aving
been fixed at nearly one hundred thousand Flemish crowns. By an agreement
now made by the States, with consent of the Nassau family, the prisoner
was definitely released, on condition of effecting the exchange of all
prisoners of the republic, now held in durance by Spain in any part of
the world. This was in lieu of the hundred thousand crowns which were to
be put into the impoverished coffers of Lewis Gunther. It may be
imagined, as the hapless prisoners afterwards poured in--not only from
the peninsula, but from more distant regions, whither they had been sent
by their cruel taskmasters, some to relate their sufferings in the
horrible dungeons of Spain, where they had long been expiating the crime
of defending their fatherland, others to relate their experiences as
chained galley-slaves in the naval service of their bitterest enemies,
many with shorn heads and long beards like Turks, many with crippled
limbs, worn out with chains and blows, and the squalor of disease and
filth--that the hatred for Spain and Rome did not glow any less fiercely
within the republic, nor the hereditary love for the Nassaus, to whose
generosity these poor victims were indebted for their deliverance, become
fainter, in consequence of these revelations. It was at first vehemently
disputed by many that the admiral could be exchanged as a prisoner of
war, in respect to the manifold murders and other crimes which would seem
to authorize his trial and chastisement by the tribunals of the republic.
But it was decided by the States that the sacred aegis of military law
must be held to protect even so bloodstained a criminal as he, and his
release was accordingly effected. Not long afterwards he took his
departure for Spain, where his reception was not enthusiastic.

From this epoch is to be dated a considerable reform in the laws
regulating the exchange of prisoners of war.--[Grotius]

While Maurice was occupied with the siege of Grave, and thus not only
menacing an important position, but spreading, danger and dismay over all
Brabant and Flanders, it was necessary for the archduke to detach so
large a portion of his armies to observe his indefatigable and scientific
enemy, as to much weaken the vigour of the operations before Ostend.
Moreover, the execrable administration of his finances, and the dismal
delays and sufferings of that siege; had brought about another mutiny--on
the whole, the most extensive, formidable, and methodical of all