also much disquisition on the subject of finance--the Advocate observing
that the States now raised as much in a month as the Provinces in the
time of the Emperor used to levy in a year--and expressed the hope that
the Queen would increase her contingent to ten thousand foot, and two
thousand horse. He repudiated, in the name of the States-General and his
own, the possibility of peace-negotiations; deprecated any allusion to
the subject as fatal to their religion, their liberty, their very
existence, and equally disastrous to England and to Protestantism, and
implored the Earl, therefore, to use all his influence in opposition to
any pacific overtures to or from Spain.

On the 24th November, acts were drawn up and signed by the Earl,
according to which the supreme government of the United Netherlands was
formally committed to the state-council during his absence. Decrees were
to be pronounced in the name of his Excellency, and countersigned by
Maurice of Nassau.

On the following day, Leicester, being somewhat indisposed, requested a
deputation of the States-General to wait upon him in his own house. This
was done, and a formal and affectionate farewell was then read to him by
his secretary, Mr. Atye. It was responded to in complimentary fashion by
Advocate Barneveld, who again took occasion at this parting interview to
impress upon the governor the utter impossibility, in his own opinion and
that of the other deputies, of reconciling the Provinces with Spain.

Leicester received from the States--as a magnificent parting present--a
silver gilt vase "as tall as a man," and then departed for Flushing to
take shipping for England.

CHAPTER XII.

Ill-timed Interregnum in the Provinces--Firmness of the English and
Dutch People--Factions during Leicester's Government--Democratic
Theories of the Leicestriana--Suspicions as to the Earl's Designs--
Extreme Views of the Calvinists--Political Ambition of the Church--
Antagonism of the Church and States--The States inclined to
Tolerance--Desolation of the Obedient Provinces--Pauperism and
Famine--Prosperity of the Republic--The Year of Expectation.

It was not unnatural that the Queen should desire the presence of her
favourite at that momentous epoch, when the dread question, "aut fer aut
feri," had at last demanded its definite solution. It was inevitable,
too, that Leicester should feel great anxiety to be upon the spot where
the great tragedy, s