ree of religious freedom were urged upon the royal government with his
usual sagacity of thought, moderation of language, and modesty in tone.
The man who had held the most important civil and military offices in the
country almost from boyhood, and who was looked up to by friend and foe
as the most important personage in the three millions of its inhabitants,
apologized for his "presumption" in coming forward publicly with his
advice. "I would not," he said, "in matters of such importance, affect to
be wiser or to make greater pretensions than my age or experience
warrants, yet seeing affairs in such perplexity, I will rather incur the
risk of being charged with forwardness than neglect that which I consider
my duty."

This, then, was the attitude of the principal personages in the
Netherlands, and the situation of affairs at the end of the eventful year
1566, the last year of peace which the men then living or their children
were to know. The government, weak at the commencement, was strong at the
close. The confederacy was broken and scattered. The Request, the beggar
banquets, the public preaching, the image-breaking, the Accord of August,
had been followed by reaction. Tournay had accepted its garrison. Egmont,
completely obedient to the crown, was compelling all the cities of
Flanders and Artois to receive soldiers sufficient to maintain implicit
obedience, and to extinguish all heretical demonstrations, so that the
Regent was at comparative leisure to effect the reduction of
Valenciennes.

This ancient city, in the province of Hainault, and on the frontier of
France, had been founded by the Emperor Valentinian, from whom it had
derived its name. Originally established by him as a city of refuge, it
had received the privilege of affording an asylum to debtors, to outlaws,
and even to murderers. This ancient right had been continued, under
certain modifications, even till the period with which we are now
occupied. Never, however, according to the government, had the right of
asylum, even in the wildest times, been so abused by the city before.
What were debtors, robbers, murderers, compared to heretics? yet these
worst enemies of their race swarmed in the rebellious city, practising
even now the foulest rites of Calvin, and obeying those most pestilential
of all preachers, Guido de Bray, and Peregrine de la Grange. The place
was the hot-bed of heresy and sedition, and it seemed to be agreed, as by
common accord, t