

In this document, which bore date 31st January, 1567, Philip appointed

him to be Captain-General "in correspondence with his Majesty's dear

sister of Parma, who was occupied with other matters belonging to the

government," begged the Duchess to co-operate with him and to command

obedience for him, and ordered all the cities of the Netherlands to

receive such garrisons as he should direct.

At the official interview between Alva and Madame de Parma, at which

these powers were produced, the necessary preliminary arrangements were

made regarding the Spanish troops, which were now to be immediately

quartered in the principal cities. The Duke, however, informed the Regent

that as these matters were not within her province, he should take the

liberty of arranging them with the authorities, without troubling her in

the matter, and would inform her of the result of his measures at their

next interview, which was to take place on the 26th August.

Circular letters signed by Philip, which Alva had brought with him, were

now despatched to the different municipal bodies of the country. In these

the cities were severally commanded to accept the garrisons, and to

provide for the armies whose active services the King hoped would not be

required, but which he had sent beforehand to prepare a peaceful entrance

for himself. He enjoined the most absolute obedience to the Duke of Alva

until his own arrival, which was to be almost immediate. These letters

were dated at Madrid on the 28th February, and were now accompanied by a

brief official circular, signed by Margaret of Parma, in which she

announced the arrival of her dear cousin of Alva, and demanded

unconditional submission to his authority.

Having thus complied with these demands of external and conventional

propriety, the indignant Duchess unbosomed herself, in her private

Italian letters to her brother, of the rage which had been hitherto

partially suppressed. She reiterated her profound regret that Philip had

not yet accepted the resignation which she had so recently and so

earnestly offered. She disclaimed all jealousy of the supreme powers now

conferred upon Alva, but thought that his Majesty might have allowed her

to leave the country before the Duke arrived with an authority which was

so extraordinary, as well as so humiliating to herself. Her honor might

thus have been saved. She was pained to perceive that she was like to

furnish a perpetual example to all others, who considering the manner in

which she had been treated by the King, would henceforth have but little

inducement to do their duty. At no time, on no occasion, could any person

ever render him such services as hers had been. For nine years she had

enjoyed not a moment of repose. If the King had shown her but little

gratitude, she was consoled by the thought that she had satisfied her

God, herself, and the world. She had compromised her health, perhaps her

life, and now that she had pacified the country, now that the King was

more absolute, more powerful than ever before, another was sent to enjoy

the fruit of her labors and her sufferings.

The Duchess made no secret of her indignation at being thus superseded

and as she considered the matter, outraged. She openly avowed her

displeasure. She was at times almost beside herself with rage. There was

universal sympathy with her emotions, for all hated the Duke, and

shuddered at the arrival of the Spaniards. The day of doom for all the

crimes which had ever been committed in the course of ages, seemed now to

have dawned upon the Netherlands. The sword which had so long been

hanging over them, seemed now about to descend. Throughout the provinces,

there was but one feeling of cold and hopeless dismay. Those who still

saw a possibility of effecting their escape from the fated land, swarmed

across the frontier. All foreign merchants deserted the great marts. The

cities became as still as if the plague-banner had been unfurled on every

house-top.

Meantime the Captain-General proceeded methodically with his work. He

distributed his troops through Brussels, Ghent, Antwerp, and other

principal cities. As a measure of necessity and mark of the last

humiliation, he required the municipalities to transfer their keys to his

keeping. The magistrates of Ghent humbly remonstrated against the

indignity, and Egmont was imprudent enough to make himself the

mouth-piece of their remonstrance, which, it is needless to add, was

unsuccessful. Meantime his own day of reckoning had arrived.

As already observed, the advent of Alva at the head of a foreign army was

the natural consequence of all which had gone before. The delusion of the

royal visit was still maintained, and the affectation of a possible

clemency still displayed, while the monarch sat quietly in his cabinet

without a remote intention of leaving Spain, and while the messengers of

his accumulated and long-concealed wrath were already descending upon

their prey. It was the deliberate intention of Philip, when the Duke was

despatched to the Netherlands, that all the leaders of the

anti-inquisition party, and all who had, at any time or in any way,

implicated themselves in opposition to the government, or in censure of

its proceedings, should be put to death. It was determined that the

provinces should be subjugated to the absolute domination of the council

of Spain, a small body of foreigners sitting at the other end of Europe,

a junta in which Netherlanders were to have no voice and exercise no

influence. The despotic government of the Spanish and Italian possessions

was to be extended to these Flemish territories, which were thus to be

converted into the helpless dependencies of a foreign and an absolute

crown. There was to be a re-organization of the inquisition, upon the

same footing claimed for it before the outbreak of the troubles, together

with a re-enactment and vigorous enforcement of the famous edicts against

heresy.

Such was the scheme recommended by Granvelle and Espinosa, and to be

executed by Alva. As part and parcel of this plan, it was also arranged

at secret meetings at the house of Espinosa, before the departure of the

Duke, that all the seigniors against whom the Duchess Margaret had made

so many complaints, especially the Prince of Orange, with the Counts

Egmont, Horn, and Hoogstraaten, should be immediately arrested and

brought to chastisement. The Marquis Berghen and the Baron Montigny,

being already in Spain, could be dealt with at pleasure. It was also

decided that the gentlemen implicated in the confederacy or compromise,

should at once be proceeded against for high treason, without any regard

to the promise of pardon granted by the Duchess.

The general features of the great project having been thus mapped out, a

few indispensable preliminaries were at once executed. In order that

Egmont, Horn, and other distinguished victims might not take alarm, and

thus escape the doom deliberately arranged for them, royal assurances

were despatched to the Netherlands, cheering their despondency and

dispelling their doubts. With his own hand Philip wrote the letter, full

of affection and confidence, to Egmont, to which allusion has already

been made. He wrote it after Alva had left Madrid upon his mission of

vengeance. The same stealthy measures were pursued with regard to others.

The Prince of Orange was not capable of falling into the royal trap,

however cautiously baited. Unfortunately he could not communicate his

wisdom to his friends.

It is difficult to comprehend so very sanguine a temperament as that to

which Egmont owed his destruction. It was not the Prince of Orange alone

who had prophesied his doom. Warnings had come to the Count from every

quarter, and they were now frequently repeated. Certainly he was not

without anxiety, but he had made his decision; determined to believe in

the royal word, and in the royal gratitude for his services rendered, not

only against Montmorency and De Thermes, but against the heretics of

Flanders. He was, however, much changed. He had grown prematurely old. At

forty-six years his hair was white, and he never slept without pistols

under his pillow. Nevertheless he affected, and sometimes felt, a

light-heartedness which surprised all around him. The Portuguese

gentleman Robles, Seigneur de Billy, who had returned early in the summer

from Spain; whither he had been sent upon a confidential mission by

Madame de Parma, is said to have made repeated communications to Egmont

as to the dangerous position in which he stood. Immediately after his

arrival in Brussels he had visited the Count, then confined to his house

by an injury caused by the fall of his horse. "Take care to get well very

fast," said De Billy, "for there are very bad stories told about you in

Spain." Egmont laughed heartily at the observation, as if, nothing could

well be more absurd than such a warning. His friend--for De Billy is said

to have felt a real attachment to the Count--persisted in his prophecies,

telling him that "birds in the field sang much more sweetly than those in

cages," and that he would do well to abandon the country before the

arrival of Alva.

These warnings were repeated almost daily by the same gentleman, and by

others, who were more and more astonished at Egmont's infatuation.

Nevertheless, he had disregarded their admonitions, and had gone forth to

meet the Duke at Tirlemont. Even then he might have seen, in the coldness

of his first reception, and in the disrespectful manner of the Spanish

soldiers, who not only did not at first salute him, but who murmured

audibly that he was a Lutheran and traitor, that he was not so great a

favorite with the government at Madrid as he desired to be.

After the first few moments, however, Alva's manner had changed, while

Chiappin Vitelli, Gabriel de Serbelloni, and other principal officers,

received the Count with great courtesy, even upon his first appearance.

The grand prior, Ferdinando de Toledo, natural son of the Duke, and

already a distinguished soldier, seems to have felt a warm and unaffected

friendship for Egmont, whose brilliant exploits in the field had excited

his youthful admiration, and of whose destruction he was, nevertheless,

compelled to be the unwilling instrument. For a few days, accordingly,

after the arrival of the new Governor-General all seemed to be going

smoothly. The grand prior and Egmont became exceedingly intimate, passing

their time together in banquets, masquerades, and play, as joyously as if

the merry days which had succeeded the treaty of Cateau Cambreais were

returned. The Duke, too, manifested the most friendly dispositions,

taking care to send him large presents of Spanish and Italian fruits,

received frequently by the government couriers.

Lapped in this fatal security, Egmont not only forgot his fears, but

unfortunately succeeded in inspiring Count Horn with a portion of his

confidence. That gentleman had still remained in his solitary mansion at

Weert, notwithstanding the artful means which had been used to lure him

from that "desert." It is singular that the very same person who,

according to a well-informed Catholic contemporary, had been most eager

to warn Egmont of his danger, had also been the foremost instrument for

effecting the capture of the Admiral. The Seigneur de Billy, on the day

after his arrival from Madrid, had written to Horn, telling him that the

King was highly pleased with his services and character. De Billy also

stated that he had been commissioned by Philip to express distinctly the

royal gratitude for the Count's conduct, adding that his Majesty was

about to visit the Netherlands in August, and would probably be preceded

or accompanied by Baron Montigny.

Alva and his son Don Ferdinando had soon afterwards addressed letters

from Gerverbiller (dated 26th and 27th July) to Count Horn, filled with

expressions of friendship and confidence. The Admiral, who had sent one

of his gentlemen to greet the Duke, now responded from Weert that he was

very sensible of the kindness manifested towards him, but that for

reasons which his secretary Alonzo de la Loo would more fully

communicate, he must for the present beg to be excused from a personal

visit to Brussels. The secretary was received by Alva with extreme

courtesy. The Duke expressed infinite pain that the King had not yet

rewarded Count Horn's services according to their merit, said that a year

before he had told his brother Montigny how very much he was the

Admiral's friend, and begged La Loo to tell his master that he should not

doubt the royal generosity and gratitude. The governor added, that if he

could see the Count in person he could tell him things which would please

him, and which would prove that he had not been forgotten by his friends.

La Loo had afterward a long conversation with the Duke's secretary

Albornoz, who assured him that his master had the greatest affection for

Count Horn, and that since his affairs were so much embarrassed, he might

easily be provided with the post of governor at Milan, or viceroy of

Naples, about to become vacant. The secretary added, that the Duke was

much hurt at receiving no visits from many distinguished nobles whose

faithful friend and servant he was, and that Count Horn ought to visit

Brussels, if not to treat of great affairs, at least to visit the

Captain-General as a friend. "After all this," said honest Alonzo, "I am

going immediately to Weert, to urge his lordship to yield to the Duke's

desires."

This scientific manoeuvring, joined to the urgent representations of

Egmont, at last produced its effect. The Admiral left his retirement at

Weert to fall into the pit which his enemies had been so skilfully

preparing at Brussels. On the night of the 8th September, Egmont received

another most significative and mysterious warning. A Spaniard, apparently

an officer of rank, came secretly into his house, and urged him solemnly

to effect his escape before the morrow. The Countess, who related the

story afterwards, always believed, without being certain, that the

mysterious visitor was Julian Romero, marechal de camp. Egmont, however,

continued as blindly confident as before.

On the following day, September 9th, the grand prior, Don Ferdinando,

gave a magnificent dinner, to which Egmont and Horn, together with

Noircarmes, the Viscount of Ghent, and many other noblemen were invited.

The banquet was enlivened by the music of Alva's own military band, which

the Duke sent to entertain the company. At three o'clock he sent a

message begging the gentlemen, after their dinner should be concluded, to

favor him with their company at his house (the maison de Jassey), as he

wished to consult them concerning the plan of the citadel, which he

proposed erecting at Antwerp.

At this moment, the grand prior who was seated next to Egmont, whispered

in his ear; "Leave this place, Signor Count, instantly; take the fleetest

horse in your stable and make your escape without a moment's delay."

Egmont, much troubled, and remembering the manifold prophecies and

admonitions which he had passed by unheeded, rose from the table and went

into the next room. He was followed by Noircarmes and two other

gentlemen, who had observed his agitation, and were curious as to its

cause. The Count repeated to them the mysterious words just whispered to

him by the grand prior, adding that he was determined to take the advice

without a moment's delay. "Ha! Count," exclaimed Noircarmes, "do not put

lightly such implicit confidence in this stranger who is counselling you

to your destruction. What will the Duke of Alva and all the Spaniards say

of such a precipitate flight? Will they not say that your Excellency has

fled from the consciousness of guilt? Will not your escape be construed

into a confession of high treason."

If these words were really spoken by Noircarmes; and that they were so,

we have the testimony of a Walloon gentleman in constant communication

with Egmont's friends and with the whole Catholic party, they furnish

another proof of the malignant and cruel character of the man. The advice

fixed forever the fate of the vacillating Egmont. He had risen from table

determined to take the advice of a noble-minded Spaniard, who had

adventured his life to save his friend. He now returned in obedience to

the counsel of a fellow-countryman, a Flemish noble, to treat the

well-meant warning with indifference, and to seat himself again at the

last banquet which he was ever to grace with his presence.

At four o'clock, the dinner being finished, Horn and Egmont, accompanied

by the other gentlemen, proceeded to the "Jassy" house, then occupied by

Alva, to take part in the deliberations proposed. They were received by

the Duke with great courtesy. The engineer, Pietro Urbino, soon appeared

and laid upon the table a large parchment containing the plan and

elevation of the citadel to be erected at Antwerp. A warm discussion upon

the subject soon arose, Egmont, Horn, Noircarmes and others, together

with the engineers Urbino and Pacheco, all taking part in the debate.

After a short time, the Duke of Alva left the apartment, on pretext of a

sudden indisposition, leaving the company still warmly engaged in their

argument. The council lasted till near seven in the evening. As it broke

up, Don Sancho d'Avila, captain of the Duke's guard, requested Egmont to

remain for a moment after the rest, as he had a communication to make to

him. After an insignificant remark or two, the Spanish officer, as soon

as the two were alone, requested Egmont to surrender his sword. The

Count, agitated, and notwithstanding every thing which had gone before,

still taken by surprise, scarcely knew what reply to make. Don Sancho

repeated that he had been commissioned to arrest him, and again demanded

his sword. At the same moment the doors of the adjacent apartment were

opened, and Egmont saw himself surrounded by a company of Spanish

musqueteers and halberdmen. Finding himself thus entrapped, he gave up

his sword, saying bitterly, as he did so, that it had at least rendered

some service to the King in times which were past. He was then conducted

to a chamber, in the upper story of the house, where his temporary prison

had been arranged. The windows were barricaded, the daylight excluded,

the whole apartment hung with black. Here he remained fourteen days (from

the 9th to 23d September). During this period, he was allowed no

communication with his friends. His room was lighted day and night with

candles, and he was served in strict silence by Spanish attendants, and

guarded by Spanish soldiers. The captain of the watch drew his curtain

every midnight, and aroused him from sleep that he might be identified by

the relieving officer.

Count Horn was arrested upon the same occasion by Captain Salinas, as he

was proceeding through the court-yard of the house, after the breaking up

of the council. He was confined in another chamber of the mansion, and

met with a precisely similar treatment to that experienced by Egmont.

Upon the 23d September, both were removed under a strong guard to the

castle of Ghent.

On this same day, two other important arrests, included and arranged in

the same program, had been successfully accomplished. Bakkerzeel, private

and confidential secretary of Egmont, and Antony Van Straalen, the rich

and influential burgomaster of Antwerp, were taken almost simultaneously.

At the request of Alva, the burgomaster had been invited by the Duchess

of Parma to repair on business to Brussels. He seemed to have feared an

ambuscade, for as he got into his coach to set forth upon the journey, he

was so muffed in a multiplicity of clothing, that he was scarcely to be

recognized. He was no sooner, however, in the open country and upon a

spot remote from human habitations, than he was suddenly beset by a band

of forty soldiers under command of Don Alberic Lodron and Don Sancho de

Lodrono. These officers had been watching his movements for many days.

The capture of Bakkerzeel was accomplished with equal adroitness at about

the same hour.

Alva, while he sat at the council board with Egmont and Horn, was

secretly informed that those important personages, Bakkerzeel and

Straalen, with the private secretary of the Admiral, Alonzo de la Loo, in

addition, had been thus successfully arrested. He could with difficulty

conceal his satisfaction, and left the apartment immediately that the

trap might be sprung upon the two principal victims of his treachery. He

had himself arranged all the details of these two important arrests,

while his natural son, the Prior Don Ferdinando, had been compelled to

superintend the proceedings. The plot had been an excellent plot, and was

accomplished as successfully as it bad been sagaciously conceived. None

but Spaniards had been employed in any part of the affair. Officers of

high rank in his Majesty's army had performed the part of spies and

policemen with much adroitness, nor was it to be expected that the duty

would seem a disgrace, when the Prior of the Knights of Saint John was

superintendent of the operations, when the Captain-General of the

Netherlands had arranged the whole plan, and when all, from subaltern to

viceroy, had received minute instructions as to the contemplated

treachery from the great chief of the Spanish police, who sat on the

throne of Castile and Aragon.

No sooner were these gentlemen in custody than the secretary Albornoz was

dispatched to the house of Count Horn, and to that of Bakkerzeel, where

all papers were immediately seized, inventoried, and placed in the hands

of the Duke. Thus, if amid the most secret communications of Egmont and

Horn or their correspondents, a single treasonable thought should be

lurking, it was to go hard but it might be twisted into a cord strong

enough to strangle them all.

The Duke wrote a triumphant letter to his Majesty that very night. He

apologized that these important captures had been deferred so long but,

stated that he had thought it desirable to secure all these leading

personages at a single stroke. He then narrated the masterly manner in

which the operations had been conducted. Certainly, when it is remembered

that the Duke had only reached Brussels upon the 23d August, and that the

two Counts were securely lodged in prison on the 9th of September, it

seemed a superfluous modesty upon his part thus to excuse himself for an

apparent delay. At any rate, in the eyes of the world and of posterity,

his zeal to carry out the bloody commands of his master was sufficiently

swift.

The consternation was universal throughout the provinces when the arrests

became known. Egmont's great popularity and distinguished services placed

him so high above the mass of citizens, and his attachment to the

Catholic religion was moreover so well known, as to make it obvious that

no man could now be safe, when men like him were in the power of Alva and

his myrmidons. The animosity to the Spaniards increased hourly. The

Duchess affected indignation at the arrest of the two nobles, although it

nowhere appears that she attempted a word in their defence, or lifted, at

any subsequent moment, a finger to save them. She was not anxious to wash

her hands of the blood of two innocent men; she was only offended that

they had been arrested without her permission. The Duke had, it is true,

sent Berlaymont and Mansfeld to give her information of the fact, as soon

as the capture had been made, with the plausible excuse that he preferred

to save her from all the responsibility and all the unpopularity of the

measure, Nothing, however, could appease her wrath at this and every

other indication of the contempt in which he appeared to hold the sister

of his sovereign. She complained of his conduct daily to every one who

was admitted to her presence. Herself oppressed by a sense of personal

indignity, she seemed for a moment to identify herself with the cause of

the oppressed provinces. She seemed to imagine herself the champion of

their liberties, and the Netherlanders, for a moments seemed to

participate in the delusion. Because she was indignant at the insolence

of the Duke of Alva to her self, the honest citizens began to give her

credit for a sympathy with their own wrongs. She expressed herself

determined to move about from one city to another, until the answer to

her demand for dismissal should arrive. She allowed her immediate

attendants to abuse the Spaniards in good set terms upon every occasion.

Even her private chaplain permitted himself, in preaching before her in

the palace chapel, to denounce the whole nation as a race of traitors and

ravishers, and for this offence was only reprimanded, much against her

will, by the Duchess, and ordered to retire for a season to his convent.

She did not attempt to disguise her dissatisfaction at every step which

had been taken by the Duke. In all this there was much petulance, but

very little dignity, while there was neither a spark of real sympathy for

the oppressed millions, nor a throb of genuine womanly emotion for the

impending fate of the two nobles. Her principal grief was that she had

pacified the provinces, and that another had now arrived to reap the

glory; but it was difficult, while the unburied bones of many heretics

were still hanging, by her decree, on the rafters of their own dismantled

churches, for her successfully to enact the part of a benignant and

merciful Regent. But it is very true that the horrors of the Duke's

administration have been propitious to the fame of Margaret, and perhaps

more so to that of Cardinal Granvelle. The faint and struggling rays of

humanity which occasionally illumined the course of their government,

were destined to be extinguished in a chaos so profound and dark, that

these last beams of light seemed clearer and more bountiful by the

contrast.

The Count of Hoogstraaten, who was on his way to Brussels, had, by good

fortune, injured his hand through the accidental discharge of a pistol.

Detained by this casualty at Cologne, he was informed, before his arrival

at the capital, of the arrest of his two distinguished friends, and

accepted the hint to betake himself at once to a place of Safety.

The loyalty of the elder Mansfeld was beyond dispute even by Alva. His

son Charles had, however, been imprudent, and, as we have seen, had even

affixed his name to the earliest copies of the Compromise. He had

retired, it is true, from all connexion with the confederates, but his

father knew well that the young Count's signature upon that famous

document would prove his death-warrant, were he found in the country. He

therefore had sent him into Germany before the arrival of the Duke.

The King's satisfaction was unbounded when he learned this important

achievement of Alva, and he wrote immediately to express his approbation

in the most extravagant terms. Cardinal Granvelle, on the contrary,

affected astonishment at a course which he had secretly counselled. He

assured his Majesty that he had never believed Egmont to entertain

sentiments opposed to the Catholic religion, nor to the interests of the

Crown, up to the period of his own departure from the Netherlands. He was

persuaded, he said, that the Count had been abused by others, although,

to be sure, the Cardinal had learned with regret what Egmont had written

on the occasion of the baptism of Count Hoogstraaten's child. As to the

other persons arrested, he said that no one regretted their fate. The

Cardinal added, that he was supposed to be himself the instigator of

these captures, but that he was not disturbed by that, or by other

imputations of a similar nature.

In conversation with those about him, he frequently expressed regret that

the Prince of Orange had been too crafty to be caught in the same net in

which his more simple companions were so inextricably entangled. Indeed,

on the first arrival of the news, that men of high rank had been arrested

in Brussels, the Cardinal eagerly inquired if the Taciturn had been

taken, for by that term he always characterized the Prince. Receiving a

negative reply, he expressed extreme disappointment, adding, that if

Orange had escaped, they had taken nobody; and that his capture would

have been more valuable than that of every man in the Netherlands.

Peter Titelmann, too, the famous inquisitor, who, retired from active

life, was then living upon Philip's bounty, and encouraged by friendly

letters from that monarch, expressed the same opinion. Having been

informed that Egmont and Horn had been captured, he eagerly inquired if

"wise William" had also been taken. He was, of course, answered in the

negative. "Then will our joy be but brief," he observed. "Woe unto us for

the wrath to come from Germany."

On the 12th of July, of this year, Philip wrote to Granvelle to inquire

the particulars of a letter which the Prince of Orange, according to a

previous communication of the Cardinal, had written to Egmont on the

occasion of the baptism of Count Hoogstraaten's child. On the 17th of

August, the Cardinal replied, by setting the King right as to the error

which he had committed. The letter, as he had already stated, was not

written by Orange, but by Egmont, and he expressed his astonishment that

Madame de Parma had not yet sent it to his Majesty. The Duchess must have

seen it, because her confessor had shown it to the person who was

Granvelle's informant. In this letter, the Cardinal continued, the

statement had been made by Egmont to the Prince of Orange that their

plots were discovered, that the King was making armaments, that they were

unable to resist him, and that therefore it had become necessary to

dissemble and to accommodate themselves as well as possible to the

present situation, while waiting for other circumstances under which to

accomplish their designs. Granvelle advised, moreover, that Straalen, who

had been privy to the letter, and perhaps the amanuensis, should be

forthwith arrested.

The Cardinal was determined not to let the matter sleep, notwithstanding

his protestation of a kindly feeling towards the imprisoned Count.

Against the statement that he knew of a letter which amounted to a full

confession of treason, out of Egmont's own mouth--a fact which, if

proved, and perhaps, if even insinuated, would be sufficient with Philip

to deprive Egmont of twenty thousand lives--against these constant

recommendations to his suspicious and sanguinary master, to ferret out

this document, if it were possible, it must be confessed that the

churchman's vague and hypocritical expressions on the side of mercy were

very little worth.

Certainly these seeds of suspicion did not fall upon a barren soil.

Philip immediately communicated the information thus received to the Duke

of Alva, charging him on repeated occasions to find out what was written,

either by Egmont or by Straalen, at Egmont's instigation, stating that

such a letter was written at the time of the Hoogstraaten baptism, that

it would probably illustrate the opinions of Egmont at that period, and

that the letter itself, which the confessor of Madame de Parma had once

had in his hands, ought, if possible, to be procured. Thus the very

language used by Granvelle to Philip was immediately repeated by the

monarch to his representative in the Netherlands, at the moment when all

Egmont's papers were in his possession, and when Egmont's private

secretary was undergoing the torture, in order that; secrets might be

wrenched from him which had never entered his brain. The fact that no

such letter was found, that the Duchess had never alluded to any such

document, and that neither a careful scrutiny of papers, nor the

application of the rack, could elicit any satisfactory information on the

subject, leads to the conclusion that no such treasonable paper had ever

existed, save in the imagination of the Cardinal. At any rate, it is no

more than just to hesitate before affixing a damning character to a

document, in the absence of any direct proof that there ever was such a

document at all. The confessor of Madame de Parma told another person,

who told the Cardinal, that either Count Egmont, or Burgomaster Straalen,

by command of Count Egmont, wrote to the Prince of Orange thus and so.

What evidence was this upon which to found a charge of high treason

against a man whom Granvelle affected to characterize as otherwise

neither opposed to the Catholic religion, nor to the true service of the

King? What vulpine kind of mercy was it on the part of the Cardinal,

while making such deadly insinuations, to recommend the imprisoned victim

to clemency?

The unfortunate envoys, Marquis Bergen and Baron Montigny, had remained

in Spain under close observation. Of those doomed victims who, in spite

of friendly remonstrances and of ominous warnings, had thus ventured into

the lion's den, no retreating footmarks were ever to be seen. Their fate,

now that Alva had at last been despatched to the Netherlands, seemed to

be sealed, and the Marquis Bergen, accepting the augury in its most evil

sense, immediately afterwards had sickened unto death. Whether it were

the sickness of hope deferred, suddenly changing to despair, or whether

it were a still more potent and unequivocal poison which came to the

relief of the unfortunate nobleman, will perhaps never be ascertained

with certainty. The secrets of those terrible prison-houses of Spain,

where even the eldest begotten son, and the wedded wife of the monarch,

were soon afterwards believed to have been the victims of his dark

revenge, can never perhaps be accurately known, until the grave gives up

its dead, and the buried crimes of centuries are revealed.

It was very soon after the departure of Alva's fleet from Carthagena,

that the Marquis Bergen felt his end approaching. He sent for the Prince

of Eboli, with whom he had always maintained intimate relations, and whom

he believed to be his disinterested friend. Relying upon his faithful

breast, and trusting to receive from his eyes alone the pious drops of

sympathy which he required, the dying noble poured out his long and last

complaint. He charged him to tell the man whom he would no longer call

his king, that he had ever been true and loyal, that the bitterness of

having been constantly suspected, when he was conscious of entire

fidelity, was a sharper sorrow than could be lightly believed, and that

he hoped the time would come when his own truth and the artifices of his

enemies would be brought to light. He closed his parting message by

predicting that after he had been long laid in the grave, the

impeachments against his character would be, at last, although too late,

retracted.

So spake the unhappy envoy, and his friend replied with words of

consolation. It is probable that he even ventured, in the King's name, to

grant him the liberty of returning to his home; the only remedy, as his

physicians had repeatedly stated, which could possibly be applied to his

disease. But the devilish hypocrisy of Philip, and the abject perfidy of

Eboli, at this juncture, almost surpass belief. The Prince came to press

the hand and to close the eyes of the dying man whom he called his

friend, having first carefully studied a billet of most minute and secret

instructions from his master as to the deportment he was to observe upon

this solemn occasion and afterwards. This paper, written in Philip's own

hand, had been delivered to Eboli on the very day of his visit to Bergen,

and bore the superscription that it was not to be read nor opened till

the messenger who brought it had left his presence. It directed the

Prince, if it should be evident Marquis was past recovery, to promise

him, in the King's name, the permission of returning to the Netherlands.

Should, however, a possibility of his surviving appear, Eboli was only to

hold out a hope that such permission might eventually be obtained. In

case of the death of Bergen, the Prince was immediately to confer with

the Grand Inquisitor and with the Count of Feria, upon the measures to be

taken for his obsequies. It might seem advisable, in that event to

exhibit the regret which the King and his ministers felt for his death,

and the great esteem in which they held the nobles of the Netherlands. At

the same time, Eboli was further instructed to confer with the same

personages as to the most efficient means for preventing the escape of

Baron Montigny; to keep a vigilant eye upon his movements, and to give

general directions to governors and to postmasters to intercept his

flight, should it be attempted. Finally, in case of Bergen's death, the

Prince was directed to despatch a special messenger, apparently on his

own responsibility, and as if in the absence and without the knowledge of

the King, to inform the Duchess of Parma of the event, and to urge her

immediately to take possession of the city of Bergen-op-Zoom, and of all

other property belonging to the Marquis, until it should be ascertained

whether it were not possible to convict him, after death, of treason, and

to confiscate his estates accordingly.

Such were the instructions of Philip to Eboli, and precisely in

accordance with the program, was the horrible comedy enacted at the

death-bed of the envoy. Three days after his parting interview with his

disinterested friend, the Marquis was a corpse.--Before his limbs were

cold, a messenger was on his way to Brussels, instructing the Regent to

sequestrate his property, and to arrest, upon suspicion of heresy, the

youthful kinsman and niece, who, by the will of the Marquis, were to be

united in marriage and to share his estate. The whole drama, beginning

with the death scene, was enacted according to order: Before the arrival

of Alva in the Netherlands, the property of the Marquis was in the hands

of the Government, awaiting the confiscation,--which was but for a brief

season delayed, while on the other hand, Baron Montigny, Bergen's

companion in doom, who was not, however, so easily to be carried off by

homesickness, was closely confined in the alcazar of Segovia, never to

leave a Spanish prison alive. There is something pathetic in the delusion

in which Montigny and his brother, the Count Horn, both indulged, each

believing that the other was out of harm's way, the one by his absence

from the Netherlands, the other by his absence from Spain, while both,

involved in the same meshes, were rapidly and surely approaching their

fate.

In the same despatch of the 9th September, in which the Duke communicated

to Philip the capture of Egmont and Horn, he announced to him his

determination to establish a new court for the trial of crimes committed

during the recent period of troubles. This wonderful tribunal was

accordingly created with the least possible delay. It was called the

Council of Troubles, but it soon acquired the terrible name, by which it

will be forever known in history, of the 'Blood-Council'. It superseded

all other institutions. Every court, from those of the municipal

magistracies up to the supreme councils of the provinces, were forbidden

to take cognizance in future of any cause growing out of the late

troubles. The council of state, although it was not formally disbanded,

fell into complete desuetude, its members being occasionally summoned

into Alva's private chambers in an irregular manner, while its principal

functions were usurped by the Blood-Council. Not only citizens of every

province, but the municipal bodies and even the sovereign provincial

estates themselves, were compelled to plead, like humble individuals,

before this new and extraordinary tribunal. It is unnecessary to allude

to the absolute violation which was thus committed of all charters, laws

and privileges, because the very creation of the council was a bold and

brutal proclamation that those laws and privileges were at an end. The

constitution or maternal principle of this suddenly erected court was of

a twofold nature. It defined and it punished the crime of treason. The

definitions, couched in eighteen articles, declared it to be treason to

have delivered or signed any petition against the new bishops, the

Inquisition, or the Edicts; to have tolerated public preaching under any

circumstances; to have omitted resistance to the image-breaking, to the

field-preaching, or to the presentation of the Request by the nobles, and

"either through sympathy or surprise" to have asserted that the King did

not possess the right to deprive all the provinces of their liberties, or

to have maintained that this present tribunal was bound to respect in any

manner any laws or any charters. In these brief and simple, but

comprehensive terms, was the crime of high treason defined. The

punishment was still more briefly, simply, and comprehensively stated,

for it was instant death in all cases. So well too did this new and

terrible engine perform its work, that in less than three months from the

time of its erection, eighteen hundred human beings had suffered death by

its summary proceedings; some of the highest, the noblest, and the most

virtuous in the land among the number; nor had it then manifested the

slightest indication of faltering in its dread career.

Yet, strange to say, this tremendous court, thus established upon the

ruins of all the ancient institutions of the country, had not been

provided with even a nominal authority from any source whatever. The King

had granted it no letters patent or charter, nor had even the Duke of

Alva thought it worth while to grant any commissions either in his own

name or as Captain-General, to any of the members composing the board.

The Blood-Council was merely an informal club, of which the Duke was

perpetual president, while the other members were all appointed by

himself.

Of these subordinate councillors, two had the right of voting, subject,

however, in all cases to his final decision, while the rest of the number

did not vote at all. It had not, therefore, in any sense, the character

of a judicial, legislative, or executive tribunal, but was purely a board

of advice by which the bloody labors of the duke were occasionally

lightened as to detail, while not a feather's weight of power or of

responsibility was removed from his shoulders. He reserved for himself

the final decision upon all causes which should come before the council,

and stated his motives for so doing with grim simplicity. "Two reasons,"

he wrote to the King, "have determined me thus to limit the power of the

tribunal; the first that, not knowing its members, I might be easily

deceived by them; the second, that the men of law only condemn for crimes

which are proved; whereas your Majesty knows that affairs of state are

governed by very different rules from the laws which they have here."

It being, therefore, the object of the Duke to compose a body of men who

would be of assistance to him in condemning for crimes which could not be

proved, and in slipping over statutes which were not to be recognized, it

must be confessed that he was not unfortunate in the appointments which

he made to the office of councillors. In this task of appointment he had

the assistance of the experienced Viglius. That learned jurisconsult,

with characteristic lubricity, had evaded the dangerous honor for

himself, but he nominated a number of persons from whom the Duke selected

his list. The sacerdotal robes which he had so recently and so "craftily"

assumed, furnished his own excuse, and in his letters to his faithful

Hopper he repeatedly congratulated himself upon his success in keeping

himself at a distance from so bloody and perilous a post.

It is impossible to look at the conduct of the distinguished Frisian at

this important juncture without contempt. Bent only upon saving himself,

his property, and his reputation, he did not hesitate to bend before the

"most illustrious Duke," as he always denominated him, with fulsome and

fawning homage. While he declined to dip his own fingers in the innocent

blood which was about to flow in torrents, he did not object to officiate

at the initiatory preliminaries of the great Netherland holocaust. His

decent and dainty demeanor seems even more offensive than the jocularity

of the real murderers. Conscious that no man knew the laws and customs of

the Netherlands better than himself, he had the humble effrontery to

observe that it was necessary for him at that moment silently to submit

his own unskilfulness to the superior judgment and knowledge of others.

Having at last been relieved from the stone of Sisyphus, which, as he

plaintively expressed himself, he had been rolling for twenty years;

having, by the arrival of Tisnacq, obtained his discharge as President of

the state council, he was yet not unwilling to retain the emoluments and

the rank of President of the privy council, although both offices had

become sinecures since the erection of the Council of Blood. Although his

life had been spent in administrative and judicial employments, he did

not blush upon a matter of constitutional law to defer to the authority

of such jurisconsults as the Duke of Alva and his two Spanish

bloodhounds, Vargas and Del Rio. He did not like, he observed, in his

confidential correspondence, to gainsay the Duke, when maintaining, that

in cases of treason, the privileges of Brabant were powerless, although

he mildly doubted whether the Brabantines would agree with the doctrine.

He often thought, he said, of remedies for restoring the prosperity of

the provinces, but in action he only assisted the Duke, to the best of

his abilities, in arranging the Blood-Council. He wished well to his

country, but he was more anxious for the favor of Alva. "I rejoice," said

he, in one of his letters, "that the most illustrious Duke has written to

the King in praise of my obsequiousness; when I am censured here for so

reverently cherishing him, it is a consolation that my services to the

King and to the governor are not unappreciated there." Indeed the Duke of

Alva, who had originally suspected the President's character, seemed at

last overcome by his indefatigable and cringing homage. He wrote to the

King, in whose good graces the learned Doctor was most anxious at that

portentous period to maintain himself, that the President was very

serviceable and diligent, and that he deserved to receive a crumb of

comfort from the royal hand. Philip, in consequence, wrote in one of his

letters a few lines of vague compliment, which could be shown to Viglius,

according to Alva's suggestion. It is, however, not a little

characteristic of the Spanish court and of the Spanish monarch, that, on

the very day before, he had sent to the Captain-General a few documents

of very different import. In order, as he said, that the Duke might be

ignorant of nothing which related to the Netherlands, he forwarded to him

copies of the letters written by Margaret of Parma from Brussels, three

years before. These letters, as it will be recollected, contained an

account of the secret investigations which the Duchess had made as to the

private character and opinions of Viglius--at the very moment when he

apparently stood highest in her confidence--and charged him with heresy,

swindling, and theft. Thus the painstaking and time-serving President,

with all his learning and experience, was successively the dupe of

Margaret and of Alva, whom he so obsequiously courted, and always of

Philip, whom he so feared and worshipped.

With his assistance, the list of blood-councillors was quickly completed.

No one who was offered the office refused it. Noircarmes and Berlaymont

accepted with very great eagerness. Several presidents and councillors of

the different provincial tribunals were appointed, but all the

Netherlanders were men of straw. Two Spaniards, Del Rio and Vargas, were

the only members who could vote; while their decisions, as already

stated, were subject to reversal by Alva. Del Rio was a man without

character or talent, a mere tool in the hands of his superiors, but Juan

de Vargas was a terrible reality.

No better man could have been found in Europe for the post to which he

was thus elevated. To shed human blood was, in his opinion, the only

important business and the only exhilarating pastime of life. His youth

had been stained with other crimes. He had been obliged to retire from

Spain, because of his violation of an orphan child to whom he was

guardian, but, in his manhood, he found no pleasure but in murder. He

executed Alva's bloody work with an industry which was almost superhuman,

and with a merriment which would have shamed a demon. His execrable jests

ring through the blood and smoke and death-cries of those days of

perpetual sacrifice. He was proud to be the double of the iron-hearted

Duke, and acted so uniformly in accordance with his views, that the right

of revision remained but nominal. There could be no possibility of

collision where the subaltern was only anxious to surpass an incomparable

superior. The figure of Vargas rises upon us through the mist of three

centuries with terrible distinctness. Even his barbarous grammar has not

been forgotten, and his crimes against syntax and against humanity have

acquired the same immortality. "Heretici fraxerunt templa, boni nihili

faxerunt contra, ergo debent omnes patibulare," was the comprehensive but

barbarous formula of a man who murdered the Latin language as ruthlessly

as he slaughtered his contemporaries.

Among the ciphers who composed the rest of the board, the Flemish

Councillor Hessels was the one whom the Duke most respected. He was not

without talent or learning, but the Duke only valued him for his cruelty.

Being allowed to take but little share in the deliberations, Hessels was

accustomed to doze away his afternoon hours at the council table, and

when awakened from his nap in order that he might express an opinion on

the case then before the court, was wont to rub his eyes and to call out

"Ad patibulum, ad patibulum," ("to the gallows with him, to the gallows

with him,") with great fervor, but in entire ignorance of the culprit's

name or the merits of the case. His wife, naturally disturbed that her

husband's waking and sleeping hours were alike absorbed with this

hangman's work, more than once ominously expressed her hope to him, that

he, whose head and heart were thus engrossed with the gibbet, might not

one day come to hang upon it himself; a gloomy prophecy which the Future

most terribly fulfilled.

The Council of Blood, thus constituted, held its first session on the

20th September, at the lodgings of Alva. Springing completely grown and

armed to the teeth from the head of its inventor, the new tribunal--at

the very outset in possession of all its vigor--forthwith began to

manifest a terrible activity in accomplishing the objects of its

existence. The councillors having been sworn to "eternal secrecy as to

any thing which should be transacted at the board, and having likewise

made oath to denounce any one of their number who should violate the

pledge," the court was considered as organized. Alva worked therein seven

hours daily. It may be believed that the subordinates were not spared,

and that their office proved no sinecure. Their labors, however, were not

encumbered by antiquated forms. As this supreme and only tribunal for all

the Netherlands had no commission or authority save the will of the

Captain-General, so it was also thought a matter of supererogation to

establish a set of rules and orders such as might be useful in less

independent courts. The forms of proceeding were brief and artless. There

was a rude organization by which a crowd of commissioners, acting as

inferior officers of the council, were spread over the provinces, whose

business was to collect information concerning all persons who might be

incriminated for participation in the recent troubles. The greatest

crime, however, was to be rich, and one which could be expiated by no

virtues, however signal. Alva was bent upon proving himself as

accomplished a financier as he was indisputably a consummate commander,

and he had promised his master an annual income of 500,000 ducats from

the confiscations which were to accompany the executions.

It was necessary that the blood torrent should flow at once through the

Netherlands, in order that the promised golden river, a yard deep,

according to his vaunt, should begin to irrigate the thirsty soil of

Spain. It is obvious, from the fundamental laws which were made to define

treason at the same moment in which they established the council, that

any man might be at any instant summoned to the court. Every man, whether

innocent or guilty, whether Papist or Protestant, felt his head shaking

on his shoulders. If he were wealthy, there seemed no remedy but flight,

which was now almost impossible, from the heavy penalties affixed by the

new edict upon all carriers, shipmasters, and wagoners, who should aid in

the escape of heretics.

A certain number of these commissioners were particularly instructed to

collect information as to the treason of Orange, Louis Nassau, Brederode,

Egmont, Horn, Culemberg, Vanden Berg, Bergen, and Montigny. Upon such

information the proceedings against those distinguished seigniors were to

be summarily instituted. Particular councillors of the Court of Blood

were charged with the arrangement of these important suits, but the

commissioners were to report in the first instance to the Duke himself,

who afterwards returned the paper into the hands of his subordinates.

With regard to the inferior and miscellaneous cases which were daily

brought in incredible profusion before the tribunal, the same

preliminaries were observed, by way of aping the proceedings in courts of

justice. Alva sent the cart-loads of information which were daily brought

to him, but which neither he nor any other man had time to read, to be

disposed of by the board of councillors. It was the duty of the different

subalterns, who, as already stated, had no right of voting, to prepare

reports upon the cases. Nothing could be more summary. Information was

lodged against a man, or against a hundred men, in one document. The Duke

sent the papers to the council, and the inferior councillors reported at

once to Vargas. If the report concluded with a recommendation of death to

the man, or the hundred men in question, Vargas instantly approved it,

and execution was done upon the man, or the hundred men, within

forty-eight hours. If the report had any other conclusion, it was

immediately sent back for revision, and the reporters were overwhelmed

with reproaches by the President.

Such being the method of operation, it may be supposed that the

councillors were not allowed to slacken in their terrible industry. The

register of every city, village, and hamlet throughout the Netherlands

showed the daily lists of men, women, and children thus sacrificed at the

shrine of the demon who had obtained the mastery over this unhappy land.

It was not often that an individual was of sufficient importance to be

tried--if trial it could be called--by himself. It was found more

expeditious to send them in batches to the furnace. Thus, for example, on

the 4th of January, eighty-four inhabitants of Valenciennes were

condemned; on another day, ninety-five miscellaneous individuals, from

different places in Flanders; on another, forty-six inhabitants of

Malines; on another, thirty-five persons from different localities, and

so on.

The evening of Shrovetide, a favorite holiday in the Netherlands,

afforded an occasion for arresting and carrying off a vast number of

doomed individuals at a single swoop. It was correctly supposed that the

burghers, filled with wine and wassail, to which perhaps the persecution

under which they lived lent an additional and horrible stimulus, might be

easily taken from their beds in great numbers, and be delivered over at

once to the council. The plot was ingenious, the net was spread

accordingly. Many of the doomed were, however, luckily warned of the

terrible termination which was impending over their festival, and

bestowed themselves in safety for a season. A prize of about five hundred

prisoners was all which rewarded the sagacity of the enterprise. It is

needless to add that they were all immediately executed. It is a

wearisome and odious task to ransack the mouldy records of three

centuries ago, in order to reproduce the obscure names of the thousands

who were thus sacrificed.. The dead have buried their dead, and are

forgotten. It is likewise hardly necessary to state that the proceedings

before the council were all 'ex parte', and that an information was

almost inevitably followed by a death-warrant. It sometimes happened even

that the zeal of the councillors outstripped the industry of the

commissioners. The sentences were occasionally in advance of the docket.

Thus upon one occasion a man's case was called for trial, but before the

investigation was commenced it was discovered that he had been already

executed. A cursory examination of the papers proved, moreover, as usual,

that the culprit had committed no crime. "No matter for that," said

Vargas, jocosely, "if he has died innocent, it will be all the better for

him when he takes his trial in the other world."

But, however the councillors might indulge in these gentle jests among

themselves, it was obvious that innocence was in reality impossible,

according to the rules which had been laid down regarding treason. The

practice was in accordance with the precept, and persons were daily

executed with senseless pretexts, which was worse than executions with no

pretexts at all. Thus Peter de Witt of Amsterdam was beheaded, because at

one of the tumults in that city he had persuaded a rioter not to fire

upon a magistrate. This was taken as sufficient proof that he was a man

in authority among the rebels, and he was accordingly put to death.

Madame Juriaen, who, in 1566, had struck with her slipper a little wooden

image of the Virgin, together with her maid-servant, who had witnessed

without denouncing the crime, were both drowned by the hangman in a

hogshead placed on the scaffold.

Death, even, did not in all cases place a criminal beyond the reach of

the executioner. Egbert Meynartzoon, a man of high official rank, had

been condemned, together with two colleagues, on an accusation of

collecting money in a Lutheran church. He died in prison of dropsy. The

sheriff was indignant with the physician, because, in spite of cordials

and strengthening prescriptions, the culprit had slipped through his

fingers before he had felt those of the hangman. He consoled himself by

placing the body on a chair, and having the dead man beheaded in company

with his colleagues.

Thus the whole country became a charnel-house; the deathbell tolled

hourly in every village; not a family but was called to mourn for its

dearest relatives, while the survivors stalked listlessly about, the

ghosts of their former selves, among the wrecks of their former homes.

The spirit of the nation, within a few months after the arrival of Alva,

seemed hopelessly broken. The blood of its best and bravest had already

stained the scaffold; the men to whom it bad been accustomed to look for

guidance and protection, were dead, in prison, or in exile. Submission

had ceased to be of any avail, flight was impossible, and the spirit of

vengeance had alighted at every fireside. The mourners went daily about

the streets, for there was hardly a house which had not been made

desolate. The scaffolds, the gallows, the funeral piles, which had been

sufficient in ordinary times, furnished now an entirely inadequate

machinery for the incessant executions. Columns and stakes in every

street, the door-posts of private houses, the fences in the fields were

laden with human carcasses, strangled, burned, beheaded. The orchards in

the country bore on many a tree the hideous fruit of human bodies.

Thus the Netherlands were crushed, and but for the stringency of the

tyranny which had now closed their gates, would have been depopulated.

The grass began to grow in the streets of those cities which had recently

nourished so many artisans. In all those great manufacturing and

industrial marts, where the tide of human life had throbbed so

vigorously, there now reigned the silence and the darkness of midnight.

It was at this time that the learned Viglius wrote to his friend Hopper,

that all venerated the prudence and gentleness of the Duke of Alva. Such

were among the first-fruits of that prudence and that gentleness.

The Duchess of Parma had been kept in a continued state of irritation.

She had not ceased for many months to demand her release from the odious

position of a cipher in a land where she had so lately been sovereign,

and she had at last obtained it. Philip transmitted his acceptance of her

resignation by the same courier who brought Alva's commission to be

governor-general in her place. The letters to the Duchess were full of

conventional compliments for her past services, accompanied, however,

with a less barren and more acceptable acknowledgment, in the shape of a

life income of 14,000 ducats instead of the 8000 hitherto enjoyed by her

Highness.

In addition to this liberal allowance, of which she was never to be

deprived, except upon receiving full payment of 140,000 ducats, she was

presented with 25,000 florins by the estates of Brabant, and with 30,000

by those of Flanders.

With these substantial tokens of the success of her nine years' fatigue

and intolerable anxiety, she at last took her departure from the

Netherlands, having communicated the dissolution of her connexion with

the provinces by a farewell letter to the Estates dated 9th December,

1567. Within a few weeks afterwards, escorted by the Duke of Alva across

the frontier of Brabant; attended by a considerable deputation of Flemish

nobility into Germany, and accompanied to her journey's end at Parma by

the Count and Countess of Mansfeld, she finally closed her eventful

career in the Netherlands.

The horrors of the succeeding administration proved beneficial to her

reputation. Upon the dark ground of succeeding years the lines which

recorded her history seemed written with letters of light. Yet her

conduct in the Netherlands offers but few points for approbation, and

many for indignant censure. That she was not entirely destitute of

feminine softness and sentiments of bounty, her parting despatch to her

brother proved. In that letter she recommended to him a course of

clemency and forgiveness, and reminded him that the nearer kings approach

to God in station, the more they should endeavor to imitate him in his

attributes of benignity. But the language of this farewell was more

tender than had been the spirit of her government. One looks in vain,

too, through the general atmosphere of kindness which pervades the

epistle; for a special recommendation of those distinguished and doomed

seigniors, whose attachment to her person and whose chivalrous and

conscientious endeavors to fulfil her own orders, had placed them upon

the edge of that precipice from which they were shortly to be hurled. The

men who had restrained her from covering herself with disgrace by a

precipitate retreat from the post of danger, and who had imperilled their

lives by obedience to her express instructions, had been long languishing

in solitary confinement, never to be terminated except by a traitor's

death--yet we search in vain for a kind word in their behalf.

Meantime the second civil war in France had broken out. The hollow truce

by which the Guise party and the Huguenots had partly pretended to

deceive each other was hastened to its end; among other causes, by the

march of Alva, to the Netherlands. The Huguenots had taken alarm, for

they recognized the fellowship which united their foes in all countries

against the Reformation, and Conde and Coligny knew too well that the

same influence which had brought Alva to Brussels would soon create an

exterminating army against their followers. Hostilities were resumed with

more bitterness than ever. The battle of St. Denis--fierce, fatal, but

indecisive--was fought. The octogenarian hero, Montmorency, fighting like

a foot soldier, refusing to yield his sword, and replying to the

respectful solicitations of his nearest enemy by dashing his teeth down

his throat with the butt-end of his pistol, the hero of so many battles,

whose defeat at St. Quintin had been the fatal point in his career, had

died at last in his armor, bravely but not gloriously, in conflict with

his own countrymen, led by his own heroic nephew. The military control of

the Catholic party was completely in the hand of the Guises; the

Chancellor de l'Hopital had abandoned the court after a last and futile

effort to reconcile contending factions, which no human power could

unite; the Huguenots had possessed themselves of Rochelle and of other

strong places, and, under the guidance of adroit statesmen and

accomplished generals, were pressing the Most Christian monarch hard in

the very heart of his kingdom.

As early as the middle of October, while still in Antwerp, Alva had

received several secret agents of the French monarch, then closely

beleaguered in his capital. Cardinal Lorraine offered to place several

strong places of France in the hands of the Spaniard, and Alva had

written to Philip that he was disposed to accept the offer, and to render

the service. The places thus held would be a guarantee for his expenses,

he said, while in case King Charles and his brother should die, "their

possession would enable Philip to assert his own claim to the French

crown in right of his wife, the Salic law being merely a pleasantry."

The Queen Dowager, adopting now a very different tone from that which

characterized her conversation at the Bayonne interview, wrote to Alva,

that, if for want of 2000 Spanish musketeers, which she requested him to

furnish, she should be obliged to succumb, she chose to disculpate

herself in advance before God and Christian princes for the peace which

she should be obliged to make. The Duke wrote to her in reply, that it

was much better to have a kingdom ruined in preserving it for God and the

king by war, than to have it kept entire without war, to the profit of

the devil and of his followers. He was also reported on another occasion

to have reminded her of the Spanish proverb--that the head of one salmon

is worth those of a hundred frogs. The hint, if it were really given, was

certainly destined to be acted upon.

The Duke not only furnished Catherine with advice, but with the

musketeers which she had solicited. Two thousand foot and fifteen hundred

horse, under the Count of Aremberg, attended by a choice band of the

Catholic nobility of the Netherlands, had joined the royal camp at Paris

before the end of the year, to take their part in the brief hostilities

by which the second treacherous peace was to be preceded.

Meantime, Alva was not unmindful of the business which had served as a

pretext in the arrest of the two Counts. The fortifications of the

principal cities were pushed on with great rapidity. The memorable

citadel of Antwerp in particular had already been commenced in October

under the superintendence of the celebrated engineers, Pacheco and

Gabriel de Cerbelloni. In a few months it was completed, at a cost of one

million four hundred thousand florins, of which sum the citizens, in

spite of their remonstrances, were compelled to contribute more than one

quarter. The sum of four hundred thousand florins was forced from the

burghers by a tax upon all hereditary property within the municipality.

Two thousand workmen were employed daily in the construction of this

important fortress, which was erected, as its position most plainly

manifested, not to protect, but to control the commercial capital of the

provinces. It stood at the edge of the city, only separated from its

walls by an open esplanade. It was the most perfect pentagon in Europe,

having one of its sides resting on the Scheld, two turned towards the

city, and two towards the open country. Five bastions, with walls of

hammered stone, connected by curtains of turf and masonry, surrounded by

walls measuring a league in circumference, and by an outer moat fed by

the Scheld, enclosed a spacious enceinte, where a little church with many

small lodging-houses, shaded by trees and shrubbery, nestled among the

bristling artillery, as if to mimic the appearance of a peaceful and

pastoral village. To four of the five bastions, the Captain-General, with

characteristic ostentation, gave his own names and titles. One was called

the Duke, the second Ferdinando, a third Toledo, a fourth Alva, while the

fifth was baptized with the name of the ill-fated engineer, Pacheco. The

Watergate was decorated with the escutcheon of Alva, surrounded by his

Golden Fleece collar, with its pendant lamb of God; a symbol of

blasphemous irony, which still remains upon the fortress, to recal the

image of the tyrant and murderer. Each bastion was honeycombed with

casemates and subterranean storehouses, and capable of containing within

its bowels a vast supply of provisions, munitions, and soldiers. Such was

the celebrated citadel built to tame the turbulent spirit of Antwerp, at

the cost of those whom it was to terrify and to insult.