And Ferdinand was one day to sit on the throne of the holy Roman Empire.
Might not a shudder come over the souls of men as coming events vaguely
shaped themselves to prophetic eyes?

Meantime there was religious peace in Hungary, in Austria, in Bohemia, in
France, in Great Britain, in the Netherlands. The hangman's hands were
for a period at rest, so far as theology had need of them. Butchery in
the name of Christ was suspended throughout Christendom. The Cross and
the Crescent, Santiago and the Orange banner, were for a season in
repose.

There was a vast lull between two mighty storms. The forty years' war
was in the past, the thirty years' war in the not far distant future.




CHAPTER LIII.

CONCLUSION.

Forth-three years had passed since the memorable April morning in which
the great nobles of the, Netherlands presented their "Request" to the
Regent Margaret at Brussels.

They had requested that the holy Spanish Inquisition might not be
established on their soil to the suppression of all their political and
religious institutions.

The war which those high-born "beggars" had then kindled, little knowing