History of the United Netherlands, 1595

CHAPTER XXXI.

Formal declaration of war against Spain--Marriage festivities--Death
of Archduke Ernest--His year of government--Fuentes declared
governor-general--Disaffection of the Duke of Arschot and Count
Arenberg--Death of the Duke of Arschot----Fuentes besieges Le
Catelet--The fortress of Ham, sold to the Spanish by De Gomeron,
besieged and taken by the Duke of Bouillon--Execution of De
Gomeron--Death of Colonel Verdugo--Siege of Dourlens by Fuentes--
Death of La Motte--Death of Charles Mansfeld--Total defeat of the
French--Murder of Admiral De Pillars--Dourlens captured, and the
garrison and citizens put to the sword--Military operations in
eastern Netherlands and on the Rhine--Maurice lays siege to Groento
--Mondragon hastening to its relief, Prince Maurice raises the
siege--Skirmish between Maurice and Mondragon--Death of Philip of
Nassau--Death of Mondragon--Bombardment and surrender of Weerd
Castle--Maurice retires into winter quarters--Campaign of Henry Iv.-
--He besieges Dijon--Surrender of Dijon--Absolution granted to Henry
by the pope--Career of Balagny at Cambray--Progress of the siege--
Capitulation of the town--Suicide of the Princess of Cambray, wife
of Balagny

The year 1595 Opened with a formal declaration of war by the King of
France against the King of Spain. It would be difficult to say for
exactly how many years the war now declared had already been waged,
but it was a considerable advantage to the United Netherlands that the
manifesto had been at last regularly issued. And the manifesto was
certainly not deficient in bitterness. Not often in Christian history
has a monarch been solemnly and officially accused by a brother sovereign
of suborning assassins against his life. Bribery, stratagem, and murder,
were, however, so entirely the commonplace machinery of Philip's
administration as to make an allusion to the late attempt of Chastel
appear quite natural in Henry's declaration of war. The king further
stigmatized in energetic language the long succession of intrigues by
which the monarch of Spain, as chief of the Holy League, had been making
war upon him by means of his own subjects, for the last half dozcn years.
Certainly there was hardly need of an elaborate statement of grievances.
The deeds of Philip required no herald, unless Henry was prepared to
abdicate his hardly-earned title to the throne of France.

Nevertheless the politic Gascon subsequently regretted the fierce style
in which he had fulminated his challenge. He was accustomed to observe
that no state paper required so much careful pondering as a declaration
of war, and that it was scarcely possible to draw up such a document
without committing many errors in the phraseology. The man who never
knew fear, despondency, nor resentment, was already instinctively acting
on the principle that a king should deal with his enemy as if sure to
become his friend, and with his friends as if they might easily change
to foes.

The answer to the declaration was delayed for two months. When the
reply came it of course breathed nothing but the most benignant
sentiments in regard to France, while it expressed regret that it was
necessary to carry fire and sword through that country in order to avert
the unutterable woe which the crimes of the heretic Prince of Bearne were
bringing upon all mankind.

It was a solace for Philip to call the legitimate king by the title
borne by him when heir-presumptive, and to persist in denying to him that
absolution which, as the whole world was aware, the Vicar of Christ was
at that very moment in the most solemn manner about to bestow upon him.

More devoted to the welfare of France than were the French themselves,
he was determined that a foreign prince himself, his daughter, or one of
his nephews--should