damage on the inhabitants, sailed thence to the Isle of St. Thomas, near
the equator, where the towns and villages were sacked and burned, and
where a contagious sickness broke out in the fleet, sweeping off in a
very brief period a large proportion of the crew. The admiral himself
fell a victim to the disease and was buried on the island. The fleet put
to sea again under Admiral Storm van Wena, but the sickness pursued the
adventurers on their voyage towards Brazil, one thousand of them dying at
sea in fifteen days. At Brazil they accomplished nothing, and, on their
homeward voyage, not only the new commander succumbed to the same
contagion, but the mortality continued to so extraordinary an extent
that, on the arrival of the expedition late in the winter in Holland,
there were but two captains left alive, and, in many of the vessels, not
more than six sound men to each. Nothing could be more wretched than
this termination of a great and expensive voyage, which had occasioned
such high hopes throughout the provinces; nothing more dismal than the
political atmosphere which surrounded the republic during the months
which immediately ensued. It was obvious to Barneveld and the other
leading personages, in whose hands was the administration of affairs,
that a great military success was absolutely indispensable, if the
treacherous cry of peace, when peace was really impossible, should
not become universal and fatal.

Meantime affairs were not much more cheerful in the obedient provinces.
Archduke Albert arrived with his bride in the early days of September,
1599, at Brussels, and was received with great pomp and enthusiastic
rejoicings. When are pomp and enthusiasm not to be obtained by imperial
personages, at brief notice and in vast quantities, if managers
understand their business? After all, it may be doubted whether the
theatrical display was as splendid as that which marked the beginning of
the Ernestian era. Schoolmaster Houwaerts had surpassed himself on that