persons of influence, who now, for the first time, showed a disposition
to side with their country against its tyrants. Hitherto the land had
been divided into two very unequal portions. Holland and Zealand were
devoted to the Prince; their whole population, with hardly an individual
exception, converted to the Reformed religion. The other fifteen
provinces were, on the whole, loyal to the King; while the old religion
had, of late years, taken root so rapidly again, that perhaps a moiety of
their population might be considered as Catholic. At the same time, the
reign of terror under Alva, the paler, but not less distinct tyranny of
Requesens, and the intolerable excesses of the foreign soldiery, by which
the government of foreigners was supported, had at last maddened all the
inhabitants of the seventeen provinces. Notwithstanding, therefore, the
fatal difference of religious opinion, they were all drawn into closer
relations with each other; to regain their ancient privileges, and to
expel the detested foreigners from the soil, being objects common to all.
The provinces were united in one great hatred and one great hope.

The Hollanders and Zealanders, under their heroic leader, had well nigh
accomplished both tasks, so far as those little provinces were concerned.
Never had a contest, however, seemed more hopeless at its commencement.
Cast a glance at the map. Look at Holland--not the Republic, with its
sister provinces beyond the Zuyder Zee--but Holland only, with the
Zealand archipelago. Look at that narrow tongue of half-submerged earth.
Who could suppose that upon that slender sand-bank, one hundred and
twenty miles in length, and varying in breadth from four miles to forty,
one man, backed by the population of a handful of cities, could do battle
nine years long with the master of two worlds, the "Dominator Of Asia,
Africa, and America"--the despot of the fairest realms of Europe--and
conquer him at last. Nor was William even entirely master of that narrow
shoal where clung the survivors of a great national shipwreck. North and