During the years 1570-71 there were however few outward signs of the gradual undermining of Alva’s authority.  There was sullen resentment and discontent throughout the land, but no attempt at overt resistance.  The iron hand of the governor-general did not relax its firm grasp of the reins of power, and the fear of his implacable vengeance filled men’s hearts.  He ruled by force, not by love; and those who refused to submit had either to fly the country or to perish by the hands of the executioner.  Nevertheless during these sad years the Prince of Orange and Lewis of Nassau, in spite of the apparent hopelessness of the situation, were unremitting in their efforts to raise fresh forces.  William at Dillenburg exerted himself to the uttermost to obtain assistance from the Protestant princes of the Rhineland.  With the Calvinists he was, however, as yet strongly suspect.  He himself was held to be a lukewarm convert from Catholicism to the doctrines of Augsburg; and his wife was the daughter and heiress of Maurice of Saxony, the champion of Lutheranism.  William’s repudiation of Anne of Saxony for her repeated infidelities (March, 1571) severed this Lutheran alliance.  The unfortunate Anne, after six years’ imprisonment, died insane in 1577.  At the same time the closest relations of confidence and friendship sprang up between Orange and the well-known Calvinist writer and leader, Philip de Marnix, lord of Sainte Aldegonde.  This connection with Sainte Aldegonde ensured for William the support of the Calvinists; and secret agents of the prince were soon busily at work in the different parts of the provinces promising armed assistance and collecting levies for the raising of an invading force.  Foremost among these active helpers were Jacob van Wesenbeke, Diedrich Sonoy and Paul Buys; and the chief scene of their operations were the provinces of Holland and Zeeland, already distinguished for their zeal in the cause of freedom.  The amount of cash that was raised was, however, for some time very small.  There was goodwill in plenty, but the utter failure of the prince’s earlier efforts had made people despair.

These earlier efforts had indeed, on land, been disastrous, but they had not been confined entirely to land operations.  Orange, in his capacity as a sovereign prince, had given letters of marque to a number of vessels under the command of the lord of Dolhain.  These vessels were simply corsairs and they were manned by fierce fanatical sectaries, desperadoes inflamed at once by bitter hatred of the papists and by the hope of plunder.  These “Beggars of the Sea” (Gueux de mer), as they were called, rapidly increased in number and soon made themselves a terror in the narrow seas by their deeds of reckless daring and cruelty.  William tried in vain to restrain excesses which brought him little profit and no small discredit.  It was to no purpose that he associated the lord of Lumbres in the chief command with Dolhain.