On the very day of the Parma wedding, while the princely couple were being united with the full magnificence of the rites of the Catholic Church, twenty gentlemen of the Reformed Faith gathered in the house of Count Culemburg on the horse market and listened to the preaching of a famous Huguenot, Francis Junius, the pastor of a secret congregation at Antwerp. This man, young, brave, eloquent, already in hiding, combined with Louis of Nassau to draw up a petition or protest to the Government on the ever-important subject of the Edicts.
So came in the first stormy months of the year 1566.
The price of grain rose to hitherto unheard-of figures, for the ground was untilled, the harvests unsown; all business with foreign lands was at a standstill, for no stranger would venture into a country which lay under such a ban, nor trust their goods in Dutch ports. Industry was paralysed; the great busy cities, formerly some of the finest and busiest in the world, were silent, deserted, and desolate under the monstrous tyranny which had overwhelmed them.
The Inquisitors-General, De Bay and Tiletanus, had received personal letters of encouragement from the King; Peter Titelmann too received the Royal praise; and the three continued their work of horror and terror, agony and blood.
Towards the beginning of the year Berghen resigned his posts, pleading his inability to obey His Majesty in the matter of religion; Meghem soon followed his example; Egmont lamented that he had not resigned all his offices when in Spain—"As he would have done," he declared, "had he known what His Majesty's intentions were."
He, however, maintained his official position, and continued to behave with severity against the heretics in Flanders; so he vacillated, pleasing neither the nobles nor the Regent, neither of whom dared rely on him.
William addressed a letter of remonstrance and protest to the Duchess, plainly avowing his views, pointing to the state of the land, and condemning the policy of the King.
Margaret, in despair, wrote to Philip, putting all these things before him, and beseeching him to reconsider the decision with regard to the Inquisition.
Philip did not answer, and William of Orange, who did not lack spies in Madrid, knew why: the King was preparing the levies with which Alva was to try his hand at bringing the rebellious Netherlands to subjection.
But if Philip was making busy preparations in secret, William was not inactive; still hoping by calm and patience to avert the worst of the disaster that still threatened—the arrival, namely, of Alva's army—he summoned a meeting of the nobles and grandees at Breda, and in a series of conferences, disguised as hunting parties, endeavoured to bring all to concur in some reasonable petition to be presented to the Regent, the main scope of which was to be an appeal for the convocation of the States-General.