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Rise of the Dutch Republic, the — Volume 14: 1568, part I by John Lothrop Motley
page 17 of 60 (28%)
that the crimes for which the Admiral and Egmont had been arrested, were
beyond the powers of the tribunal.

So much for the plea to the jurisdiction. It is hardly worth while to
look any further into proceedings which were initiated and brought to a
conclusion in the manner already narrated. Nevertheless, as they were
called a process, a single glance at the interior of that mass of
documents can hardly be superfluous.

The declaration against Count Horn; upon which, supported by invisible
witnesses, he was condemned, was in the nature of a narrative. It
consisted in a rehearsal of circumstances, some true and some fictitious,
with five inferences. These five inferences amounted to five crimes--
high treason, rebellion, conspiracy, misprision of treason, and breach of
trust. The proof of these crimes was evolved, in a dim and misty manner,
out of a purposely confused recital. No events, however, were
recapitulated which have not been described in the course of this
history. Setting out with a general statement, that the Admiral, the
Prince of Orange, Count Egmont, and other lords had organized a plot to
expel his Majesty from the Netherlands, and to divide the provinces among
themselves; the declaration afterwards proceeded to particulars. Ten of
its sixty-three articles were occupied with the Cardinal Granvelle, who,
by an absurd affectation, was never directly named, but called "a certain
personage--a principal personage--a grand personage, of his Majesty's
state council." None of the offences committed against him were
forgotten: the 11th of March letter, the fool's-cap, the livery, were
reproduced in the most violent colors, and the cabal against the minister
was quietly assumed to constitute treason against the monarch.

The Admiral, it was further charged, had advised and consented to the
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