“The princes and most gentlemen,” here continued the Ambassador, “believe that these reciprocal and double marriages will bring about great changes in Christendom if they take the course which the authors of them intend, however much they may affect to believe that no novelties are impending.  The marriages were proposed to the late king, and approved by him, during the negotiations for the truce, and had Don Pedro do Toledo been able to govern himself, as Jeannin has just been telling me, the United Provinces would have drawn from it their assured security.  What he means by that, I certainly cannot conceive, for Don Pedro proposed the marriage of the Dauphin (now Louis XIII.) with the Infanta on the condition that Henry should renounce all friendship with your Mightinesses, and neither openly nor secretly give you any assistance.  You were to be entirely abandoned, as an example for all who throw off the authority of their lawful prince.  But his Majesty answered very generously that he would take no conditions; that he considered your Mightinesses as his best friends, whom he could not and would not forsake.  Upon this Don Pedro broke off the negotiation.  What should now induce the King of Spain to resume the marriage negotiations but to give up the conditions, I am sure I don’t know, unless, through the truce, his designs and his ambition have grown flaccid.  This I don’t dare to hope, but fear, on the contrary, that he will so manage the irresolution, weakness, and faintheartedness of this kingdom as through the aid of his pensioned friends here to arrive at all his former aims.”

Certainly the Ambassador painted the condition of France in striking and veracious colours, and he was quite right in sending the information which he was first to discover, and which it was so important for the States to know.  It was none the less certain in Barneveld’s mind that the best, not the worst, must be made of the state of affairs, and that France should not be assisted in throwing herself irrecoverably into the arms of Spain.

“Refuge will tell you,” said Aerssens, a little later, “that these marriages will not interfere with the friendship of France for you nor with her subsidies, and that no advantage will be given to Spain in the treaty to your detriment or that of her other allies.  But whatever fine declarations they may make, it is sure to be detrimental.  And all the princes, gentlemen, and officers here have the same conviction.  Those of the Reformed religion believe that the transaction is directed solely against the religion which your Mightinesses profess, and that the next step will be to effect a total separation between the two religions and the two countries.”