He now, however, ventured a step farther.  Presuming upon the indulgence which he had already experienced; and bravely assuming the tone of injured innocence, he ascribed the enterprise partly to accident, and partly to the insubordination of his troops.  This was the ground which he adopted in his interviews with the states’ commissioners.  So also, in a letter addressed to Van der Tympel, commandant of Brussels, in which he begged for supplies for his troops, he described the recent invasion of Antwerp as entirely unexpected by himself, and beyond his control.  He had been intending, he said, to leave the city and to join his army.  A tumult had accidentally arisen between his soldiers and the guard at the gate.  Other troops rushing in from without, had joined in the affray, so that to, his great sorrow, an extensive disorder had arisen.  He manifested the same Christian inclination to forgive, however, which he had before exhibited.  He observed that “good men would never grow cold in his regard, or find his affection diminished.”  He assured Van der Tympel, in particular, of his ancient goodwill, as he knew him to be a lover of the common weal.

In his original communications he had been both cringing and threatening but, at least, he had not denied truths which were plain as daylight.  His new position considerably damaged his cause.  This forgiving spirit on the part of the malefactor was a little more than the states could bear, disposed as they felt, from policy, to be indulgent, and to smooth over the crime as gently as possible.  The negotiations were interrupted, and the authorities of Antwerp published a brief and spirited defence of their own conduct.  They denied that any affront or want of respect on their part could have provoked the outrage of which the Duke had been guilty.  They severely handled his self-contradiction, in ascribing originally the recent attempt to his just vengeance for past injuries, and in afterwards imputing it to accident or sudden mutiny, while they cited the simultaneous attempts at Bruges, Denremonde, Alost, Digmuyde, Newport, Ostend, Vilvoorde, and Dunkirk, as a series of damning proofs of a deliberate design.

The publication of such plain facts did not advance the negotiations when resumed.  High and harsh words were interchanged between his Highness and the commissioners, Anjou complaining, as usual, of affronts and indignities, but when pushed home for particulars, taking refuge in equivocation.  “He did not wish,” he said, “to re-open wounds which had been partially healed.”  He also affected benignity, and wishing to forgive and to forget, he offered some articles as the basis of a fresh agreement.  Of these it is sufficient to state that they were entirely different from the terms of the Bordeaux treaty, and that they were rejected as quite inadmissible.