The Governor had thus disconcerted the Prince of Orange, not by the firmness of his resistance, but by the amplitude of his concessions.  The combinations of William the Silent were, for an instant, deranged.  Had the Prince expected such liberality, he would have placed his demands upon a higher basis, for it is not probable that he contemplated or desired a pacification.  The Duke of Aerschot and the Bishop of Liege in vain essayed to prevail upon his deputies at Marche en Famine, to sign the agreement of the 27th January, upon which was founded the Perpetual Edict.  They refused to do so without consulting the Prince and the estates.  Meantime, the other commissioners forced the affair rapidly forward.  The states sent a deputation to the Prince to ask his opinion, and signed the agreement before it was possible to receive his reply.  This was to treat him with little courtesy, if not absolutely with bad faith.  The Prince was disappointed and indignant.  In truth, as appeared from all his language and letters, he had no confidence in Don John.  He believed him a consummate hypocrite, and as deadly a foe to the Netherlands as the Duke of Alva, or Philip himself.  He had carefully studied twenty-five intercepted letters from the King, the Governor, Jerome de Roda, and others, placed recently in his hands by the Duke of Aerschot, and had found much to confirm previous and induce fresh suspicion.  Only a few days previously to the signature of the treaty, he had also intercepted other letters from influential personages, Alonzo de Vargas and others, disclosing extensive designs to obtain possession of the strong places in the country, and then to reduce the land to absolute Subjection.  He had assured the estates, therefore, that the deliberate intention of the Government, throughout the whole negotiation, was to deceive, whatever might be the public language of Don John and his agents.  He implored them, therefore, to, have “pity upon the poor country,” and to save the people from falling into the trap which was laid for them.  From first to last, he had expressed a deep and wise distrust, and justified it by ample proofs.  He was, with reason, irritated, therefore, at the haste with which the states had concluded the agreement with Don John—­at the celerity with which, as he afterwards expressed it, “they had rushed upon the boar-spear of that sanguinary heart.”  He believed that everything had been signed and Sworn by the Governor, with the mental reservation that such agreements were valid only until he should repent having made them.  He doubted the good faith and the stability of the grand seigniors.  He had never felt confidence in the professions of the time-serving Aerschot, nor did he trust even the brave Champagny, notwithstanding his services at the sack of Antwerp.  He was especially indignant that provision had been made, not for demolishing but for restoring to his Majesty those hateful citadels, nests of tyranny, by which the flourishing cities of