Holland: The History of the Netherlands

by Thomas Colley Grattan

The king resolved to leave the authority in the hands of this incongruous mixture, until the arrival of Don John of Austria, his natural brother, whom he had already named to the office of governor-general. But in the interval the government assumed an aspect of unprecedented disorder; and widespread anarchy embraced the whole country. The royal troops openly revolted, and fought against each other like deadly enemies. The nobles, divided in their views, arrogated to themselves in different places the titles and powers of command. Public faith and private probity seemed alike destroyed. Pillage, violence and ferocity were the commonplace characteristics of the times.

Circumstances like these may be well supposed to have revived the hopes of the Prince of Orange, who quickly saw amid this chaos the elements of order, strength, and liberty. Such had been his previous affliction at the harrowing events which he witnessed and despaired of being able to relieve, that he had proposed to the patriots of Holland and Zealand to destroy the dikes, submerge the whole country, and abandon to the waves the soil which refused security to freedom. But Providence destined him to be the savior, instead of the destroyer, of his country. The chief motive of this excessive desperation had been the apparent desertion by Queen Elizabeth of the cause which she had hitherto so mainly assisted. Offended at the capture of some English ships by the Dutch, who asserted that they carried supplies for the Spaniards, she withdrew from them her protection; but by timely submission they appeased her wrath; and it is thought by some historians that even thus early the Prince of Orange proposed to place the revolted provinces wholly under her protection. This, however, she for the time refused; but she strongly solicited Philip's mercy for these unfortunate countries, through the Spanish ambassador at her court.

In the meantime the council of state at Brussels seemed disposed to follow up as far as possible the plans of Requesens. The siege of Zuriczee was continued; but speedy dissensions among the members of the government rendered their authority contemptible, if not utterly extinct, in the eyes of the people. The exhaustion of the treasury deprived them of all power to put an end to the mutinous excesses of the Spanish troops, and the latter carried their licentiousness to the utmost bounds. Zuriczee, admitted to a surrender, and saved from pillage by the payment of a large sum, was lost to the royalists within three months, from the want of discipline in its garrison; and the towns and burghs of Brabant suffered as much from the excesses of their nominal protectors as could have been inflicted by the enemy. The mutineers at length, to the number of some thousands, attacked and carried by force the town of Alost, at equal distances between Brussels, Ghent, and Antwerp, imprisoned the chief citizens, and levied contributions on all the country round. It was then that the council of state found itself forced to proclaim them rebels, traitors, and enemies to the king and the country, and called on all loyal subjects to pursue and exterminate them wherever they were found in arms.

This proscription of the Spanish mutineers was followed by the convocation of the states-general, and the government thus hoped to maintain some show of union and some chance of authority. But a new scene of intestine violence completed the picture of executive inefficiency. On the 4th of September, the grand bailiff of Brabant, as lieutenant of the Baron de Hesse, governor of Brussels, entered the council chamber by force, and arrested all the members present, on suspicion of treacherously maintaining intelligence with the Spaniards. Counts Mansfield and Berlaimont were imprisoned, with some others. Viglius escaped this indignity by being absent froth indisposition. This bold measure was hailed by the people with unusual joy, as the signal for that total change in the government which they reckoned on as the prelude to complete freedom.

The states-general were all at this time assembled, with the exception of those of Flanders, who joined the others with but little delay. The general reprobation against the Spaniards procured a second decree of proscription; and their desperate conduct justified the utmost violence with which they might be pursued. They still held the citadels of Ghent and Antwerp, as well as Maestricht, which they had seized on, sacked, and pillaged with all the fury which a barbarous enemy inflicts on a town carried by assault. On the 3d of November, the other body of mutineers, in possession of Alost, marched to the support of their fellow brigands in the citadel of Antwerp; and both, simultaneously attacking this magnificent city, became masters of it in all points, in spite of a vigorous resistance on the part of the citizens. They then began a scene of rapine and destruction unequalled in the annals of these desperate wars. More than five hundred private mansions and the splendid town-house were delivered to the flames: seven thousand citizens perished by the sword or in the waters of the Scheldt. For three days the carnage and the pillage went on with unheard-of fury; and the most opulent town in Europe was thus reduced to ruin and desolation by a few thousand frantic ruffians. The loss was valued at above two million golden crowns. Vargas and Romero were the principal leaders of this infernal exploit; and De Roda gained a new title to his immortality of shame by standing forth as its apologist.

The states-general, assembled at Ghent, were solemnly opened on the 14th of September. Being apprehensive of a sudden attack from the Spanish troops in the citadel, they proposed a negotiation, and demanded a protecting force from the Prince of Orange, who immediately entered into a treaty with their envoy, and sent to their assistance eight companies of infantry and seventeen pieces of cannon, under the command of the English colonel, Temple. In the midst of this turmoil and apparent insecurity, the states-general proceeded in their great work, and assumed the reins of government in the name of the king. They allowed the council of state still nominally to exist, but they restricted its powers far within those it had hitherto exercised; and the government, thus absolutely assuming the form of a republic, issued manifestoes in justification of its conduct, and demanded succor from all the foreign powers. To complete the union between the various provinces, it was resolved to resume the negotiations commenced the preceding year at Breda; and the 10th of October was fixed for this new congress to be held in the town-house of Ghent.

On the day appointed, the congress opened its sittings; and rapidly arriving at the termination of its important object, the celebrated treaty known by the title of "The Pacification of Ghent" was published on the 8th of November, to the sound of bells and trumpets; while the ceremony was rendered still more imposing by the thunder of the artillery which battered the walls of the besieged citadel. It was even intended to have delivered a general assault against the place at the moment of the proclamation; but the mutineers demanded a capitulation and finally surrendered three days afterward. It was the wife of the famous Mondragon who commanded the place in her husband's absence; and by her heroism gave a new proof of the capability of the sex to surpass the limits which nature seems to have fixed for their conduct.

The Pacification contained twenty-five articles. Among others, it was agreed:

That a full amnesty should be passed for all offences whatsoever.

That the estates of Brabant, Flanders, Hainault, Artois, and others, on the one part; the Prince of Orange, and the states of Holland and Zealand and their associates, on the other; promised to maintain good faith, peace, and friendship, firm and inviolable; to mutually assist each other, at all times, in council and action; and to employ life and fortune, above all things, to expel from the country the Spanish soldiers and other foreigners.