I had to undertake a second journey to Blois, on behalf of your Imperial Majesty’s sister the Queen of France (Elizabeth), and this has prevented my writing again as soon as usual, for I was hoping from day to day that my business would be settled one way or the other, and I should be free to depart. In this I was disappointed, and being unable to leave unfinished this business, which is of material importance to the Queen, I came at last to the conclusion that I must contrive to despatch a letter from here; and this I am now doing. When I was admitted to the King on the business to which I alluded, I took the opportunity of delivering to him your Imperial Majesty’s despatches; the few words with which I introduced the subject were to the effect, that your Imperial Majesty had heard on good authority that he was a party to his brother’s[114] (Alençon’s) expedition into the Netherlands, and that your Imperial Majesty did not believe the statement; but that, if it was true, such interference seriously affected the interests of your Majesty and the Electors of the Empire and could not be tolerated, as he would learn at greater length from your Imperial Majesty’s own letter. To this the King answered that he had no connection with his brother’s proceedings, as might be shown from the fact that the mischief done in the Netherlands was small in comparison to what it would have been if his brother had had his support in his late campaign. His brother, he added, [142]was not in the habit of asking or taking his advice; besides, he was now causing more noise than harm; nay, if there was any ground of complaint it affected rather himself and his subjects, who had for months been harassed and plundered by his brother’s soldiers,[115] while the farmers of the Netherlands were left unscathed; he would see what your Majesty wrote, and would send a reply.
I refrained from answering at greater length, and in sharper language, out of regard to the Queen’s interest, which does not allow of my lightly incurring the displeasure of the French court. The King’s reply will reach your Majesty at the same time as this letter.
March 25, 1582.[116]
LETTER II.
There is now no doubt of the Prince of Orange being alive and well; but his wife[117] has died of an attack of pleurisy. The Prince was at death’s door through the bursting of the maxillary vein; the loss of blood was very great, and there seemed no possibility of stopping [143]it, so that his life was despaired of. For thirty-six hours he held the wound together, but fresh relays of attendants were needed from time to time to prop up his elbow with the hand, or otherwise he would have been unequal to the exertion.
The Queen of England is said to have supplied Alençon with a large sum of money, namely, 300,000 crowns. It is also said that a bill has been laid before the States-General proposing, if they accept him as their Sovereign, to grant him one-fifth of their property towards the expenses of the war. If this be carried, it will produce a very considerable sum, sufficient to feed the war for a long time. The Prince of Parma is besieging Oudenarde and battering its walls with cannon; but the garrison are said to have sent word to Alençon that he need fear nothing on their account for the next two months. Meanwhile, by the capture of Alost, which is now in Alençon’s hands, a serious loss has been inflicted on the Prince of Parma, who derived many great advantages from the possession of the town. In it some gallant soldiers were slaughtered, who preferred a glorious death to the dishonour of surrender.
Fifteen hundred German troopers, hired by Alençon, are reported to be not far from Cambrai, with more to follow. They are joined by many Frenchmen, apart from those who are already in the Netherlands, and they are numerous. Apparently it is Alençon’s purpose to make the Prince of Parma abandon the siege of Oudenarde by laying waste Hainault or Artois.
I hear Alençon has also sent emissaries into Italy to hire horsemen as big as the Albanians.[118]
May 30, 1582.