s, we dare not
call our hero by the name of "Don Juan," (by which he is known in
Spanish history,) lest he be mistaken for the popular libertine! And
thus, the last of the knights has been stripped of his name by the
hero of the "Festin de Pierre," and of his honours by Cervantes, as
by Philip II. of a throne.--

Hard fate for one described by all the writers of his time as a model
of manly grace and Christian virtue! How charming is the account
given by the old Spanish writers of the noble youth, extricated from
his convent to be introduced on the high-road to a princely cavalier,
surrounded by his retinue, whom he is first desired to salute as a
brother, and then required to worship, as the king of Spain! We are
told of his joy on discovering his filial relationship to the great
emperor, so long the object of his admiration. We are told of his
deeds of prowess against the Turks at Lepanto, at Tunis against the
Moor. We are told of the proposition of Gregory XIII. that he should
be rewarded with the crown of Barbary, and of the desire of the
revolted nobility of Belgium, to raise him to their tottering throne;
nay, we are even assured that "la couronne d'Hibernie" was offered to
his acceptance. And finally, we are told of his untimely death and
glorious funeral--mourned by all the knighthood of the land! But we
hear and forget. Some mysterious counter-charm has stripped his
laurels of their verdure. Even the lesser incidents of the life of
Don John are replete with the interest of romance. When appointed by
Philip II. governor of the Netherlands, in order that he might deal
with the heretics of the Christian faith as with the faithful of
Mahomet, such deadly vengeance was vowed against his person by the
Protestant party headed by Horn and the Prince of Orange, that it was
judged necessary for his highness to perform his journey in disguise.
Attired as a Moorish slave, he reached Luxembourg as the attendant of
Ottavio Gonzaga, brother of Prince Amalfi, at the very moment the
troops of the king of Spain were butchering eight thousand citizens
in his revolted city of Antwerp!--

The arrival of the new governor afforded the signal for more pacific
measures. The dispositions of Don John were humane--his manners
frank. Aware that the Belgian provinces were exhausted by ten years
of civil war, and that the pay of the Spanish troops he had to lead
against them was so miserably in arrear as to compel them to acts of
atrociou