his imagination he
may judge it a sea. If not, 'tis likely he will make us fish in troubled
waters."

Maurice was hardly the fish for a mill-pond even at that epoch, and it
might one day be seen whether or not he could float in the great ocean of
events. Meanwhile, he swam his course without superfluous gambols or
spoutings.

The commander of her Majesty's forces was not satisfied with the States,
nor their generals, nor their politicians. "Affairs are going 'a malo in
pejus,'" he said. "They embrace their liberty as apes their young. To
this end are Counts Hollock and Maurice set upon the stage to entertain
the popular sort. Her Majesty and my Lord of Leicester are not forgotten.
The Counts are in Holland, especially Hollock, for the other is but the
cipher. And yet I can assure you Maurice hath wit and spirit too much for
his time."

As the troubles of the interregnum increased Willoughby was more
dissatisfied than ever with the miserable condition of the Provinces, but
chose to ascribe it to the machinations of the States' party, rather than
to the ambiguous conduct of Leicester. "These evils," he said, "are
especially, derived from the childish ambition of the young Count
Maurice, from the covetous and furious counsels of the proud Hollanders,
now chief of the States-General, and, if with pardon it may be said, from
our slackness and coldness to entertain our friends. The provident and
wiser sort--weighing what a slender ground the appetite of a young man
is, unfurnished with the sinews of war to manage so great a cause--for a
good space after my Lord of Leicester's departure, gave him far looking
on, to see him play has part on the stage."

Willoughby's spleen caused him to mix his metaphors more recklessly than
strict taste would warrant, but his violent expressions painted the
relative situation of parties more vividly than could be done by a calm
disquisition. Maurice thus playing his part upon the stage--as the
general proceeded to observe--"was a skittish horse, becoming by little
and little assured of what he had feared, and perceiving the harmlessness
thereof; while his companions, finding no safety of neutrality in so
great practices, and no overturning nor barricado to stop his rash wilded
chariot, followed without fear; and when some of the first had passed the
bog; the rest, as the fashion is, never started after. The variable
democracy; embracing novelty, began to applaud their prosperity; the base