Spain; whither he had been sent upon a confidential mission by Madame de
Parma, is said to have made repeated communications to Egmont as to the
dangerous position in which he stood. Immediately after his arrival in
Brussels he had visited the Count, then confined to his house by an
injury caused by the fall of his horse. "Take care to get well very
fast," said De Billy, "for there are very bad stories told about you in
Spain." Egmont laughed heartily at the observation, as if, nothing could
well be more absurd than such a warning. His friend--for De Billy is
said to have felt a real attachment to the Count--persisted in his
prophecies, telling him that "birds in the field sang much more sweetly
than those in cages," and that he would do well to abandon the country
before the arrival of Alva.

These warnings were repeated almost daily by the same gentleman, and
by others, who were more and more astonished at Egmont's infatuation.
Nevertheless, he had disregarded their admonitions, and had gone forth
to meet the Duke at Tirlemont. Even then he might have seen, in the
coldness of his first reception, and in the disrespectful manner of the
Spanish soldiers, who not only did not at first salute him, but who
murmured audibly that he was a Lutheran and traitor, that he was not so
great a favorite with the government at Madrid as he desired to be.

After the first few moments, however, Alva's manner had changed, while
Chiappin Vitelli, Gabriel de Serbelloni, and other principal officers,
received the Count with great courtesy, even upon his first appearance.
The grand prior, Ferdinando de Toledo, natural son of the Duke, and
already a distinguished soldier, seems to have felt a warm and unaffected
friendship for Egmont, whose brilliant exploits in the field had excited
his youthful admiration, and of whose destruction he was, nevertheless,
compelled to be the unwilling instrument. For a few days, accordingly,