60 



WILLIAM I. (OF ORANGE). 



took the field against Alva. He publicly professed 

 the Protestant religion, and received aid in money 

 and troops from several Protestant princes. With 

 the army, which he had raised, his brothers Louis 

 and Adolphus invaded Friesland. At first, they 

 defeated, at Heiligerlee, in GrOningen, the Spanish 

 general, John of Ligne, count of Aremberg, who 

 fell in the engagement ; but Adolphus also lost his 

 life ; and, as count Louis wanted money to pay his 

 troops, he was soon after beaten by Alva at Jem- 

 iningen, July 21, 1568. William now raised a new 

 army of 24,000 Germans, who were joined by 4000 

 French soldiers, and declared publicly that Alva 

 and his council of blood (conseil des troubles'), in 

 Brussels, were the cause of the war. He conducted 

 his forces, with great skill, across the Rhine and 

 Meuse, entered Brabant, and defeated a division of 

 the hostile army, but was unable to bring the duke 

 of Alva, who threw himself into the fortresses, to 

 an engagement, or to excite the people, who trem- 

 bled before the Spaniards, to a general insurrection : 

 on the contrary, he was obliged to sell his plate 

 and baggage, and even pledge his principality of 

 Orange to pay his arrears to his officers and soldiers. 

 His army now dispersed. He himself, with 1200 

 cavalry, and his brothers, repaired to the duke of 

 Deux Fonts, and took part in his expedition to 

 France, against the Catholic party of the Guises. 

 In this expedition, he distinguished himself in seve- 

 ral battles and sieges, but, after the unhappy ter- 

 mination of the campaign, returned to Germany. 

 In France, admiral Coligny had advised him to fit 

 out privateers against the Spanish, and establish 

 himself particularly in Zealand and Holland, from 

 which the Spaniards would hardly be able to drive 

 him. The prince followed this advice, and the pri- 

 vateers made themselves masters, in 1572, of the 

 town and harbour of Briel, on the island of Voorn, 

 and also took Flushing. As Alva's tyranny became 

 more intolerable, and the people were exasperated 

 by new exactions, several cities of Holland, Zealand, 

 Overyssel and Gueldres publicly declared for the 

 prince of Orange. To relieve his brother Louis, 

 besieged by Alva at Bergen, in Hainault, he enter- 

 ed Brabant with 17,000 men, where Mechlin and 

 Louvaid threw open their gates to him ; but the 

 French auxiliaries, sent him by Coligny, were de- 

 feated, and he himself could not compel Alva, who 

 had stationed his forces in an entrenched camp, to 

 an engagement. He therefore retired, not without 

 loss, to the Rhine, and narrowly escaped the danger 

 of being captured by 1000 Spaniards, who broke by 

 night into his camp. A little dog waked him in 

 time to assemble his soldiers, and cut off the retreat 

 of the enemy. He next proceeded to Utrecht and 

 Zealand, where the Dutch privateers had appointed 

 him their admiral. In 1575, the states of Holland 

 conferred on him the sovereignty and chief com- 

 mand, for the time that the war with Spain should 

 last; and the example was followed by Zealand, 

 and afterwards by Utrecht, Gueldres and Overyssel. 

 This trust was renewed in 1581. Some days before 

 they openly announced their defection from Spain, 

 the states did homage to the prince as their sove- 

 reign, and took the oath of allegiance. This sove- 

 reignty, however, was merely personal; but, in 

 1582, the grant of the hereditary dignity of the old 

 counts of Holland, to which was annexed the pos- 

 session of their domains, was made him by the 

 states, and formally accepted. The prince was de- 

 serving of this confidence. He had already, in 1573, 

 equipped a fleet of 150 sail at Flushing. " This fleet 



was always superior to the Spanish, so that it may 

 be truly said, that the Dutch achieved their free, 

 dom on the ocean. After Alva and the prince had 

 each taken several cities, Louis of Zuniga and Re- 

 quesens succeeded the duke in 1573, and, April 14, 

 1574, defeated Louis and Henry of Nassau, the 

 brothers of the prince, who both fell on the field 

 of battle. William raised the siege of Lrydcn by 

 breaking down the dikes. Zuniga soon alter died ; 

 but the Spanish soldiers at Antwerp and other 

 places committed such outrages, that all the pro- 

 vinces of the Low Countries, excepting Luxem- 

 burg, united at Ghent, in 1576, to expel the foreign 

 troops, and relieve themselves from religious re- 

 straints; and when the new st ad t holder, John of Aus- 

 tria, a natural brother of the king, violated the pri- 

 vileges granted them by the edict of 1577, the states 

 of Antwerp called the prince of Orange to their 

 aid. The people received him with acclamations in 

 Brussels, where a part of the estates offered him 

 the stadtholdership. But as several nobles were 

 opposed to him, he effected the adoption of a reso- 

 lution that Matthew of Austria should be received 

 as stadtholder, while he himself should have the 

 rank of lieutenant-general ; but he retained the 

 management of all public business. Meanwhile, by 

 the victory at Gemblours, January 31, 1578, the 

 Spaniards recovered their superiority in the Wal- 

 loon provinces, which were zealously Catholic. 

 The new stadtholder, Alexander Farnese of Parma, 

 appointed by the king after the sudden death of 

 John, was a politic general, who knew how to win 

 the favour of the Belgians, dissatisfied with the 

 religious peace, or the political equality of the two 

 churches, and converted to the Spanish interest the 

 nobles, who were disaffected towards the prince ol 

 Orange. The prince, therefore, brought the seven 

 northern provinces into closer connexion, by the 

 union of Utrecht, January 23, 1579, and thus laid 

 the foundation of the republic of the United Ne- 

 therlands. The negotiations for peace at Cologne 

 having been fruitless, the states, at the proposal of 

 the prince, conferred the sovereignty, in 1580, on 

 Francis, duke of Anjou, brother of King Henry III. 

 of France, and on July 26, 1581, renounced their 

 allegiance to king Philip of Spain, as a tyrant. The 

 king had already declared the prince of Orange out- 

 lawed, as a " heretic and false Christian, another 

 Cain and Judas, a committer of sacrilege, a per- 

 jurer, an instigator of Ihe disturbances in the Ne- 

 therlands, and a real pest of human society," and 

 had set a price of 250,000 dollars on his Bead. 

 Whoever should deliver him, living or dead, into 

 the hands of the Spaniards, was to receive a pardon 

 for all crimes, and, with bis posterity, be raised to 

 the rank of nobility. The estates, in consequence, 

 gave their stadtholder a body-guard, and the prince 

 replied in a violent manifesto, in which he accused 

 the king of lust and murder, of the death of his 

 son don Carlos, and of his wife Elizabeth. Mean- 

 while, the duke of Parma took several fortified 

 places, but was obliged to raise the siege of Cam- 

 bray, when the duke of Anjou advanced with an 

 army. The French prince was hereupon proclaim- 

 ed duke of Brabant, March, 1682, on which occa- 

 sion the prince of Orange presented him the ducal 

 coronet, and publicly administered the oath, that 

 he would reign agreeably to the tenor of the com- 

 pact. This event took place in Antwerp, where 

 an attempt was soon after made to assassinate the 

 prince. A Spaniard, named Jaureguy, shot him 

 with a pistol : the ball entered under the right ear, 



