The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1567 part 2 | Page 3

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