osed of ten or twelve learned doctors, and was
especially entrusted with the control of matters relating to law,
pardons, and the general administration of justice. The state council,
which was far the most important of the three boards, was to superintend
all high affairs of government, war, treaties, foreign intercourse,
internal and interprovincial affairs. The members of this council were
the Bishop of Arras, Viglius, Berlaymont, the Prince of Orange, Count
Egmont, to which number were afterwards added the Seigneur de Glayon, the
Duke of Aerschot, and Count Horn. The last-named nobleman, who was
admiral of the provinces, had, for the, present, been appointed to
accompany the King to Spain, there to be specially entrusted with the
administration of affairs relating to the Netherlands. He was destined,
however, to return at the expiration of two years.

With the object, as it was thought, of curbing the power of the great
nobles, it had been arranged that the three councils should be entirely
distinct from each other, that the members of the state council should
have no participation in the affairs of the two other bodies; but, on the
other hand, that the finance and privy councillors, as well as the
Knights of the Fleece, should have access to the deliberations of the
state council. In the course of events, however, it soon became evident
that the real power of the government was exclusively in the hands of the
consulta, a committee of three members of the state council, by whose
deliberations the Regent was secretly instructed to be guided on all
important occasions. The three, Viglius, Berlaymont, and Arras, who
composed the secret conclave or cabinet, were in reality but one. The
Bishop of Arras was in all three, and the three together constituted only
the Bishop of Arras.

There was no especial governor or stadholder appointed for the province
of Brabant, where the Regent was to reside and to exercise executive
functions in person. The stadholders for the other provinces were, for
Flanders and Artois, the Count of Egmont; for Holland, Zeeland, and
Utrecht, the Prince of Orange; for Gueldres and Zutfen, the Count of
Meghen; for Friesland, Groningen and Overyssel, Count Aremberg; for
Hainault, Valenciennes and Cambray, the Marquis of Berghen; for Tournay
and Tournaisis, Baron Montigny; for Namur, Baron Berlaymont; for
Luxemburg, Count Mansfeld; for Ryssel, Douay and Orchies, the Baron
Coureires. All these stadhold