schemes of his master.

"I must make bold to remind your Majesty," again whispered the spy, "that
there never was an Italian prince who failed to pursue his own ends, and
that there are few in the world that are not wishing to become greater
than they are. This man here could strike a greater blow than all the
rest of them put together. Remember that there is not a villain anywhere
that does not desire the death of your Majesty. Believe me, and send to
cut off my head if it shall be found that I am speaking from passion, or
from other motive than pure zeal for your royal service."

The reader will remember into what a paroxysm of rage Alexander was
thrown on, a former occasion, when secretly invited to listen to
propositions by which the sovereignty over the Netherlands was to be
secured to himself, and how near he was to inflicting mortal punishment
with his own hand on the man who had ventured to broach that treasonable
matter.

Such projects and propositions were ever floating, as it were, in the
atmosphere, and it was impossible for the most just men to escape
suspicion in the mind of a king who fed upon suspicion as his daily
bread. Yet nothing could be fouler or falser than the calumny which
described Alexander as unfaithful to Philip. Had he served his God as he
served his master perhaps his record before the highest tribunal would
have been a clearer one.

And in the same vein in which he wrote to the monarch in person did the
crafty Moreo write to the principal secretary of state, Idiaquez, whose
mind, as well as his master's, it was useful to poison, and who was in
daily communication with Philip.

"Let us make sure of Flanders," said he, "otherwise we shall all of us be
well cheated. I will tell you something of that which I have already told
his Majesty, only not all, referring you to Tassis, who, as a personal
witness to many things, will have it in his power to undeceive his
Majesty, I have seen very clearly that the duke is disgusted with his
Majesty, and one day he told me that he cared not if the whole world went
to destruction, only not Flanders."

"Another day he told me that there was a report abroad that his Majesty
was sending to arrest him, by means of the Duke of Pastrana, and looking
at me he said: 'See here, seignior commander, no threats, as if it were
in the power of mortal man to arrest me, much less of such fellows as
these.'"

"But this is but a small part of what I could say," co