violence into measures of self-protection, they had already secured
friends in a certain country. The Duchess, probably astonished at the
frankness of this statement, is said to have demanded further
explanations. The confederates replied by observing that they had
resources both in the provinces and in Germany. The state council
decided that to accept the propositions of the confederates would be to
establish a triumvirate at once, and the Duchess wrote to her brother
distinctly advising against the acceptance of the proposal. The assembly
at St. Trond was then dissolved, having made violent demonstrations which
were not followed by beneficial results, and having laid itself open to
various suspicions, most of which were ill-founded, while some of them
were just.

Before giving the reader a brief account of the open and the secret
policy pursued by the government at Brussels and Madrid, in consequence
of these transactions, it is now necessary to allude to a startling
series of events, which at this point added to the complications of the
times, and exercised a fatal influence upon the situation of the
commonwealth.




1566 [CHAPTER VII.]

Ecclesiastical architecture in the Netherlands--The image-breaking--
Description of Antwerp Cathedral--Ceremony of the Ommegang--
Precursory disturbances--Iconoclasts at Antwerp--Incidents of the
image--breaking in various cities--Events at Tournay--Preaching of
Wille--Disturbance by a little boy--Churches sacked at Tournay--