an if he had been the Duke of Muscovy.

The opportunity seemed tempting to strike a great blow. How could Albert
and Isabella, with an empty exchequer and a mutinous army, hope either to
defend their soil from attack or to aim a counter blow at the republic,
even if, the republic for a season should be deprived of a portion of its
defenders?

The reasoning was plausible, the prize tempting. The States-General, who
habitually discountenanced rashness, and were wont to impose superfluous
restraints upon the valiant but discreet Lewis William, and upon the
deeply pondering but energetic Maurice, were now grown as ardent as they
had hitherto been hesitating. In the early days of June it was determined
in secret session to organize a great force in Holland and Zeeland, and
to embark suddenly for Nieuport, to carry that important position by
surprise or assault, and from that basis to redeem Dunkirk. The
possession of these two cities, besides that of Ostend, which had always
been retained by the Republic, would ensure the complete subjugation of
Flanders. The trifling force of two thousand men under Rivas--all that
the archduke then had in that province--and the sconces and earthworks
which had been constructed around Ostend to impede the movements and
obstruct the supplies of the garrison, would be utterly powerless to
prevent the consummation of the plan. Flanders once subjugated, it would
not be long before the Spaniards were swept from the obedient Netherlands
as thoroughly as they had been from the domains of the commonwealth, and
all the seventeen provinces, trampling out every vestige of a hated
foreign tyranny, would soon take their natural place as states of a free;
prosperous, and powerful union.

But Maurice of Nassau did not share the convictions of the
States-General. The unwonted ardour of Barneveld did not inflame his
imagination. He urged that the enterprise was inexcusably rash; that its
execution would require the whole army of the States, except the slender
garrisons absolutely necessary to protect important places from surprise;
that a defeat would not be simply disaster, but annihilation; that
retreat without absolute triumph would be impossible, and that amid such
circumstances the archduke, in spite of his poverty and the rebellious
condition of his troops, would doubtless assemble a sufficient force to
dispute with reasonable prospects of victory, this invasion of his
territory.

Sir Francis Vere,