The provinces, now all united again under an emperor, were treated, opulent and powerful as they were, as obscure dependencies.  The regency over them was entrusted by Charles to his near relatives, who governed in the interest of his house, not of the country.  His course towards them upon the religious question will be hereafter indicated.  The political character of his administration was typified, and, as it were, dramatized, on the occasion of the memorable insurrection at Ghent.  For this reason, a few interior details concerning that remarkable event, seem requisite.

XI.

Ghent was, in all respects, one of the most important cities in Europe.  Erasmus, who, as a Hollander and a courtier, was not likely to be partial to the turbulent Flemings, asserted that there was no town in all Christendom to be compared to it for size, power, political constitution, or the culture of its inhabitants.  It was, said one of its inhabitants at the epoch of the insurrection, rather a country than a city.  The activity and wealth of its burghers were proverbial.  The bells were rung daily, and the drawbridges over the many arms of the river intersecting the streets were raised, in order that all business might be suspended, while the armies of workmen were going to or returning from their labors.  As early as the fourteenth century, the age of the Arteveldes, Froissart estimated the number of fighting men whom Ghent could bring into the field at eighty thousand.  The city, by its jurisdiction over many large but subordinate towns, disposed of more than its own immediate population, which has been reckoned as high as two hundred thousand.

Placed in the midst of well cultivated plains, Ghent was surrounded by strong walls, the external circuit of which measured nine miles.  Its streets and squares were spacious and elegant, its churches and other public buildings numerous and splendid.  The sumptuous church of Saint John or Saint Bavon, where Charles the Fifth had been baptized, the ancient castle whither Baldwin Bras de Fer had brought the daughter of Charles the Bald, the city hall with its graceful Moorish front, the well-known belfry, where for three centuries had perched the dragon sent by the Emperor Baldwin of Flanders from Constantinople, and where swung the famous Roland, whose iron tongue had called the citizens, generation after generation, to arms, whether to win battles over foreign kings at the head of their chivalry, or to plunge their swords in each others’ breasts, were all conspicuous in the city and celebrated in the land.  Especially the great bell was the object of the burghers’ affection, and, generally, of the sovereign’s hatred; while to all it seemed, as it were, a living historical personage, endowed with the human powers and passions which it had so long directed and inflamed.