Oldenzaal and Lingen were captured. Gelderland, Overyssel and Drente
were entirely freed from the presence of the enemy. With the opening of
1598 Henry IV and Philip II entered upon negotiations for a peace. The
French king felt the necessity of a respite from war in order to
reorganise the resources of his country, exhausted by a long continuance
of civil strife; and Philip was ill and already feeling his end
approaching. The States strove hard to prevent what they regarded as
desertion, and two embassies were despatched to France and to England to
urge the maintenance of the alliance. Oldenbarneveldt himself headed the
French mission, but he failed to turn Henry from his purpose. A treaty
of peace between France and Spain was signed at Vervins, May 2, 1598.
Oldenbarneveldt went from Paris to England and was more successful.
Elizabeth bargained however for the repayment of her loan by annual
installments, and for armed assistance both by land and sea should an
attack be made by the Spaniards on England. The queen, however, made two
concessions. Henceforth only one English representative was to have a
seat in the Council of State; and all the English troops in the
Netherlands, including the garrisons of the cautionary towns, were to
take an oath of allegiance to the States.

This year saw the accomplishment of a project on which the Spanish king
had for some time set his heart--the marriage of the Cardinal Archduke
Albert to his cousin the Infanta Isabel Clara Eugenia, and the erection
of the Netherlands into an independent sovereignty under their joint
rule. Philip hoped in this way to provide suitably for a well-beloved
daughter and at the same time, by the grant of apparent independence to
the Netherland provinces, to secure their allegiance to the new
sovereigns. The use of the word "apparent" is justified, for provision
was made in the deed of cession that the Netherlands should revert to
the Spanish crown in case the union should prove childless; and there