of Saint Rombout, which the Prince of Orange had always respected.
"I don't say how much you took of that plunder for your own share,"
continued the indignant De Fromont, "for the very children cry it in your
ears as you walk the streets. 'Tis known that if God himself had been
changed into gold you would have put him in your pocket."

This was plain language, but as just as it was plain. The famous shrine
of Saint Rombout--valued at seventy thousand guldens, of silver gilt, and
enriched with precious stones--had been held sacred alike by the
fanatical iconoclasts and the greedy Spaniards who had successively held
the city. It had now been melted up, and appropriated by Peter Lupin;
the Carmelite, and De Bours, the Catholic convert, whose mouths were full
of devotion to the ancient Church and of horror for heresy.

The efforts of Orange and of the states were unavailing. De Bours
surrendered the city, and fled to Parma, who received him with
cordiality, gave him five thousand florins--the price promised for his
treason, besides a regiment of infantry--but expressed surprise that he
should have reached the camp alive. His subsequent career was short, and
he met his death two years afterwards, in the trenches before Tournay.
The archiepiscopal city was thus transferred to the royal party, but the
gallant Van der Tympel, governor of Brussels, retook it by surprise
within six months of its acquisition by Parma, and once more restored it
to the jurisdiction of the states. Peter Lupus, the Carmelite, armed to
the teeth, and fighting fiercely at the head of the royalists, was slain
in the street, and thus forfeited his chance for the mitre of Namur.

During the weary progress of the Cologne negotiations, the Prince
had not been idle, and should this august and slow-moving congress be
unsuccessful in restoring peace, the provinces were pledged to an act of