Page:A history of the gunpowder plot-The conspiracy and its agents (1904).djvu/263

Rh regard to his fighting faithfully for the Queen against his co-religionists. After quitting Ireland, Stanley was selected to hold a command under the Earl of Leicester in the Netherlands, but, before joining the Earl, returned on a brief visit to the Emerald Isle, where he raised a force of about thirteen hundred men to serve under Leicester. At this juncture, Stanley was evidently meditating treason, and was in constant but secret communication with certain Jesuit priests in England, and with the Spanish Ambassador in London.

Arrived in Holland, he fought by the side of Sir Philip Sidney at Zutphen, and evidently won the complete confidence of Leicester, who entrusted to him and his Irishmen the care of the walled town of Deventer, which he was to hold against the Spaniards. But, on January 29, 1587, he threw open the gates of this city to the enemy, and he and most of his men entered the service of Spain, to the undisguised joy of the Jesuits, and to the consternation of the English Government. Henceforth, Stanley's life was utterly changed. No man ever more completely destroyed all prospects of a brilliant career than had he by the surrender of Deventer. By the States-General, acting in concert with England, a price was put upon his head, and he went to