were possible, it must be confessed that the
churchman's vague and hypocritical expressions on the side of mercy were
very little worth.

Certainly these seeds of suspicion did not fall upon a barren soil.
Philip immediately communicated the information thus received to the Duke
of Alva, charging him on repeated occasions to find out what was written,
either by Egmont or by Straalen, at Egmont's instigation, stating that
such a letter was written at the time of the Hoogstraaten baptism, that
it would probably illustrate the opinions of Egmont at that period, and
that the letter itself, which the confessor of Madame de Parma had once
had in his hands, ought, if possible, to be procured. Thus the very
language used by Granvelle to Philip was immediately repeated by the
monarch to his representative in the Netherlands, at the moment when all
Egmont's papers were in his possession, and when Egmont's private
secretary was undergoing the torture, in order that; secrets might be
wrenched from him which had never entered his brain. The fact that no
such letter was found, that the Duchess had never alluded to any such
document, and that neither a careful scrutiny of papers, nor the
application of the rack, could elicit any satisfactory information on the
subject, leads to the conclusion that no such treasonable paper had ever
existed, save in the imagination of the Cardinal. At any rate, it is no
more than just to hesitate before affixing a damning character to a
document, in the absence of any direct proof that there ever was such a
document at all. The confessor of Madame de Parma told another person,
who told the Cardinal, that either Count Egmont, or Burgomaster Straalen,
by command of Count Egmont, wrote to the Prince of Orange thus and so.
What evidence was this upon which to found a charge of high treason
against a man whom Granvelle affected to characterize as otherwise
neither opposed to the Catholic religion, nor to the true service of the
King? What vulpine kind of mercy was it on the part of the Cardinal,
while making such deadly insinuations, to recommend the imprisoned victim
to clemency?

The unfortunate envoys, Marquis Bergen and Baron Montigny, had remained
in Spain under close observation. Of those doomed victims who, in spite
of friendly remonstrances and of ominous warnings, had thus ventured into
the lion's den, no retreating footmarks were ever to be seen. Their fate,
now that Alva had at last been despatc