furnished of my secret despatches.  This is the real source of the complaints against me.  The rest of the charges, relating to the Third and other matters, are but pretexts.  To parry the blow, they pretend that all that is said and done with the Spaniard is but feigning.  Who is going to believe that?  Has not the Pope intervened in the affair? . . .  I tell you they are furious here because I have my eyes open.  I see too far into their affairs to suit their purposes.  A new man would suit them better.”

His position was hopelessly compromised.  He remained in Paris, however, month after month, and even year after year, defying his enemies both at the Queen’s court and in Holland, feeding fat the grudge he bore to Barneveld as the supposed author of the intrigue against him, and drawing closer the personal bands which united him to Bouillon and through him to Prince Maurice.

The wrath of the Ambassador flamed forth without disguise against Barneveld and all his adherents when his removal, as will be related on a subsequent page, was at last effected.  And his hatred was likely to be deadly.  A man with a shrewd, vivid face, cleanly cut features and a restless eye; wearing a close-fitting skull cap, which gave him something the lock of a monk, but with the thoroughbred and facile demeanour of one familiar with the world; stealthy, smooth, and cruel, a man coldly intellectual, who feared no one, loved but few, and never forgot or forgave; Francis d’Aerssens, devoured by ambition and burning with revenge, was a dangerous enemy.

Time was soon to show whether it was safe to injure him.  Barneveld, from well-considered motives of public policy, was favouring his honourable recall.  But he allowed a decorous interval of more than three years to elapse in which to terminate his affairs, and to take a deliberate departure from that French embassy to which the Advocate had originally promoted him, and in which there had been so many years of mutual benefit and confidence between the two statesmen.  He used no underhand means.  He did not abuse the power of the States-General which he wielded to cast him suddenly and brutally from the distinguished post which he occupied, and so to attempt to dishonour him before the world.  Nothing could be more respectful and conciliatory than the attitude of the government from first to last towards this distinguished functionary.  The Republic respected itself too much to deal with honourable agents whose services it felt obliged to dispense with as with vulgar malefactors who had been detected in crime.  But Aerssens believed that it was the Advocate who had caused copies of his despatches to be sent to the French court, and that he had deliberately and for a fixed purpose been undermining his influence at home and abroad and blackening his character.  All his ancient feelings of devotion, if they had ever genuinely existed towards his former friend and patron, turned to gall.  He was almost ready to deny that he had ever respected Barneveld, appreciated his public services, admired his intellect, or felt gratitude for his guidance.