[940] No two writers, of course, agree in the account of Alva's forces. The exact returns of the amount of the whole army, as well as of each company, and the name of the officer who commanded it, are to be found in the Documentos Inéditos (tom. IV. p. 382). From this it appears that the precise number of horse was 1,250, and that of the foot 8,800, making a total of 10,050.
[941] A poem in ottava rima, commemorating Alva's expedition, appeared at Antwerp the year following, from the pen of one Balthazar de Vargas. It has more value in a historical point of view than in a poetical one. A single stanza, which the bard devotes to the victualling of the army, will probably satisfy the appetite of the reader:—
"Y por que la Savoya es montañosa,
Y an de passar por ella las legiones,
Seria la passada trabajosa
Si a la gente faltassen provisiones,
El real comissario no reposa.
Haze llevar de Italia municiones
Tantas que proveyo todo el camino
Que jamas falto el pan, y carno, y vino."
[942] Ossorio, Albæ Vita, tom. II. p. 237.—Trillo, Rebelion y Guerras de Flandes, (Madrid, 1592,) fol. 17.—Leti, Vita di Filippo II., tom. I. p. 490.
[943] So say Schiller, (Abfall der Niederlande, s. 363,). Cabrera, (Filipe Segundo, lib. VII. cap. 15,) et auct. al. But every schoolboy knows that nothing is more unsettled than the route taken by Hannibal across the Alps. The two oldest authorities, Livy and Polybius, differ on the point, and it has remained a vexed question ever since,—the criticism of later years, indeed, leaning to still another route, that across the Little St. Bernard. The passage of Hannibal forms the subject of a curious discussion introduced into Gibbon's journal, when the young historian was in training for the mighty task of riper years. His reluctance, even at the close of his argument, to strike the balance, is singularly characteristic of his sceptical mind.
[944] "A suidar da quel nido di Demoni, le sceleraggini di tanti Appostati." Leti, Vita di Filippo II., tom. I. p. 487.
[945] The Huguenots even went so far as to attempt to engage the reformed in the Low Countries to join them in assaulting the duke in his march through Savoy. Their views were expressed in a work which circulated widely in the provinces, though it failed to rouse the people to throw off the Spanish yoke. Sec Vandervynckt, Troubles des Pays-Bas, tom. II. p. 194.
[946] Strada, De Bello Belgico, tom. I. pp. 350-354.—Ossorio, Albæ Vita, tom. II. p. 232 et seq.—Hechos de Sancho Davila, p. 26.—Trillo, Rebelion y Guerras de Flandes, fol. 16, 17.—Cabrera, Filipe Segundo, lib. VII. cap. 15.—Meteren, Hist. des Pays-Bas, fol. 52.—Lanario, Guerras de Flandes, fol. 15.—Renom de Francia, Alborotos de Flandes, MS.
Chronological accuracy was a thing altogether beneath the attention of a chronicler of the sixteenth century. In the confusion of dates in regard to Alva's movements, I have been guided as far as possible by his own despatches. See Documentos Inéditos, tom. IV. p. 349 et seq.
[947] Strada, De Bello Belgico, tom. I. p. 354.—Ossorio, Albæ Vita, tom. I. p. 241.