sand men, according to the contract signed by the
three powers, the queen had in reality only agreed to contribute two
thousand soldiers, and these only for four months' service, within a very
strict territorial limit, and under promise of immediate reimbursement of
the expenses thus incurred.

These facts, together with the avowal that their magnanimous ally had all
along been secretly treating for peace with the common enemy, did not
make a cheerful impression upon those plain-spoken republicans, nor was
it much consolation to them to receive the assurance that "after the
king's death his affection and gratitude towards the States would be
found deeply engraved upon his heart."

The result of such a future autopsy might seem a matter of comparative
indifference, since meantime the present effect to the republic of those
deep emotions was a treacherous desertion. Calvaert, too, who had so long
haunted the king like his perpetual shadow, and who had believed him--at
least so far as the Netherlands were concerned--to be almost without
guile, had been destined after all to a rude awakening. Sick and
suffering, he did not cease, so long as life was in him, to warn the
States-General of the dangers impending over them from the secret
negotiations which their royal ally was doing his best to conceal from
them, and as to which he had for a time succeeded so dexterously in
hoodwinking their envoy himself. But the honest and energetic agent of
the republic did not live to see the consummation of these manoeuvres of
Henry and the pope. He died in Paris during the month of June of this
year.

Certainly the efforts of Spanish and Papal diplomacy had not been
unsuccessful in bringing about a dissolution of the bonds of amity by
which the three powers seemed so lately to be drawing themselves very
closely together. The republic and Henry IV. were now on a most
uncomfortable footing towards each other. On the other hand, the queen
was in a very ill humour with the States and very angry with Henry.
Especially the persistent manner in which the Hollanders carried on trade
with Spain and were at the same time making fortunes for themselves and
feeding the enemy, while Englishmen, on pain of death, were debarred from
participation in such traffic, excited great and general indignation in
England. In vain was it represented that this trade, if prohibited to the
commonwealth would fall into the hands of neutral powers, and that Spain
wo