so terrible a head. She was obstinate, reckless, abominably extravagant.
She had been provided in Ghent with a handsome establishment: "with a
duenna, six other women, a major domo, two pages, one chaplain, an
almoner, and four men-servants," and this seemed a sufficiently liberal
scheme of life for the widow of a commissary. Moreover, a very ample
allowance had been made for the education of her only legitimate son,
Conrad, the other having perished by an accident on the day of his
father's death. While Don John of Austria was, gathering laurels in
Granada, his half-brother, Pyramus junior, had been ingloriously drowned
in a cistern at Ghent.

Barbara's expenses were exorbitant; her way of life scandalous. To send
her money, said Alva, was to throw it into the sea. In two days she
would have spent in dissipation and feasting any sums which the King
might choose to supply. The Duke, who feared nothing else in the world,
stood in mortal awe of the widow Kegell. "A terrible animal, indeed, is
an unbridled woman," wrote secretary Gayas, from Madrid, at the close of
Alva's administration for, notwithstanding every effort to entice, to
intimidate, and to kidnap her from the Netherlands, there she remained,
through all vicissitudes, even till the arrival of Don John. By his
persuasions or commands she was, at last, induced to accept an exile for
the remainder of her days, in Spain, but revenged herself by asserting.
that he was quite mistaken: in supposing himself the Emperor's child; a
point, certainly, upon which her, authority might be thought conclusive.
Thus there was a double mystery about Don John. He might be the issue of
august parentage on one side; he was; possibly, sprung of most ignoble
blood. Base-born at best, he was not sure whether to look for the author
of his being in the halls of the Caesara or the booths of Ratisbon
mechanics.