une and boundless credit were seriously
compromised. He had found it an easier task to take Ostend and relieve
Grol than to bolster up the finances of Spain.

His acceptances were becoming as much a drug upon the exchanges of
Antwerp, Genoa, or Augsburg, as those of the most Catholic king or their
Highnesses the archdukes. Ruin stared him in the face, notwithstanding
the deeds with which he had startled the world, and he was therefore
sincerely desirous of peace, provided, of course, that all those
advantages for which the war had been waged in vain could now be secured
by negotiation.

There had been, since the arrival of the Duke of Alva in the Netherlands,
just forty years of fighting. Maurice and the war had been born in the
same year, and it would be difficult for him to comprehend that his whole
life's work had been a superfluous task, to be rubbed away now with a
sponge. Yet that Spain, on the entrance to negotiations, would demand of
the provinces submission to her authority, re-establishment of the
Catholic religion, abstinence from Oriental or American commerce, and the
toleration of Spanish soldiers over all the Netherlands, seemed
indubitable.

It was equally unquestionable that the seven provinces would demand
recognition of their national independence by Spain, would refuse public
practice of the Roman religion within their domains, and would laugh to
scorn any proposed limitations to their participation in the world's
traffic. As to the presence of Spanish troops on their soil, that was, of
course, an inconceivable idea.

Where, then, could even a loophole be found through which the possibility
of a compromise could be espied? The ideas of the contending parties were
as much opposed to each other as fire and snow. Nevertheless, the great
forces of the world seemed to have gradually settled into such an
equilibrium as to make the continuance of the war for the present
impossible.

Accordingly, the peace-party in Brussels had cautiously put forth its
tentacles late in 1606, and again in the early days of the new year.
Walrave van Wittenhorst and Doctor Gevaerts had been allowed to come to
the Hague, ostensibly on private business, but with secret commission
from the archdukes to feel and report concerning the political
atmosphere. They found that it was a penal offence in the republic to
talk of peace or of truce. They nevertheless suspected that there might
be a more sympathetic layer beneath the ver