1609--the year in which a peaceful period seemed to have begun. To those
who saw the entangled interests of individuals, and the conflict of
theological dogmas and religious and political intrigue which furnished
so much material out of which wide-reaching schemes of personal ambition
could be spun, it must have been obvious that the interval of truce was
necessarily but a brief interlude between two tragedies.

It seemed the very mockery of Fate that, almost at the very instant when
after two years' painful negotiation a truce had been made, the signal
for universal discord should be sounded. One day in the early summer of
1609, Henry IV. came to the Royal Arsenal, the residence of Sully,
accompanied by Zamet and another of his intimate companions. He asked
for the Duke and was told that he was busy in his study. "Of course,"
said the King, turning to his followers, "I dare say you expected to be
told that he was out shooting, or with the ladies, or at the barber's.
But who works like Sully? Tell him," he said, "to come to the balcony
in his garden, where he and I are not accustomed to be silent."

As soon as Sully appeared, the King observed: "Well; here the Duke of
Cleve is dead, and has left everybody his heir."

It was true enough, and the inheritance was of vital importance to the
world.

It was an apple of discord thrown directly between the two rival camps
into which Christendom was divided. The Duchies of Cleve, Berg, and
Julich, and the Counties and Lordships of Mark, Ravensberg, and
Ravenstein, formed a triangle, political and geographical, closely wedged
between Catholicism and Protestantism, and between France, the United
Provinces, Belgium, and Germany. Should it fall into Catholic hands, the