extinguished by the common exertions of a whole race trembling for the
destruction of their fatherland, were now re-lighted with a thousand
brands plucked from the sacred domestic hearth. Fathers and children,
brothers and sisters, husbands and wives, were beginning to wrangle, and
were prepared to persecute. Catholic and Protestant, during the
momentary relief from pressure, forgot their voluntary and most blessed
Pacification, to renew their internecine feuds. The banished Reformers,
who had swarmed back in droves at the tidings of peace and good-will to
all men, found themselves bitterly disappointed. They were exposed in
the Walloon provinces to the persecutions of the Malcontents, in the
Frisian regions to the still powerful coercion of the royal stadholders.

Persecution begat counter-persecution. The city of Ghent became the
centre of a system of insurrection, by which all the laws of God and man
were outraged under the pretence of establishing a larger liberty in
civil and religious matters. It was at Ghent that the opening scenes,
in Parma's administration took place. Of the high-born suitors for the
Netherland bride, two were still watching each other with jealous eyes.
Anjou was at Mons, which city he had secretly but unsuccessfully
attempted to master for, his, own purposes. John Casimir was at Ghent,
fomenting an insurrection which he had neither skill to guide, nor
intelligence to comprehend. There was a talk of making him Count of
Flanders,--and his paltry ambition was dazzled by the glittering prize.
Anjou, who meant to be Count of Flanders himself, as well as Duke or
Count of all the other Netherlands, was highly indignant at this report,
which he chose to consider true. He wrote to the estates to express his
indignation. He wrote to Ghent to offer his mediation between the
burghers and the Malcontents. Casimir wanted money for his troops. He
obtained a liberal supply, but he wanted more. Meantime, the mercenaries
were expatiating on their own account throughout the southern provinces;