History of the United Netherlands, 1605-07 | Page 2

of the palace whose soul was absorbed by
his own private robberies, were almost too much for human strength.
On his return to the Netherlands Spinola fell dangerously ill in Genoa.
Meantime, during his absence and the enforced idleness of the Catholic
armies, there was an opportunity for the republicans to act with
promptness and vigour. They displayed neither quality. Never had there
been so much sluggishness as in the preparations for the campaign of
1606. The States' exchequer was lower than it had been for years. The
republic was without friends. Left to fight their battle for national
existence alone, the Hollanders found themselves perpetually subjected
to hostile censure from their late allies, and to friendly advice still more
intolerable. There were many brave Englishmen and Frenchmen
sharing in the fatigues of the Dutch war of independence, but the
governments of Henry and of James were as protective, as severely
virtuous, as offensive, and, in their secret intrigues with the other
belligerent, as mischievous as it was possible for the best-intentioned
neutrals to be.
The fame and the popularity of the stadholder had been diminished by
the results of the past campaign. The States-General were disappointed,
dissatisfied, and inclined to censure very unreasonably the public
servant who had always obeyed their decrees with docility. While
Henry IV. was rapidly transferring his admiration from Maurice to
Spinola, the disagreements at home between the Advocate and the
Stadholder were becoming portentous.
There was a want of means and of soldiers for the new campaign.
Certain causes were operating in Europe to the disadvantage of both
belligerents. In the south, Venice had almost drawn her sword against
the pope in her settled resolution to put down the Jesuits and to clip the
wings of the church party, before, with bequests and donations, votive
churches and magnificent monasteries, four-fifths of the domains of the
republic should fall into mortmain, as was already the case in Brabant.
Naturally there was a contest between the ex-Huguenot, now eldest son
of the Church, and the most Catholic king, as to who should soonest
defend the pope. Henry offered thorough protection to his Holiness, but
only under condition that he should have a monopoly of that protection.
He lifted his sword, but meantime it was doubtful whether the blow
was to descend upon Venice or upon Spain. The Spanish levies, on

their way to the Netherlands, were detained in Italy by this new
exigency. The States-General offered the sister republic their maritime
assistance, and notwithstanding their own immense difficulties, stood
ready to send a fleet to the Mediterranean. The offer was gratefully
declined, and the quarrel with the pope arranged, but the incident laid
the foundation of a lasting friendship between the only two important
republics then existing. The issue of the Gunpowder Plot, at the close
of the preceding year, had confirmed James in his distaste for Jesuits,
and had effected that which all the eloquence of the States-General and
their ambassador had failed to accomplish, the prohibition of Spanish
enlistments in his kingdom. Guido Fawkes had served under the
archduke in Flanders.
Here then were delays additional to that caused by Spinola's illness. On
the other hand, the levies of the republic were for a season paralysed by
the altercation, soon afterwards adjusted, between Henry IV. and the
Duke of Bouillon, brother-in-law of the stadholder and of the Palatine,
and by the petty war between the Duke and Hanseatic city of
Brunswick, in which Ernest of Nassau was for a time employed.
During this period of almost suspended animation the war gave no
signs of life, except in a few spasmodic efforts on the part of the
irrepressible Du Terrail. Early in the spring, not satisfied with his
double and disastrous repulse before Bergen-op-Zoom, that partisan
now determined to surprise Sluy's. That an attack was impending
became known to the governor of that city, the experienced Colonel
Van der Noot. Not dreaming, however, that any mortal--even the most
audacious of Frenchmen and adventurers--would ever think of carrying
a city like Sluy's by surprise, defended as it was by a splendid citadel
and by a whole chain of forts and water-batteries, and capable of
withstanding three months long, as it had so recently done, a siege in
form by the acknowledged master of the beleaguering science, the
methodical governor event calmly to bed one fine night in June. His
slumbers were disturbed before morning by the sound of trumpets
sounding Spanish melodies in the streets, and by a, great uproar and
shouting. Springing out of bed, he rushed half-dressed to the rescue.
Less vigilant than Paul Bax had been the year before in Bergen, he
found that Du Terrail had really effected a surprise. At the head of
twelve hundred Walloons and Irishmen, that enterprising officer had

waded