tholderess
and her council; and after various insidious and illegal but
successful tricks, the consent of several of the provinces was
obtained to the adoption of measures that, under a guise of
comparative moderation, were little less abominable than those
commanded by the king. These were formally signed by the council,
and despatched to Spain to receive Philip's sanction, and thus
acquire the force of law. The embassy to Madrid was confided to
the marquis of Bergen and the baron de Montigny; the latter of
whom was brother to Count Horn, and had formerly been employed
on a like mission. Montigny appears to have had some qualms of
apprehension in undertaking this new office. His good genius seemed
for a while to stand between him and the fate which awaited him.
An accident which happened to his colleague allowed an excuse
for retarding his journey. But the stadtholderess urged him away:
he set out, and reached his destination; not to defend the cause
of his country at the foot of the throne, but to perish a victim
to his patriotism.

The situation of the patriot lords was at this crisis peculiarly
embarrassing. The conduct of the confederates was so essentially
tantamount to open rebellion, that the Prince of Orange and his
friends found it almost impossible to preserve a neutrality between
the court and the people. All their wishes urged them to join at
once in the public cause; but they were restrained by a lingering
sense of loyalty to the king, whose employments they still held,
and whose confidence they were, therefore, nominally supposed
to share. They seemed reduced to the necessity of coming to an
explanation, and, perhaps, a premature rupture with the government;
of joining in the harsh measures it was likely to adopt against
those with whose proceedings they sympathized; or, as a last
alternative, to withdraw, as they had done before, wholly from all
interference in public affairs. Still their presence in the council
of state was, even though their influence had greatly decreased,
of vast service to the patriots, in checking the hostility of the
court; and the confederates, on the other hand, were restrained
from acts of open violence, by fear of the disapprobation of
these their best and most powerful friends. Be their individual
motives of reasoning what they might, they at length adopted
the alternative above alluded to, and resigned their places.
Count Horn retired to his estates; Count Egmont repaired