illing. Passion gives place to reason; and that which
wore the air of fierce romance is superseded by what bears the
stamp of calm reality.

The consternation caused by the news of William's death soon
yielded to the firmness natural to a people inured to suffering
and calamity. The United Provinces rejected at once the overtures
made by the prince of Parma to induce them to obedience. They
seemed proud to show that their fate did not depend on that of
one man. He therefore turned his attention to the most effective
means of obtaining results by force which he found it impossible
to secure by persuasion. He proceeded vigorously to the reduction
of the chief towns of Flanders, the conquest of which would give
him possession of the entire province, no army now remaining
to oppose him in the field. He soon obliged Ypres and Termonde
to surrender; and Ghent, forced by famine, at length yielded on
reasonable terms. The most severe was the utter abolition of
the reformed religion; by which a large portion of the population
was driven to the alternative of exile; and they passed over
in crowds to Holland and Zealand, not half of the inhabitants
remaining behind. Mechlin, and finally Brussels, worn out by
a fruitless resistance, followed the example of the rest; and
thus, within a year after the death of William of Nassau, the
power of Spain was again established in the whole province of
Flanders, and the others which comprise what is in modern days
generally denominated Belgium.

But these domestic victories of the prince of Parma were barren
in any of those results which humanity would love to see in the
train of conquest. The reconciled provinces presented the most
deplorable spectacle. The chief towns were almost depopulated. The
inhabitants had in a great measure fallen victims to war, pestilence
and famine. Little inducement existed to replace by marriage the
ravages caused by death, for few men wished to propagate a race
which divine wrath seemed to have marked for persecution. The
thousands of villages which had covered the face of the country
were absolutely abandoned to the wolves, which had so rapidly
increased that they attacked not merely cattle and children,
but grown-up persons. The dogs, driven abroad by hunger, had
become as ferocious as other beasts of prey, and joined in large
packs to hunt down brutes and men. Neither fields, nor woods, nor
roads, were now to be distinguished by any visible limits. All