Having time still left, the count made a fair copy of the two letters, and gave them to the bishop, entreating him to deliver them according to their destination. He accompanied that to Philip with a ring, to be given at the same time to the monarch.[1154] It was of great value; and as it had been the{367} gift of Philip himself during the count's late visit to Madrid, it might soften the heart of the king by reminding him of happier days, when he had looked with an eye of favor on his unhappy vassal.

Having completed all his arrangements, Egmont became impatient for the hour of his departure; and he expressed the hope that there would be no unnecessary delay.[1155] At ten in the morning the soldiers appeared who were to conduct him to the scaffold. They brought with them cords, as usual, to bind the prisoner's hands. But Egmont remonstrated, and showed that he had, himself, cut off the collar of his doublet and shirt, in order to facilitate the stroke of the executioner. This he did to convince them that he meditated no resistance; and on his promising that he would attempt none, they consented to his remaining with his hands unbound.

Egmont was dressed in a crimson damask robe, over which was a Spanish, mantle fringed with gold. His breeches were of black silk; and his hat, of the same material, was garnished with white and sable plumes.[1156] In his hand, which, as we have seen, remained free, he held a white handkerchief. On his way to the place of execution, he was accompanied by Julian de Romero, maître de camp, by the captain, Salinas, who had charge of the fortress of Ghent, and by the bishop of Ypres. As the procession moved slowly forward, the count repeated some portion of the fifty-first psalm,—"Have mercy on me, O God!"—in which the good prelate joined with him. In the centre of the square, on the spot where so much of the best blood of the Netherlands has been shed, stood the scaffold, covered with black cloth. On it were two velvet cushions with a small table, shrouded likewise in black, and supporting a silver crucifix. At the corners of the platform were two poles, pointed at the end with steel, intimating the purpose for which they were intended.[1157]

In front of the scaffold was the provost of the court, mounted on horseback and bearing the red wand of office in his hand.[1158] The executioner remained, as usual, below the platform, screened from view, that he might not, by his presence before it was necessary, outrage the feelings of the prisoners.[1159] The{368} troops, who had been under arms all night, were drawn up around in order of battle; and strong bodies of arquebusiers were posted in the great avenues which led to the square. The space left open by the soldiery was speedily occupied by a crowd of eager spectators. Others thronged the roofs and windows of the buildings that surrounded the market-place, some of which, still standing at the present day, show, by their quaint and venerable architecture, that they must have looked down on the tragic scene we are now depicting.

It was indeed a gloomy day for Brussels,—so long the residence of the two nobles, where their forms were as familiar, and where they were held in as much love and honor as in any of their own provinces. All business was suspended. The shops were closed. The bells tolled in all the churches. An air of gloom, as of some impending calamity, settled on the city. "It seemed," says one residing there at the time, "as if the day of judgment were at hand!"[1160]

As the procession slowly passed through the ranks of the soldiers, Egmont saluted the officers—some of them his ancient companions—with such a sweet and dignified composure in his manner as was long remembered by those who saw it. And few even of the Spaniards could refrain from tears, as they took their last look at the gallant noble who was to perish by so miserable an end.[1161]

With a steady step he mounted the scaffold, and, as he crossed it, gave utterance to the vain wish, that, instead of meeting such a fate, he had been allowed to die in the service of his king and country.[1162] He quickly, however, turned to other thoughts, and, kneeling on one of the cushions, with the bishop beside him on the other, he was soon engaged earnestly in prayer. With his eyes raised towards Heaven with a look of unutterable sadness,[1163] he prayed so fervently and loud as to be distinctly heard by the spectators. The prelate, much affected, put into his hands the silver crucifix, which Egmont repeatedly kissed; after which, having received absolution for the last time, he rose and made a sign to the bishop to retire. He then stripped off his mantle and robe; and again kneeling, he drew a silk cap, which he had brought for the purpose, over his eyes, and repeating the words, "Into thy hands, O Lord, I commend my spirit," he calmly awaited the stroke of the executioner.

The low sounds of lamentation, which from time to time had been heard among the populace, were now hushed into silence,[1164] as the minister of justice appearing on the platform, approached his victim, and with a single blow of the sword severed the head from the body. A cry of horror rose from the multitude, and some frantic with grief, broke through the ranks of the soldiers, and wildly dipped their handkerchiefs in the blood that streamed from the scaffold, treasuring them up, says the chronicler, as precious memorials of love and incitements to vengeance.[1165]—The head was then set on one of the{369} poles at the end of the platform, while a mantle thrown over the mutilated trunk hid it from the public gaze.[1166]

It was near noon, when orders were sent to lead forth the remaining prisoner to execution. It had been assigned to the curate of La Chapelle to acquaint Count Hoorne with his fate. That nobleman received the awful tidings with less patience than was shown by his friend. He gave way to a burst of indignation at the cruelty and injustice of the sentence. It was a poor requital, he said, for eight and twenty years of faithful services to his sovereign. Yet, he added, he was not sorry to be released from a life of such incessant fatigue.[1167] For some time he refused to confess, saying he had done enough in the way of confession.[1168] When urged not to throw away the few precious moments that were left to him, he at length consented.

The count was dressed in a plain suit of black, and wore a Milanese cap upon his head. He was, at this time, about fifty years of age. He was tall, with handsome features, and altogether of a commanding presence.[1169] His form was erect, and as he passed with a steady step through the files of soldiers, on his way to the place of execution, he frankly saluted those of his acquaintance whom he saw among the spectators. His look had in it less of sorrow than of indignation, like that of one conscious of enduring wrong. He was spared one pang, in his last hour, which had filled Egmont's cup with bitterness; though, like him, he had a wife, he was to leave no orphan family to mourn him.

As he trod the scaffold, the apparatus of death seemed to have no power to move him. He still repeated the declaration, that, "often as he had offended his Maker, he had never, to his knowledge, committed any offence against the king." When his eyes fell on the bloody shroud that enveloped the remains of Egmont, he inquired if it were the body of his friend. Being answered in the affirmative, he made some remark in Castilian, not understood. He then prayed for a few moments, but in so low a tone, that the words were not caught by the by-standers, and, rising, he asked pardon of those around if he had ever offended any of them, and earnestly besought their prayers. Then, without further delay, he knelt down, and, repeating the words "In manus tuas, Domine," he submitted himself to his fate.[1170]{370}

His bloody head was set up opposite to that of his fellow-sufferer. For three hours these ghastly trophies remained exposed to the gaze of the multitude. They were then taken down, and, with the bodies, placed in leaden coffins, which were straightway removed,—that containing the remains of Egmont to the convent of Santa Clara, and that of Hoorne to the ancient church of St. Gudule. To these places, especially to Santa Clara, the people now flocked, as to the shrine of a martyr. They threw themselves on the coffin, kissing it and bedewing it with their tears, as if it had contained the relics of some murdered saint;[1171] while many of them, taking little heed of the presence of informers, breathed vows of vengeance; some even swearing not to trim either hair or beard till these vows were executed.[1172] The government seems to have thought it prudent to take no notice of this burst of popular feeling. But a funeral hatchment, blazoned with the arms of Egmont, which, as usual after the master's death, had been fixed by his domestics on the gates of his mansion, was ordered to be instantly removed; no doubt, as tending to keep alive the popular excitement.[1173] The bodies were not allowed to remain long in their temporary places of deposit, but were transported to the family residences of the two lords in the country, and laid in the vaults of their ancestors.[1174]

Thus by the hand of the common executioner perished these two unfortunate noblemen, who, by their rank, possessions, and personal characters, were the most illustrious victims that could have been selected in the Netherlands. Both had early enjoyed the favor of Charles the Fifth, and both had been intrusted by Philip with some of the highest offices in the state. Philip de Montmorency, Count Hoorne, the elder of the two, came of the ancient house of Montmorency in France. Besides filling the high post of Admiral of the Low Countries, he was made governor of the provinces of Gueldres and Zutphen, was a councillor of state, and was created by the emperor a knight of the Golden Fleece. His fortune was greatly inferior to that of Count Egmont; yet its confiscation afforded a supply by no means unwelcome to the needy exchequer of the duke of Alva.

However nearly on a footing they might be in many respects, Hoorne was altogether eclipsed by his friend in military renown. Lamoral, Count Egmont, inherited through his mother, the most beautiful woman of her time,[1175] the title of prince of Gavre,—a place on the Scheldt, not far from Ghent. He preferred, however, the more modest title of count of Egmont, which came to him by the father's side, from ancestors who had reigned over the duchy of Gueldres. The uncommon promise which he early gave served, with his high{371} position, to recommend him to the notice of the Emperor Charles the Fifth, who, in 1544, honored by his presence Egmont's nuptials with Sabina, countess-palatine of Bavaria. In 1546, when scarcely twenty-four years of age, he was admitted to the order of the Golden Fleece,—and, by a singular coincidence, on the same day on which that dignity was bestowed on the man destined to become his mortal foe, the duke of Alva.[1176] Philip, on his accession, raised him to the dignity of a councillor of state, and made him governor of the important provinces of Artois and Flanders.

But every other title to distinction faded away before that derived from those two victories, which left the deepest stain on the French arms that they had received since the defeat at Pavia. "I have seen," said the French ambassador, who witnessed the execution of Egmont, "I have seen the head of that man fall who twice caused France to tremble."[1177]

Yet the fame won by his success was probably unfortunate for Egmont. For this, the fruit of impetuous valor and of a brilliant coup-de-main, was very different from the success of a long campaign, implying genius and great military science in the commander. Yet the éclat it gave was enough to turn the head of a man less presumptuous than Egmont. It placed him at once on the most conspicuous eminence in the country; compelling him, in some sort, to take a position above his capacity to maintain. When the troubles broke out, Egmont was found side by side with Orange, in the van of the malecontents. He was urged to this rather by generous sensibility to the wrongs of his countrymen, than by any settled principle of action. Thus acting from impulse, he did not, like William, calculate the consequences of his conduct. When those consequences came, he was not prepared to meet them; he was like some unskilful necromancer, who has neither the wit to lay the storm which he has raised, nor the hardihood to brave it. He was acted on by contrary influences. In opposition to the popular movement came his strong feeling of loyalty, and his stronger devotion to the Roman Catholic faith. His personal vanity coöperated with these; for Egmont was too much of a courtier willingly to dispense with the smiles of royalty. Thus the opposite forces by which he was impelled served to neutralize each other. Instead of moving on a decided one of conduct, like his friend, William of Orange, he appeared weak and vacillating. He hesitated where he should have acted. And as the storm thickened, he even retraced his steps, and threw himself on the mercy of the monarch whom he had offended. William better understood the character of his master,—and that of the minister who was to execute his decrees.[1178]

Still, with all his deficiencies, there was much both in the personal qualities of Egmont and in his exploits to challenge admiration. "I knew him," says Brantôme, "both in France and in Spain, and never did I meet with a nobleman{372} of higher breeding, or more gracious in his manners."[1179] With an address so winning, a heart so generous, and with so brilliant a reputation, it is not wonderful that Egmont should have been the pride of his court and the idol of his countrymen. In their idolatry they could not comprehend that Alva's persecution should not have been prompted by a keener feeling than a sense of public duty or obedience to his sovereign. They industriously sought in the earlier history of the rival chiefs the motives for personal pique. On Alva's first visit to the Netherlands, Egmont, then a young man, was said to have won of him a considerable sum at play. The ill-will thus raised in Alva's mind was heightened by Egmont's superiority over him at a shooting-match, which the people, regarding as a sort of national triumph, hailed with an exultation that greatly increased the mortification of the duke.[1180] But what filled up the measure of his jealousy was his rival's military renown; for the Fabian policy which directed Alva's campaigns, however it established his claims to the reputation of a great commander, was by no means favorable to those brilliant feats of arms which have such attraction for the multitude. So intense, indeed, was the feeling of hatred, it was said, in Alva's bosom, that, on the day of his rival's execution, he posted himself behind a lattice of the very building in which Egmont had been confined, that he might feast his eyes with the sight of his mortal agony.[1181]

The friends of Alva give a very different view of his conduct. According to them, an illness under which he labored, at the close of Egmont's trial, was occasioned by his distress of mind at the task imposed on him by the king. He had written more than once to the court of Castile, to request some mitigation of Egmont's sentence, but was answered, that "this would have been easy to grant, if the offence had been against the king; but against the faith, it was impossible."[1182] It was even said that the duke was so much moved, that he was seen to shed tears as big as peas on the day of the execution![1183]{373}

I must confess, I have never seen any account that would warrant a belief in the report that Alva witnessed in person the execution of his prisoners. Nor, on the other hand, have I met with any letter of his deprecating the severity of their sentence, or advising a mitigation of their punishment. This, indeed, would be directly opposed to his policy, openly avowed. The reader may, perhaps, recall the homely simile by which he recommended to the queen-mother, at Bayonne, to strike at the great nobles in preference to the commoners. "One salmon," he said, "was worth ten thousand frogs."[1184] Soon after Egmont's arrest, some of the burghers of Brussels waited on him to ask why it had been made. The duke bluntly told them, "When he had got together his troops, he would let them know."[1185] Everything shows that, in his method of proceeding in regard to the two lords, he had acted on a preconcerted plan, in the arrangement of which he had taken his full part. In a letter to Philip, written soon after the execution, he speaks with complacency of having carried out the royal views in respect to the great offenders.[1186] In another, he notices the sensation caused by the death of Egmont; and "the greater the sensation," he adds, "the greater will be the benefit to be derived from it."[1187]—There is little in all this of compunction for the act, or of compassion for its victims.

The truth seems to be, that Alva was a man of an arrogant nature, an inflexible will, and of the most narrow and limited views. His doctrine of implicit obedience went as far as that of Philip himself. In enforcing it, he disdained the milder methods of argument or conciliation. It was on force, brute force alone, that he relied. He was bred a soldier, early accustomed to the stern discipline of the camp. The only law he recognized was martial law; his only argument, the sword. No agent could have been fitter to execute the designs of a despotic prince. His hard, impassible nature was not to be influenced by those affections which sometimes turn the most obdurate from their purpose. As little did he know of fear; nor could danger deter him from carrying out his work. The hatred he excited in the Netherlands was such, that, as he was warned, it was not safe for him to go out after dark. Placards were posted up in Brussels menacing his life if he persisted in the prosecution of Egmont.[1188] He held such menaces as light as he did the entreaties of the countess, or the arguments of her counsel. Far from being moved by personal considerations, no power could turn him from that narrow path which he professed to regard as the path of duty. He went surely, though it might be slowly, towards the mark, crushing by his iron will every obstacle that lay in his track. We shudder at the contemplation of such a character, relieved by scarcely a single touch of humanity. Yet we must admit there is something which challenges our admiration in the stern, uncompromising manner, without fear or favor, with which a man of this indomitable temper carries his plans into execution.

It would not be fair to omit, in this connection, some passages from Alva's{374} correspondence, which suggest the idea that he was not wholly insensible to feelings of compassion,—when they did not interfere with the performance of his task. In a letter to the king, dated the ninth of June, four days only after the death of the two nobles, the duke says: "Your majesty will understand the regret I feel at seeing these poor lords brought to such an end, and myself obliged to bring them to it.[1189] But I have not shrunk from doing what is for your majesty's service. Indeed, they and their accomplices have been the cause of very great present evil, and one which will endanger the souls of many for years to come. The Countess Egmont's condition fills me with the greatest pity, burdened as she is with a family of eleven children, none old enough to take care of themselves;—and she too a lady of so distinguished rank, sister of the count-palatine, and of so virtuous, truly Catholic, and exemplary life.[1190] There is no man in the country who does not grieve for her! I cannot but commend her," he concludes, "as I do now, very humbly, to the good grace of your majesty, beseeching you to call to mind that if the count, her husband, came to trouble at the close of his days, he formerly rendered great service to the state."[1191] The reflection, it must be owned, came somewhat late.

In another letter to Philip, though of the same date, Alva recommends the king to summon the countess and her children to Spain; where her daughters might take the veil, and her sons be properly educated. "I do not believe," he adds, "that there is so unfortunate a family in the whole world. I am not sure that the countess has the means of procuring a supper this very evening!"[1192]

Philip, in answer to these letters, showed that he was not disposed to shrink from his own share of responsibility for the proceedings of his general. The duke, he said, had only done what justice and his duty demanded.[1193] He could have wished that the state of things had warranted a different result; nor could he help feeling deeply that measures like those to which he had been forced should have been necessary in his reign. "But," continued the king, "no man has a right to shrink from his duty.[1194]—I am well pleased," he concludes, "to learn that the two lords made so good and Catholic an end. As to what you recommend in regard to the countess of Egmont and her eleven children, I shall give all proper heed to it."[1195]

The condition of the countess might well have moved the hardest heart to{375} pity. Denied all access to her husband, she had been unable to afford him that consolation which he so much needed during his long and dreary confinement. Yet she had not been idle; and, as we have seen, she was unwearied in her efforts to excite a sympathy in his behalf. Neither did she rely only on the aid which this world can give; and few nights passed during her lord's imprisonment in which she and her daughters might not be seen making their pious pilgrimages, barefooted, to the different churches of Brussels, to invoke the blessing of Heaven on their labors. She had been supported through this trying time by a reliance on the success of her endeavors, in which she was confirmed by the encouragement she received from the highest quarters. It is not necessary to give credit to the report of a brutal jest attributed to the duke of Alva, who, on the day preceding the execution, was said to have told the countess "to be of good cheer; for her husband would leave the prison on the morrow!"[1196] There is more reason to believe that the Emperor Maximilian, shortly before the close of the trial, sent a gentleman with a kind letter to the countess, testifying the interest he took in her affairs, and assuring her she had nothing to fear on account of her husband.[1197] On the very morning of Egmont's execution, she was herself, we are told, paying a visit of condolence to the countess of Aremberg, whose husband had lately fallen in the battle of Heyligerlee; and at her friend's house the poor lady is said to have received the first tidings of the fate of her lord.[1198]

The blow fell the heavier, that she was so ill prepared for it. On the same day she found herself, not only a widow, but a beggar,—with a family of orphan children in vain looking up to her for the common necessaries of life.[1199] In her extremity, she resolved to apply to the king himself. She found an apology for it in the necessity of transmitting to Philip her husband's letter to him, which, it seems, had been intrusted to her care.[1200] She apologizes for not sooner sending this last and most humble petition of her deceased lord, by the extreme wretchedness of her situation, abandoned, as she is, by all, far from kindred and country.[1201] She trusts in his majesty's benignity and compassion[1202] to aid her sons by receiving them into his service when they shall be of sufficient age. This will oblige her, during the remainder of her sad days, and her children after her, to pray God for the long and happy life of his majesty.[1203]—It must have given another pang to the heart of the{376} widowed countess, to have been thus forced to solicit aid from the very hand that had smitten her. But it was the mother pleading for her children.

Yet Philip, notwithstanding his assurances to the duke of Alva, showed no alacrity in relieving the wants of the countess. On the first of September the duke again wrote, to urge the necessity of her case, declaring that, if it had not been for a "small sum that he had himself sent, she and the children would have perished of hunger!"[1204]

The misfortunes of this noble lady excited commiseration not only at home, but in other countries of Europe, and especially in Germany, the land of her birth.[1205] Her brother, the elector of Bavaria, wrote to Philip, to urge the restitution of her husband's estates to his family. Other German princes preferred the same request, which was moreover formally made by the emperor, through his ambassador at Madrid. Philip coolly replied, that "the time for this had not yet come."[1206] A moderate pension, meanwhile, was annually paid by Alva to the countess of Egmont, who survived her husband ten years,—not long enough to see her children established in possession of their patrimony.[1207] Shortly before her death, her eldest son, then grown to man's estate, chafing under the sense of injustice to himself and his family, took part in the war against the Spaniards. Philip, who may perhaps have felt some compunction for the ungenerous requital he had made for the father's services, not only forgave this act of disloyalty in the son, but three years later allowed the young man to resume his allegiance, and placed him in full possession of the honors and estates of his ancestors.[1208]

Alva, as we have seen, in his letters to Philip, had dwelt on the important effects of Egmont's execution. He did not exaggerate these effects. But he sorely mistook the nature of them. Abroad, the elector of Bavaria at once threw his whole weight into the scale of Orange and the party of reform.[1209] Others of the German princes followed his example; and Maximilian's ambassador at Madrid informed Philip that the execution of the two nobles, by the indignation it had caused throughout Germany, had wonderfully served the designs of the prince of Orange.[1210]{377}

At home the effects were not less striking. The death of these two illustrious men, following so close upon the preceding executions, spread a deep gloom over the country. Men became possessed with the idea that the reign of blood was to be perpetual.[1211] All confidence was destroyed, even that confidence which naturally exists between parent and child, between brother and brother.[1212] The foreign merchant caught somewhat of this general distrust, and refused to send his commodities to a country where they were exposed to confiscation.[1213] Yet among the inhabitants indignation was greater than even fear or sorrow;[1214] and the Flemings who had taken part in the prosecution of Egmont trembled before the wrath of an avenging people.[1215] Such were the effects produced by the execution of men whom the nation reverenced as martyrs in the cause of freedom. Alva notices these consequences in his letters to the king. But though he could discern the signs of the times, he little dreamed of the extent of the troubles they portended. "The people of this country," he writes, "are of so easy a temper, that, when your majesty shall think fit to grant them a general pardon, your clemency, I trust, will make them as prompt to render you their obedience as they are now reluctant to do it."[1216]—The haughty soldier, in his contempt for the peaceful habits of a burgher population, comprehended as little as his master the true character of the men of the Netherlands.{378}

CHAPTER VI.

It may be remembered that, in the year 1566, two noble Flemings, the marquis of Bergen and the baron of Montigny, were sent on a mission to the court of Madrid, to lay before the king the critical state of affairs, imperatively demanding some change in the policy of the government. The two lords went on the mission; but they never returned. Many conjectures were made respecting their fate; and historians have concluded that Bergen possibly,[1217] and certainly Montigny, came to their end by violence.[1218] But, in the want of evidence, it was only conjecture, while the greatest discrepancy has prevailed in regard to details. It is not till very recently that the veil has been withdrawn through the access that has been given to the Archives of Simancas, that dread repository, in which the secrets of the Castilian kings have been buried for ages. Independently of the interest attaching to the circumstances of the present narrative, it is of great importance for the light it throws on the dark, unscrupulous policy of Philip the Second. It has, moreover, the merit of resting on the most authentic grounds of the correspondence of the king and his ministers.

Both envoys were men of the highest consideration. The marquis of Bergen, by his rank and fortune, was in the first class of the Flemish aristocracy.[1219] Montigny was of the ancient house of the Montmorencys, being a younger brother of the unfortunate Count Hoorne. At the time of Charles the Fifth's abdication he had the honor of being selected by the emperor as one of those Flemish nobles who were to escort him to his monastic residence in Spain. He occupied several important posts,—among others, that of governor of Tournay,—and, like Bergen, was a knight of the Golden Fleece. In the political disturbances of the time, although not placed in the front of disaffection, the two lords had taken part with the discontented faction, had joined in the war upon Granvelle, and had very generally disapproved of the policy of the crown. They had, especially, raised their voices against the system of religious persecution, with a manly independence which had{379} secured for them—it seems undeservedly—the reputation of being the advocates of religious reform. This was particularly the case with Bergen, who, to one that asked how heretics should be dealt with, replied, "If they were willing to be converted, I would not trouble them. If they refused, still I would not take their lives, as they might hereafter be converted." This saying, duly reported to the ears of Philip, was doubtless treasured up against the man who had the courage to utter it.[1220]

The purpose of their embassy was to urge on the king the necessity of a more liberal and lenient policy, to which Margaret, who had not yet broken with the nobles, was herself inclined. It was not strange that the two lords should have felt the utmost reluctance to undertake a mission which was to bring them so directly within the power of the monarch whom they knew they had offended, and who, as they also knew, was not apt to forgive an offence. True, Egmont had gone on a similar mission to Madrid, and returned uninjured to Brussels. But it was at an earlier period, when the aspect of things was not so dangerous. His time had not yet come.

It was not till after much delay that the other nobles, with the regent, prevailed on Bergen and Montigny to accept the trust, by urging on them its absolute importance for assuring the tranquillity of the country. Even then, an injury which confined the marquis some weeks to his house furnished him with a plausible excuse for not performing his engagement, of which he would gladly have availed himself. But his scruples again vanished before the arguments and entreaties of his friends; and he consented to follow, as he could not accompany, Montigny.

The latter reached Madrid towards the middle of June, 1566, was graciously received by the king, and was admitted to repeated audiences, at which he did not fail to urge the remedial measures countenanced by Margaret. Philip appeared to listen with complacency; but declined giving an answer till the arrival of the other ambassador, who, having already set out on his journey, was attacked, on his way through France, by a fever. There Bergen halted, and again thought of abandoning the expedition. His good genius seemed ever willing to interpose to save him. But his evil genius, in the shape of Philip, who wrote to him, in the most condescending terms, to hasten his journey, beckoned him to Madrid.[1221]

Besides the two envoys there was another person of consequence from the Low Countries at that time in the capital,—Simon Renard, once Charles's minister at the English court, the inexorable foe of Granvelle. He had been persuaded by Philip to come to Spain, although to do so, he knew, was to put himself on trial for his manifold offences against the government. He was arrested; proceedings were commenced against him; and he was released only by an illness which terminated in his death. There seems to have been a mysterious fascination possessed by Philip, that he could thus draw within his reach the very men whom every motive of self-preservation should have kept at an immeasurable distance.

The arrival of the marquis did not expedite the business of the mission. Unfortunately, about that period news came to Madrid of the outbreak of the iconoclasts, exciting not merely in Spain, but throughout Christendom, feelings of horror and indignation. There was no longer a question as to a more temperate policy. The only thought now was of vengeance. It was in vain that the Flemish envoys interposed to mitigate the king's anger, and turn him{380} from those violent measures which must bring ruin on the country. Their remonstrances were unheeded. They found access to his person by no means so easy a thing as before. They felt that somewhat of the odium of the late transactions attached to them. Even the courtiers, with the ready instinct that detects a sovereign's frown, grew cold in their deportment. The situation of the envoys became every day more uncomfortable. Their mission was obviously at an end, and all they now asked was leave to return to the Netherlands.

But the king had no mind to grant it. He had been long since advised by Granvelle, and others in whom he trusted, that both the nobles had taken a decided part in fostering the troubles of the country.[1222] To that country they were never to return. Philip told them he had need of their presence for some time longer, to advise with him on the critical state of affairs in Flanders. So thin a veil could not impose on them, and they were idled with the most serious apprehensions. They wrote to Margaret, begging her to request the king to dismiss them; otherwise they should have good cause to complain both of her and of the nobles, who had sent them on a mission from which they would gladly have been excused.[1223] But Margaret had already written to her brother to keep them in Spain until the troubles in Flanders should be ended.[1224] On the reception of the letter of her envoys, however, she replied that she had already written to the king to request leave for them to return.[1225] I have found no record of such a letter.

In the spring of 1567, the duke of Alva was sent to take command of the Netherlands. Such an appointment, at such a crisis, plainly intimated the course to be pursued, and the host of evils it would soon bring on the devoted country. The conviction of this was too much for Bergen, heightened as his distress was by his separation, at such a moment, from all that was most dear to him on earth. He fell ill of a fever, and grew rapidly worse, till at length, it was reported to Philip that there was no chance for his recovery unless he were allowed to return to his native land.[1226]