Viglius, much against his will, had been induced, provisionally, to supply his place.  But there was now hardly a pretence of friendship between the learned Frisian and the Governor.  Each cordially detested the other.  Alva was weary of Flemish and Frisian advisers, however subservient, and was anxious to fill the whole council with Spaniards of the Vargas stamp.  He had forced Viglius once more into office, only that, by a little delay, he might expel him and every Netherlander at the same moment.  “Till this ancient set of dogmatizers be removed,” he wrote to Philip, “with Viglius, their chief, who teaches them all their lessons, nothing will go right.  ’Tis of no use adding one or two Spaniards to fill vacancies; that is only pouring a flask of good wine into a hogshead of vinegar; it changes to vinegar likewise.  Your Majesty will soon be able to reorganize the council at a blow; so that Italians or Spaniards, as you choose, may entirely govern the country.”

Such being his private sentiments with regard to his confidential advisers, it may be supposed that his intercourse with his council during the year was not like to be amicable.  Moreover, he had kept himself, for the most part, at a distance from the seat of government.  During the military operations in Holland, his head-quarters had been at Amsterdam.  Here, as the year drew to its close, he had become as unpopular as in Brussels.  The time-serving and unpatriotic burghers, who, at the beginning of the spring, set up his bust in their houses, and would give large sums for his picture in little, now broke his images and tore his portraits from their walls, for it was evident that the power of his name was gone, both with prince and people.  Yet, certainly, those fierce demonstrations which had formerly surrounded his person with such an atmosphere of terror had not slackened or become less frequent than heretofore.  He continued to prove that he could be barbarous, both on a grand and a minute scale.  Even as in preceding years, he could ordain wholesale massacres with a breath, and superintend in person the executions of individuals.  This was illustrated, among other instances, by the cruel fate of Uitenhoove.  That unfortunate nobleman, who had been taken prisoner in the course of the summer, was accused of having been engaged in the capture of Brill, and was, therefore, condemned by the Duke to be roasted to death before a slow fire.  He was accordingly fastened by a chain, a few feet in length, to a stake, around which the fagots were lighted.  Here he was kept in slow torture for a long time, insulted by the gibes of the laughing Spaniards who surrounded him—­until the executioner and his assistants, more humane than their superior, despatched the victim with their spears—­a mitigation of punishment which was ill received by Alva.  The Governor had, however, no reason to remain longer in Amsterdam.  Harlem had fallen; Alkmaar was relieved; and Leyden—­destined in its second siege to furnish so signal a chapter to the history of the war—­was beleaguered, it was true, but, because known to be imperfectly supplied, was to be reduced by blockade rather than by active operations.  Don Francis Valdez was accordingly left in command of the siege, which, however, after no memorable occurrences, was raised, as will soon be related.