ety in time, and he who follows my
example will save himself much future regret. These words opportunely
spoken and immediately acted upon had their effect. Those who stood
nearest followed him, and were again followed by the next, so that at
last the few who had already hastened out of the city when they saw no
one coming after them lost the desire of coping alone with the six
hundred horse. All accordingly returned to the Meer Bridge, where they
posted watches and videttes, and the night was passed tumultuously under
arms.

The town of Antwerp was now threatened with fearful bloodshed and
pillage. In this pressing emergency Orange assembled an extraordinary
senate, to which were summoned all the best-disposed citizens of the
four nations. If they wished, said he, to repress the violence of the
Calvinists they must oppose them with an army strong enough and prepared
to meet them. It was therefore resolved to arm with speed the Roman
Catholic inhabitants of the town, whether natives, Italians, or
Spaniards, and, if possible, to induce the Lutherans also to join them.
The haughtiness of the Calvinists, who, proud of their wealth and
confident in their numbers, treated every other religious party with
contempt, had long made the Lutherans their enemies, and the mutual
exasperation of these two Protestant churches was even more implacable
than their common hatred of the dominant church. This jealousy the
magistrate had turned to advantage, by making use of one party to curb
the other, and had thus contrived to keep the Calvinists in check, who,
from their numbers and insolence, were most to be feared. With this
view, he had tacitly taken into his protection the Lutherans, as the
weaker and more peaceable party, having moreover invited for them, from
Germany, spiritual teachers, who, by controversial sermons, might keep
up the mutual hatred of the two bodies. He encouraged the Lutherans in
the vain idea that the king thought more favorably of their religious
creed than that of the Calvinists, and exhorted them to be careful how
they damaged their good cause by any understanding with the latter. It
was not, therefore, difficult to bring about, for the moment, a union
with the Roman Catholics and the Lutherans, as its object was to keep
down their detested rivals. At dawn of day an army was opposed to the
Calvinists which was far superior in force to their own. At the head of
this army, the eloquence of Orange had far greater