n the chief
citadel of the country, while Protestantism in the shape of the
possessory princes stood menacingly in the capital.

Hardly was the ink dry on the treaty which had suspended for twelve years
the great religious war of forty years, not yet had the ratifications
been exchanged, but the trumpet was again sounding, and the hostile
forces were once more face to face.

Leopold, knowing where his great danger lay, sent a friendly message to
the States-General, expressing the hope that they would submit to his
arrangements until the Imperial decision should be made.

The States, through the pen and brain of Barneveld, replied that they had
already recognized the rights of the possessory princes, and were
surprised that the Bishop-Archduke should oppose them. They expressed the
hope that, when better informed, he would see the validity of the Treaty
of Dortmund. "My Lords the States-General," said the Advocate, "will
protect the princes against violence and actual disturbances, and are
assured that the neighbouring kings and princes will do the same. They
trust that his Imperial Highness will not allow matters, to proceed to
extremities."

This was language not to be mistaken. It was plain that the Republic did
not intend the Emperor to decide a question of life and death to herself,
nor to permit Spain, exhausted by warfare, to achieve this annihilating
triumph by a petty intrigue.

While in reality the clue to what seemed to the outside world a
labyrinthine maze of tangled interests and passions was firmly held in
the hand of Barneveld, it was not to him nor to My Lords the
States-General that the various parties to the impending conflict applied
in the first resort.

Mankind were not yet sufficiently used to this young republic, intruding
herself among the family of kings, to defer at once to an authority which
they could not but feel.

Moreover, Henry of France was universally looked to both by friends and
foes as the probable arbiter or chief champion in the great debate. He
had originally been inclined to favour Neuberg, chiefly, so Aerssens
thought, on account of his political weakness. The States-General on the
other hand were firmly disposed for Brandenburg from the first, not only
as a strenuous supporter of the Reformation and an ancient ally of their
own always interested in their safety, but because the establishment of
the Elector on the Rhine would roll back the Empire beyond that river. As
Ae