Nevertheless Philip thought it necessary to continue making use of the duke.  Both were indefatigable therefore in expressing feelings of boundless confidence each in the other.

It has been seen too how entirely the king relied on the genius and devotion of Alexander Farnese to carry out his great schemes; and certainly never had monarch a more faithful, unscrupulous, and dexterous servant.  Remonstrating, advising, but still obeying—­entirely without conscience, unless it were conscience to carry out his master’s commands, even when most puerile or most diabolical—­he was nevertheless the object of Philip’s constant suspicion, and felt himself placed under perpetual though secret supervision.

Commander Moreo was unwearied in blackening the duke’s character, and in maligning his every motive and action, and greedily did the king incline his ear to the calumnies steadily instilled by the chivalrous spy.

“He has caused all the evil we are suffering,” said Moreo.  “When he sent Egmont to France ’twas without infantry, although Egmont begged hard for it, as did likewise the Legate, Don Bernardino, and Tassis.  Had he done this there is no doubt at all that the Catholic cause in France would have been safe, and your Majesty would now have the control over that kingdom which you desire.  This is the opinion of friends and foes.  I went to the Duke of Parma and made free to tell him that the whole world would blame him for the damage done to Christianity, since your Majesty had exonerated yourself by ordering him to go to the assistance of the French Catholics with all the zeal possible.  Upon this he was so disgusted that he has never shown me a civil face since.  I doubt whether he will send or go to France at all, and although the Duke of Mayenne despatches couriers every day with protestations and words that would soften rocks, I see no indications of a movement.”

Thus, while the duke was making great military preparations far invading France without means; pawning his own property to get bread for his starving veterans, and hanging those veterans whom starving had made. mutinous, he was depicted, to the most suspicious and unforgiving mortal that ever wore a crown, as a traitor and a rebel, and this while he was renouncing his own judicious and well-considered policy in obedience to the wild schemes of his master.

“I must make bold to remind your Majesty,” again whispered the spy, “that there never was an Italian prince who failed to pursue his own ends, and that there are few in the world that are not wishing to become greater than they are.  This man here could strike a greater blow than all the rest of them put together.  Remember that there is not a villain anywhere that does not desire the death of your Majesty.  Believe me, and send to cut off my head if it shall be found that I am speaking from passion, or from other motive than pure zeal for your royal service.”

The reader will remember into what a paroxysm of rage Alexander was thrown on, a former occasion, when secretly invited to listen to propositions by which the sovereignty over the Netherlands was to be secured to himself, and how near he was to inflicting mortal punishment with his own hand on the man who had ventured to broach that treasonable matter.