She regarded this cruel deed of Alba as a false step at any rate, for, though she kept so far aloof from the Netherland burghers and common people, she perceived what deep indignation this measure aroused.

Meanwhile the Prince of Orange, the spirit and soul of this execrable rebellion, had escaped the sentence of the court.

Nevertheless, she regarded Alba with great admiration, for he was a man of ability, whom the Emperor Charles had held in high esteem.  Besides, after her husband’s death the haughty noble had been courteous enough to assure her of his sympathy.

Moreover, a time was just approaching in which she withdrew too far from this conflict to follow it with full attention, for her son’s first deed of heroism became known in Brussels.

The King had appointed John to the command of the fleet, and sent him against the pirates upon the African coast.  He could now gather his first laurels, and to do everything in her power for the success of his arms, Barbara spent the greater portion of her time in church, praying devoutly.  In September he was greeted in Madrid as a conqueror, but her joy was not unclouded; for the Infant Don Carlos had yielded up his young life in July as a prisoner, and she believed him to be her John’s best friend, and lamented his death because she thought that it would grieve her hero son.

But this little cloud soon vanished, and how brilliantly the blue sky arched above her the next year, when she learned that Don John of Austria had received the honourable commission of crushing the rebellion of the infidel Moriscoes in Andalusia!  Here her royal son first proved himself a glorious military hero, and his deeds at the siege of Galera and before Seron filled her maternal heart with inexpressible pride.  The words which he shouted to his retreating men:  “Do you call yourselves Spaniards and not know what honour means?  What have you to fear when I am with you?” echoed in her ears like the most beautiful melody which she had ever sting or heard.

Yet a dark shadow fell on these radiant joys also; her John’s friend and foster-father, Don Luis Quijada, had been wounded in these battles, and died from his injuries.  Barbara felt what deep pain this would cause her distant son, and expressed her sympathy to him in a letter.

But the greatest happiness was still in store for her and for him.  On the 7th of October, 1571, the young hero, now twenty-four years old, as commander of the united fleets of Spain, Venice, and the Pope, gained the greatest victory which any Castilian force had ever won over the troops of the infidels.