The Prince, was saved, but unhappily the murderer had yet found an illustrious victim.  The Princess of Orange; Charlotte de Bourbon—­the devoted wife who for seven years, had so faithfully shared his joys and sorrows—­lay already on her death-bed.  Exhausted by anxiety, long watching; and the alternations of hope and fear during the first eighteen days, she had been prostrated by despair at the renewed haemorrhage.  A violent fever seized her, under which she sank on the 5th of May, three days after the solemn thanksgiving for her husband’s recovery.  The Prince, who loved her tenderly, was in great danger of relapse upon the sad event, which, although not sudden, had not been anticipated.  She was laid in her grave on the 9th of May, amid the lamentations of the whole country, for her virtues were universally known and cherished.  She was a woman of rare intelligence, accomplishment, and gentleness of disposition; whose only offence had been to break, by her marriage, the Church vows to which she had been forced in her childhood, but which had been pronounced illegal by competent authority, both ecclesiastical and lay.  For this, and for the contrast which her virtues afforded to the vices of her predecessor, she was the mark of calumny and insult.  These attacks, however, had cast no shadow upon the serenity of her married life, and so long as she lived she was the trusted companion and consoler of her husband.  “His Highness,” wrote Count John in 1580, “is in excellent health, and, in spite of adversity, incredible labor, perplexity, and dangers, is in such good spirits that, it makes me happy to witness it.  No doubt a chief reason is the consolation he derives from the pious and highly-intelligent wife whom, the Lord has given him —­a woman who ever conforms to his wishes, and is inexpressibly dear to him.”

The Princess left six daughters—­Louisa Juliana, Elizabeth, Catharina Belgica, Flandrina, Charlotta Brabantica, and Emilia Secunda.

Parma received the first intelligence of the attempt from the mouth of Anastro himself, who assured him that the deed had been entirely successful, and claimed the promised reward.

Alexander, in consequence, addressed circular letters to the authorities of Antwerp, Brussels, Bruges, and other cities, calling upon them, now that they had been relieved of their tyrant and their betrayer, to return again to the path of their duty and to the ever open arms of their lawful monarch.  These letters were premature.  On the other hand, the states of Holland and Zealand remained in permanent session, awaiting with extreme anxiety the result of the Prince’s wound.  “With the death of his Excellency, if God should please to take him to himself,” said the magistracy of Leyden, “in the death of the Prince we all foresee our own death.”  It was, in truth, an anxious moment, and the revulsion of feeling consequent on his recovery was proportionately intense.