The duke of Parma, whose constitution was severely injured by the constant fatigues of war and the anxieties attending on the late transactions, had snatched a short interval for the purpose of recruiting his health at the waters of Spa. While at that place he received urgent orders from Philip to abandon for a while all his proceedings in the Netherlands, and to hasten into France with his whole disposable force, to assist the army of the League. The battle of Yvri (in which the son of the unfortunate Count Egmont met his death while fighting in the service of his father's royal murderer) had raised the prospects and hopes of Henry IV. to a high pitch; and Paris, which he closely besieged, was on the point of yielding to his arms. The duke of Parma received his uncle's orders with great repugnance; and lamented the necessity of leaving the field of his former exploits open to the enterprise and talents of Prince Maurice. He nevertheless obeyed; and leaving Count Mansfield at the head of the government, he conducted his troops against the royal opponent, who alone seemed fully worthy of coping with him.
The attention of all Europe was now fixed on the exciting spectacle of a contest between these two greatest captains of the age. The glory of success, the fruit of consummate skill, was gained by Alexander; who, by an admirable manoeuvre, got possession of the town of Lagny-sur-Seine, under the very eyes of Henry and his whole army, and thus acquired the means of providing Paris with everything requisite for its defence. The French monarch saw all his projects baffled, and his hopes frustrated; while his antagonist, having fully completed his object, drew off his army through Champagne, and made a fine retreat through an enemy's country, harassed at every step, but with scarcely any loss.
But while this expedition added greatly to the renown of the general, it considerably injured the cause of Spain in the Low Countries. Prince Maurice, taking prompt advantage of the absence of his great rival, had made himself master of several fortresses; and some Spanish regiments having mutinied against the commanders left behind by the duke of Parma, others, encouraged by the impunity they enjoyed, were ready on the slightest pretext to follow their example. Maurice did not lose a single opportunity of profiting by circumstances so favorable; and even after the return of Alexander he seized on Zutphen, Deventer, and Nimeguen, despite all the efforts of the Spanish army. The duke of Parma, daily breaking down under the progress of disease, and agitated by these reverses, repaired again to Spa, taking at once every possible means for the recruitment of his army and the recovery of his health, on which its discipline and the chances of success now so evidently depended.
But all his plans were again frustrated by a renewal of Philip's peremptory orders to march once more into France, to uphold the failing cause of the League against the intrepidity and talent of Henry IV. At this juncture the emperor Rodolf again offered his mediation between Spain and the United Provinces. But it was not likely that the confederated States, at the very moment when their cause began to triumph, and their commerce was every day becoming more and more flourishing, would consent to make any compromise with the tyranny they were at length in a fair way of crushing.
The duke of Parma again appeared in France in the beginning of the year 1592; and, having formed his communications with the army of the League, marched to the relief of the city of Rouen, at that period pressed to the last extremity by the Huguenot forces. After some sharp skirmishes—and one in particular, in which Henry IV. suffered his valor to lead him into a too rash exposure of his own and his army's safety—a series of manoeuvres took place, which displayed the talents of the rival generals in the most brilliant aspect. Alexander at length succeeded in raising the siege of Rouen, and made himself master of Condebec, which commanded the navigation of the Seine. Henry, taking advantage of what appeared an irreparable fault on the part of the duke, invested his army in the hazardous position he had chosen; but while believing that he had the whole of his enemies in his power, he found that Alexander had passed the Seine with his entire force—raising his military renown to the utmost possible height by a retreat which it was deemed utterly impossible to effect.
On his return to the Netherlands, the duke found himself again under the necessity of repairing to Spa, in search of some relief from the suffering which was considerably increased by the effects of a wound received in this last campaign. In spite of his shattered constitution, he maintained to the latest moment the most active endeavors for the reorganization of his army; and he was preparing for a new expedition into France, when, fortunately for the good cause in both countries, he was surprised by death on the 3d of December, 1592, at the abbey of St. Vaast, near Arras, at the age of forty-seven years. As it was hard to imagine that Philip would suffer anyone who had excited his jealousy to die a natural death, that of the duke of Parma was attributed to slow poison.
Alexander of Parma was certainly one of the most remarkable, and, it may be added, one of the greatest, characters of his day. Most historians have upheld him even higher perhaps than he should be placed on the scale; asserting that he can be reproached with very few of the vices of the age in which he lived. Others consider this judgment too favorable, and accuse him of participation in all the crimes of Philip, whom he served so zealously. His having excited the jealousy of the tyrant, or even had he been put to death by his orders, would little influence the question; for Philip was quite capable of ingratitude or murder, to either an accomplice or an opponent of his baseness. But even allowing that Alexander's fine qualities were sullied by his complicity in these odious measures, we must still in justice admit that they were too much in the spirit of the times, and particularly of the school in which he was trained; and while we lament that his political or private faults place him on so low a level, we must rank him as one of the very first masters in the art of war in his own or any other age.