Book: The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 1 20

V >> Various >> The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 1 20




Apart from her political duty, as she understood it, and which meant the
upholding of the monarchy, Catherine was a true woman; kind to her
suite, faithful to her friends. She had none of the weaknesses of her
sex; she lived chaste amid the debauchery of the most licentious court
in Europe. The losses to art caused by the destructive Calvinists she
replaced by erecting noble buildings and beautifying Paris. But she had
the sense of royalty developed to the utmost; she defended it to the
extreme. In France the opposition was always Protestant. It was her
enemy, the enemy of the crown, the arch-enemy of France. It is laid to
her charge that she coquetted with the Huguenots, whom she afterward
slew. This there is no denying; she had but her craft with which to
oppose the Guise faction, the various court cliques, and the Huguenots
themselves.

An expert at the game, she played one piece against another, skilfully
avoiding the checkmate. Pawns might be lost, bishops fall to her hand,
knights be unhorsed, but her king was secured. She could only triumph by
cunning.

A state cannot be governed by the same rule of morality as that which
should govern individual conduct; it is impossible that it should be so.
Professor Saintsbury says: "Every cool-headed student of history and
ethics will admit that it was precisely the abuse of the principle at
this time, and by the persons of whom Catherine de' Medici, if not the
most blamable, _has had the most blame put on her_, that brought the
principle itself into discredit."[1]

[1] The author, not Professor Saintsbury, is responsible for the
Italics.

Casimir Perier, the noted French statesman, wrote, "All power is a
permanent conspiracy." This is as true to-day in republican America as
it was at that time in monarchical France. And it was not religion, as
such, that led to the horrible scenes of that fatal August 24th; it was
a move in the game of politics. Protestantism spelt republicanism; to
one raised as Catherine had been, taught her life through by bitter
experience, any means available, any course adopted, was righteous if it
answered the purpose of saving the realm.

Research into this period will amply repay the explorer with enlarged
ideas of its meaning and its issues. Of the Queen-mother "naught
extenuate nor aught set down in malice." Catherine compares more than
favorably with Marie de' Medici, whom history has painted in brighter
hue. Bigotry has blasted the name of one who for her time was at least
the equal of any ruler in Europe.




HEROIC AGE OF THE NETHERLANDS

SIEGE OF LEYDEN

A.D. 1573

THOMAS HENRY DYER


Events followed one another rapidly after the rising of the
Netherlanders in 1566. The organization of the Gueux ("beggars"),
the league of noblemen pledged to resist the introduction of the
Inquisition into the Low Countries by Philip II of Spain, had shown
itself prepared for extreme action in self-defence. The name Gueux,
first used in contempt, was borne in honor by the patriots in the
ensuing war, which Philip conducted as a "war of extermination."

In 1567 the Duke of Alva, a famous veteran of the wars of Charles V
and of Philip, was sent to the Netherlands as governor, where his
cruelties soon made him notorious. He established the court known as
the Council of Blood, which first sat in September, 1567. In less
than three months this tribunal put to death eighteen hundred
persons, including Horn, Egmont, and other eminent patriots. As many
as one hundred thousand of the population are said to have emigrated
at this time to England.

William of Orange, the great leader of the Netherlanders, refused to
appear before the Council of Blood. He had resigned his offices,
civil and military, and now retired to Dillenburg, still proclaiming
his adhesion to the Protestant faith. But in 1568 he gathered two
armies. Alva destroyed one of them, and the other was disbanded. In
1570 William issued letters of marque to seamen who were nicknamed
"Sea Beggars," and bore a prominent part in the war of independence.
In 1572 they captured Briel. That year Mons was captured by Louis of
Nassau, William's brother, but in September it was retaken by Alva.
In Dyer's narrative the subsequent course of events, to the
Pacification of Ghent, is clearly and succinctly traced.


Soon after the capture of Mons, Alva went to Brussels and left the
conduct of the war to his son, Frederick de Toledo. Zutphen and Naarden
successively yielded to Frederick's arms, and became the scenes of the
most detestable violence. Alva ordered his son not to leave a single man
alive in Zutphen, and to burn down all the houses--commands which were
almost literally obeyed. The treatment of Naarden was still more
revolting. The town had capitulated, and Don Julian Romero, an officer
of Don Frederick's, had pledged his word that the lives and property of
the inhabitants should be respected. Romero then entered the town with
some five hundred musketeers, for whom the citizens provided a sumptuous
feast; and he summoned the inhabitants to assemble in the Gast Huis
Church, then used as a town hall. More than five hundred of them had
entered the church when a priest, suddenly rushing in, bade them prepare
for death. Scarcely had the announcement been made when a band of
Spanish soldiers entered and, after discharging a volley into the
defenceless crowd, attacked them sword in hand. The church was then
fired and the dead and dying consumed together.

But these cruelties only steeled the Hollanders to a more obstinate
resistance; nor must it be concealed that in these _plusquam civilia
bella_, where civil hatred was still further embittered by sectarian
malignancy, the Dutch sometimes displayed as much savageness as their
adversaries. Thus, during the struggle in Zealand, a surgeon at Veer cut
out the heart of a Spanish prisoner, and, fixing it on the prow of a
vessel, invited his fellow-townsmen to fix their teeth in it, an
invitation with which many complied.

The war was continued during the winter (1572-1573). In December the
Spaniards marched to attack a fleet frozen up near Amsterdam. It was
defended by a body of Dutch musketeers on skates, who, by the superior
skill of their evolutions, drove the enemy back and killed great numbers
of them. In consequence of this extraordinary combat, Alva ordered seven
thousand pairs of skates, and directed his soldiers to be instructed in
their use. Siege was then laid to Haarlem, which town, warned by the
fate of Zutphen and Naarden, made a defence that astonished all Europe.
A corps of three hundred respectable women, armed with musket, sword,
and dagger, and led by Kenan Hasselaer, a widow lady of distinguished
family, about forty-seven years of age, enrolled themselves among its
defenders, and partook in some of the most fiercely contested actions.
Battles took place upon Haarlem Lake, on which the Prince of Orange had
more than a hundred sail of various kinds; till at length Bossu, whose
vessels were larger, though less numerous, entirely defeated the
Hollanders, and swept the lake in triumph (May 28, 1573). The siege had
lasted seven months, and Frederick de Toledo, who had lost a great part
of his army by hunger, cold, and pestilence, was inclined to abandon the
enterprise; but he was kept to it by the threats of his father, and on
the 12th of July Haarlem surrendered. Don Frederick had written a letter
solemnly assuring the besieged that no punishment should be inflicted
except on those who deserved it in the opinion of the citizens
themselves, yet he was in possession of strict orders from his father to
put to death the whole garrison, except the Germans, and also to execute
a large number of the inhabitants. Between two and three thousand were
slaughtered; three hundred were drowned in the lake tied by twos back to
back.

The resistance of Haarlem and other places determined Alva to try what
might be done by an affectation of clemency; and on the 26th of July he
issued a proclamation in which Philip was compared to a hen gathering
its chickens under the parental wing. But in the same breath his
subjects were admonished not to excite his rage, cruelty, and fury, and
they were threatened that if his gracious offers of mercy were
neglected, his majesty would strip bare and utterly depopulate the land,
and cause it to be again inhabited by strangers. So ludicrous a specimen
of paternal love was not calculated to excite much confidence in the
breasts of the Hollanders, and Alkmaar, the next town to which Don
Frederick laid siege, though defended only by eight hundred soldiers and
thirteen hundred citizens against sixteen thousand veterans, also
resolved to hold out to the last extremity. Enraged at this contempt of
what he called his clemency, at Haarlem, Alva resolved to make Alkmaar
an example of his cruelty, and he wrote to Philip that everyone in it
should be put to the sword. But the inhabitants made a heroic defence
and repulsed the besiegers in many a bloody assault; till at length the
superstitious Spaniards, believing that the place was defended by the
devil, whom they thought that the Protestants worshipped, refused to
mount to the attack, suffering themselves rather to be run through the
body by their officers; and Don Frederick, finding from an intercepted
letter that the Prince of Orange contemplated cutting the dikes and
flooding the country, in order to prevent the place from being
surrendered, raised the siege (October 8th) after it had lasted seven
weeks.

About this time William published his _Epistle in the form of
supplication to his Royal Majesty of Spain, from the Prince of Orange
and States of Holland and Zealand_, which produced a profound
impression. It demanded that the privileges of the country should be
restored, and insisted on the recall of the Duke of Alva, whose
atrocities were vigorously described and condemned. Orange, as
stadtholder, was now acting as the King's representative in Holland,
and gave all his orders in Philip's name. He had recently turned
Calvinist, and in October publicly joined the Church at Dort. It was
reserved for the two greatest princes of the age to alleviate by their
apostasy, which, however, approached more nearly than the orthodoxy of
their adversaries, the spirit of true Christianity, the evils inflicted
on society by a consistent but bloody-minded and intolerant bigotry.

The siege of Alkmaar was one of the last acts under Alva's auspices in
the Netherlands, and formed a fitting termination to his career. He had
himself solicited to be recalled, and in December, 1573, he was
superseded by Don Luis de Requesens, Grand Commander of St. Jago. In
fact, Philip had found this war of extermination too expensive for his
exhausted treasury. Alva boasted on his journey back that he had caused
eighteen thousand six hundred Netherlanders to be executed. He was well
received by Philip, but soon after his return was imprisoned along with
his son, Don Frederick; the latter for having seduced a maid of honor,
his father for recommending him not to marry his victim. Alva was,
however, subsequently released to undertake the conquest of Portugal.

Requesens, the new Governor, had been vice-admiral to Don John of
Austria, had distinguished himself at the battle of Lepanto, and had
subsequently governed the Milanese with reputation. He was mild and just
and more liberal than the generality of Spaniards, though inferior to
Alva in military talent. He attempted immediately after his arrival in
the Netherlands to bring about a peace through the mediation of St.
Aldegonde, but Orange was too suspicious to enter into it. Requesens put
down robbery and murder, but he was neither able to abrogate the Council
of Blood nor to alleviate the oppressive taxes. Philip had selected him
as governor of the Netherlands, as a pledge of the more conciliatory
policy which he had thought it prudent to adopt; yet Requesens' hands
were tied up with such injunctions as rendered all conciliation
hopeless, and he was instructed to bring forward no measures which had
not for their basis the maintenance of the King's absolute authority and
the prohibition of all worship except the Roman Catholic.

The Gueux de Mer were at this time most troublesome to the Spaniards, as
their small vessels enabled them to penetrate up the rivers and canals.
A naval action had been fought (October 11, 1573) on the Zuyder Zee
between Count Bossu, who had collected a considerable fleet at
Amsterdam, and the patriot admiral Dirkzoon, in which Bossu was
completely defeated and taken prisoner. One of the first acts of
Requesens was to send a fleet under Sancho Davila, Julian Romero, and
Admiral Glimes to the relief of Middelburg, which had been besieged by
the patriots upward of eighteen months and was now reduced to the last
extremity. Orange visited the Zealand fleet under the command of Louis
Boissot (January 20, 1574), and an action ensued a few days later, in
which the Spaniards were completely beaten. Requesens himself beheld the
action from the lofty dike of Schakerloo, where he stood all day in a
drenching rain; and Romero, who had escaped by jumping out of a
porthole, swam ashore and landed at the very feet of the Grand
Commander. The Hollanders and Zealanders were now masters of the coast,
but the Spaniards still held their ground in the interior of Holland.
After raising the siege of Alkmaar, they had invested Leyden and cut off
all communication between the Dutch cities.

The efforts of the patriots were less fortunate on land, where they were
no match for the Spanish generals and their veteran troops. It had been
arranged that Louis of Nassau should march out of Germany with an army
of newly levied recruits and form a junction with his brother William,
who was at Bommel on the Waal. Toward the end of February, 1574, Louis
encamped within four miles of Maestricht, with the design of taking that
town; but finding that he could not accomplish this object, and having
suffered some losses, he marched down the right bank of the Meuse to
join his brother. When, however, he arrived at Mook, a village on the
Meuse a few miles south of Nimwegen, he found himself intercepted by the
Spaniards under Davila, who, having outmarched him on the opposite bank,
had crossed the river at a lower point on a bridge of boats, and placed
himself directly in his path. There was now no alternative but to fight,
and battle was delivered on the following day on the heath of Mook, when
fortune declared against the patriots. The gallant Louis, seeing that
the day was lost, put himself at the head of a little band of troopers,
and, accompanied by his brother Henry, and Duke Christopher, son of the
Elector Palatine Frederick III, made a desperate charge in which they
all perished, and were never heard of more. The only effect of Louis'
invasion was to cause the Spaniards to raise the siege of Leyden; before
which place, however, they afterward again sat down (May 26th).

The defence of Leyden formed a worthy parallel to that of Haarlem and
Alkmaar, and acquired for the garrison and the inhabitants the respect
and admiration of all Europe. A modern historian has aptly observed that
this was the heroic age of Protestantism. Never have the virtues which
spring from true patriotism and sincere religious conviction been more
strikingly developed and displayed. Leyden was defended by John van der
Does, Lord of Nordwyck, a gentleman of distinguished family, but still
more distinguished by his learning and genius, and his Latin poetry
published under the name of Joannes Douza. The garrison of Leyden was
small, and it relied for its defence chiefly on the exertions of the
inhabitants. The revictualling of the city had been neglected after the
raising of the first siege, and at the end of June it became necessary
to put the inhabitants on short allowance; yet they held out more than
three months longer. Orange, whose head-quarters were at Delft and
Rotterdam, had no means of relieving Leyden except by breaking down the
dikes on the Meuse and the Yssel, and thus flooding the country, a step
which would involve the destruction of the growing crops, besides other
extraordinary expenses; yet he succeeded in obtaining the consent of the
Dutch States to this extreme and desperate measure. On the 3d of August
he superintended in person the rupture of the dikes on the Yssel; at the
same time the sluices of Rotterdam and Schiedam were opened; the flood
began to pour over the land, while the citizens of Leyden watched with
anxious eyes from the tower of Hengist the rising of the waters.

A flotilla of two hundred flat-bottomed vessels had been provided,
stored with provisions, and manned by two thousand five hundred veterans
under the command of Boissot. But unexpected obstacles arose. Fresh
dikes appeared above the water, and had to be cut through amid the
resistance of the Spaniards. Twice the waters receded under the
influence of the east wind, and left the fleet aground; twice it was
floated again, as if by a providential interposition, by violent gales
from the north and west, which accumulated on the coast the waters of
the ocean. Meanwhile the besieged were suffering all the extremities of
famine; the most disgusting garbage was used for food, and caused a
pestilence which carried off thousands. In this extremity a number of
the citizens surrounded the burgomaster, Adrian van der Werf, demanding
with loud threats and clamors that he should either provide them with
food or surrender the city to the enemy. To these menaces Adrian calmly
replied, "I have taken an oath that I will never put myself or my
fellow-citizens in the power of the cruel and perfidious Spaniards, and
I will rather die than violate it." Then drawing his sword he offered it
to the surrounding crowd and bade them plunge it in his bosom and devour
his flesh if such an action could relieve them from their direful
necessity. This extraordinary address filled the people with amazement
and admiration and inspired them with a new courage. Their constancy was
soon rewarded with deliverance. On the night of October 1st a fresh gale
set in from the northwest; the ocean rushed furiously through the ruined
dikes; the fleet had soon two feet of water, and sailed on their onward
course amid storm and darkness. They had still to contend with the
vessels of the enemy, and a naval battle was fought amid the boughs of
orchards and the chimney-stacks of houses. But this was the last attempt
at resistance on the part of the Spaniards. Appalled both by the
constancy of their adversaries and by the rising flood, which was
gradually driving them into a narrow circle, the Spaniards abandoned the
two remaining forts of Zoetermonde and Lammen, which still stood between
the fleet and the city. From the latter they fled in alarm at the noise
of the falling of a large portion of the town walls which had been
thrown down by the waters, and which in the darkness they luckily
mistook for some operation of their adversaries; otherwise they might
easily have entered and captured Leyden. The fleet of Boissot approached
the city on the morning of October 3d. After the pangs of hunger were
relieved the whole population repaired to church to return thanks to the
Almighty for their deliverance. On October 4th another providential gale
from the northeast assisted in clearing off the water from the land. In
commemoration of this remarkable defence, and as a reward for the
heroism of the citizens, was founded the University of Leyden, as well
as a ten days' annual fair, free from all tolls and taxes. During this
siege the Gueux had been again successful at sea. On May 30th Boissot
defeated between Lilloo and Kalloo a Spanish fleet, took the admiral and
three ships, and chased the rest into Antwerp.

The bankrupt state of Philip II's exchequer, and the reverses which his
arms had sustained, induced him to accept in the following year the
proffered mediation of the emperor Maximilian, which he had before
arrogantly rejected, and a congress was held at Breda from March till
June, 1575. But the insurgents were suspicious, and Philip was
inflexible; he could not be induced to dismiss his Spanish troops, to
allow the meeting of the States-General, or to admit the slightest
toleration in matters of religion; and the contest was therefore renewed
with more fury than ever. The situation of the patriots became very
critical when the enemy, by occupying the islands of Duyveland and
Schouwen, cut off the communication between Holland and Zealand,
especially as all hope of succor from England had expired. Toward the
close of the year envoys were despatched to solicit the aid of
Elizabeth, and to offer her, under certain conditions, the sovereignty
of Holland and Zealand. Requesens sent Champagny to counteract these
negotiations, which ended in nothing. The English Queen was afraid of
provoking the power of Spain, and could not even be induced to grant the
Hollanders a loan. The attitude assumed at that time by the Duke of
Alencon in France also prevented them from entering into any
negotiations with that Prince.

In these trying circumstances William the Silent displayed the greatest
firmness and courage. It was now that he is said to have contemplated
abandoning Holland and seeking with its inhabitants a home in the New
World, having first restored the country to its ancient state of a waste
of waters, a thought, however, which he probably never seriously
entertained, though he may have given utterance to it in a moment of
irritation or despondency. On June 12, 1575, William had married
Charlotte de Bourbon, daughter of the Duke of Montpensier. The Prince's
second wife, Anne of Saxony, had turned out a drunken, violent
character, and at length an intrigue which she formed with John Rubens,
an exiled magistrate of Antwerp, and father of the celebrated painter,
justified William in divorcing her. She subsequently became insane.
Charlotte de Bourbon had been brought up a Calvinist, but at a later
period, her father having joined the party of the persecutors, she took
refuge with the Elector Palatine, and it was under these circumstances
that she received the addresses of the Prince of Orange.

The unexpected death of Requesens, who expired of a fever, March 5,
1576, after a few days' illness, threw the government into confusion.
Philip II had given Requesens a _carte blanche_ to name his successor,
but the nature of his illness had prevented him from filling it up. The
government, therefore, devolved to the council of state, the members of
which were at variance with one another; but Philip found himself
obliged to intrust it _ad interim_ with the administration till a
successor to Requesens could be appointed. Count Mansfeld was made
commander-in-chief, but was totally unable to restrain the licentious
soldiery. The Spaniards, whose pay was in arrear, had now lost all
discipline. After the raising of the siege of Leyden they had beset
Utrecht and pillaged and maltreated the inhabitants, till Valdez
contrived to furnish their pay. No sooner had Requesens expired than
they broke into open mutiny and acted as if they were entire masters of
the country. After wandering about some time and threatening Brussels,
they seized and plundered Alost, where they established themselves;
and they were soon after joined by the Walloon and German troops. To
repress their violence, the council of state restored to the Netherlands
the arms of which they had been deprived, and called upon them by a
proclamation to repress force by force, but these citizen-soldiers were
dispersed with great slaughter by the disciplined troops in various
rencounters. Ghent, Utrecht, Valenciennes, Maestricht were taken and
plundered by the mutineers; and at last the storm fell upon Antwerp,
which the Spaniards entered early in November, and sacked during three
days. More than a thousand houses were burnt, eight thousand citizens
are said to have been slain, and enormous sums in ready money were
plundered. The whole damage was estimated at twenty-four million
florins. The horrible excesses committed in this sack procured for it
the name of the "Spanish Fury."

The government was at this period conducted in the name of the State of
Brabant. On September 5th De Heze, a young Brabant gentleman who was in
secret intelligence with the Prince of Orange, had, at the head of five
hundred soldiers, entered the palace where the council of state was
assembled, and seized and imprisoned the members. William, taking
advantage of the alarm created at Brussels by the sack of Antwerp,
persuaded the provisional government to summon the States-General,
although such a course was at direct variance with the commands of the
King. To this assembly all the provinces except Luxemburg sent deputies.
The nobles of the southern provinces, although they viewed the Prince of
Orange with suspicion, feeling that there was no security for them so
long as the Spanish troops remained in possession of Ghent, sought his
assistance in expelling them, which William consented to grant only on
condition that an alliance should be effected between the northern and
the southern, or Catholic, provinces of the Netherlands. This proposal
was agreed to, and toward the end of September Orange sent several
thousand men from Zealand to Ghent, at whose approach the Spaniards, who
had valorously defended themselves for two months under the conduct of
the wife of their absent general, Mondragon, surrendered and evacuated
the citadel. The proposed alliance was now converted into a formal
union, by the treaty called the Pacification of Ghent, signed November
8, 1576, by which it was agreed, without waiting for the sanction of
Philip, whose authority, however, was nominally recognized, to renew the
edict of banishment against the Spanish troops, to procure the
suspension of the decrees against the Protestant religion, to summon the
States-General of the northern and southern provinces, according to the
model of the assembly which had received the abdication of Charles V, to
provide for the toleration and practice of the Protestant religion in
Holland and Zealand, together with other provisions of a similar
character. About the same time with the Pacification of Ghent, all
Zealand, with the exception of the island of Tholen, was recovered from
the Spaniards.

Copyright (c) 2007. knowncrafts.net. All rights reserved.