ter and take possession of the place. The air was
full of wild rumours to this effect, and already the humbler classes who
sided with the Stadholder saw in him the saviour of the country from the
treason of the Advocate and the renewed tyranny of Spain.

The Prince made no such pretence, but simply took possession of the
fortress in order to be beforehand with the Waartgelders. The
Contra-Remonstrants in Brielle had desired that "men should see who had
the hardest fists," and it would certainly have been difficult to find
harder ones than those of the hero of Nieuwpoort.

Besides the Jesuits coming in so skilfully to triumph over the warring
sects of Calvinists, there were other engineers on whom the Spanish
government relied to effect the reconquest of the Netherlands. Especially
it was an object to wreak vengeance on Holland, that head and front of
the revolt, both for its persistence in rebellion and for the immense
prosperity and progress by which that rebellion had been rewarded.
Holland had grown fat and strong, while the obedient Netherlands were
withered to the marrow of their bones. But there was a practical person
then resident in Spain to whom the Netherlands were well known, to whom
indeed everything was well known, who had laid before the King a
magnificent scheme for destroying the commerce and with it the very
existence of Holland to the great advantage of the Spanish finances and
of the Spanish Netherlands. Philip of course laid it before the Archduke
as usual, that he might ponder it well and afterwards, if approved,
direct its execution.

The practical person set forth in an elaborate memoir that the Hollanders
were making rapid progress in commerce, arts, and manufactures, while the
obedient provinces were sinking as swiftly into decay. The Spanish
Netherlands were almost entirely shut off from the sea, the rivers
Scheldt and Meuse being hardly navigable for them on account of the
control of those waters by Holland. The Dutch were attracting to their
dominions all artisans, navigators, and traders. Despising all other
nations and giving them the law, they had ruined the obedient provinces.
Ostend, Nieuwpoort, Dunkerk were wasting away, and ought to be restored.

"I have profoundly studied forty years long the subjects of commerce and
navigation," said the practical person, "and I have succeeded in
penetrating the secrets and acquiring, as it were, universal
knowledge--let me not be suspected of boa