, had given directions for organizing at once a
considerable army. It was composed mainly of troops belonging to the
Netherlands, with the addition of some German auxiliaries. Thirty-five
thousand foot and twelve thousand horse had, by the middle of July,
advanced through the province of Namur, and were assembled at Givet under
the Duke of Savoy, who, as Governor-General of the Netherlands, held the
chief command. All the most eminent grandees of the provinces, Orange,
Aerschot, Berlaymont, Meghen, Brederode, were present with the troops,
but the life and soul of the army, upon this memorable occasion, was the
Count of Egmont.

Lamoral, Count of Egmont, Prince of Gavere, was now in the thirty-sixth
year of his age, in the very noon of that brilliant life which was
destined to be so soon and so fatally overshadowed. Not one of the dark
clouds, which were in the future to accumulate around him, had yet rolled
above his horizon. Young, noble, wealthy, handsome, valiant, he saw no
threatening phantom in the future, and caught eagerly at the golden
opportunity, which the present placed within his grasp, of winning fresh
laurels on a wider and more fruitful field than any in which he had
hitherto been a reaper. The campaign about to take place was likely to be
an imposing, if not an important one, and could not fail to be attractive
to a noble of so ardent and showy a character as Egmont. If there were no
lofty principles or extensive interests to be contended for, as there
certainly were not, there was yet much that was stately and exciting to
the imagination in the warfare which had been so deliberately and
pompously arranged. The contending armies, although of moderate size,
were composed of picked troops, and were commanded by the flower of
Europe's chivalry. Kings, princes, and the most illustrious paladins of
Christendom, were arming for the great tournament, to which they had been
summoned by herald and trumpet; and the Batavian hero, without a crown or
even a country, but with as lofty a lineage as many anointed sovereigns
could boast, was ambitious to distinguish himself in the proud array.

Upon the north-western edge of the narrow peninsula of North Holland,
washed by the stormy waters of the German Ocean, were the ancient castle,
town, and lordship, whence Egmont derived his family name, and the title
by which he was most familiarly known. He was supposed to trace his
descent, through a line of chivalrous champion