Page:History of England (Froude) Vol 10.djvu/387

 1576.] THE SPANISH TREATY. 367 and the despair of the States was only less than their exasperation. It was the darkest moment in the Prince's fortunes. The Spaniards, whose progress had not been checked by the Viceroy's death, had cut Holland in two. They had taken the islands of Tholen, Duiveland, and Schowen. Boisot, the hero of Leyden, was killed in an attempt to save Zierichsee, and with the fall of that town, Philip's troops were again established upon the sea. For want of the money, which Elizabeth had first promised and then refused, the Dutch fleet was dissolving. 1 The Anglo- Catholic buccaneers seized ship after ship of the Dutch, and flung the crews into the sea. The fierce Hollanders, in savage despair, repaid cruelty with cruelty, The next step was a general arrest of all Dutch vessels in English harbours, and the Prince in retaliation seized the London merchant fleet in the Scheldt, worth, it was said, 2OO,ooo/. Elizabeth, it is quite clear, again believed that the States were about to be overwhelmed, and that her most prudent course was now to assist in their overthrow. She wrote a letter to the Prince, ' the like of which,' he said, ' he had never received from any in the world/ She sent Sir William Winter to extricate the fleet by force or practice. She bade him tell Orange not to 1 ' The Prince has engaged to pay his mariners in confidence of the sum promised. If he is frustrate his force is lost. He begs her Majesty to consider it is hut a hare loan, and all Holland and Zealand are bound for it. His extremity is such that he must be succoured or he is un- done.' M. de G. to "Walsingham, from Flushing, August 30 : MSS. Flanders.