war, and his efforts for a time proved successful; as Mary, whose best quality was the warm attachment which she entertained towards her husband, and her great anxiety for the success of all his undertakings, sent as many as eight thousand men, under the Earl of Pembroke, to join Philip's army. This proved an important accession, though the English troops soon became so discontented at fighting, as they said, the battles of the Spaniards instead of their own, that it was soon found necessary to allow them to return home again.

Another brilliant victory, soon after gained over the French by the Count Egmont, at a place called Gravelines, so enraged the Duke of Guise that he swore, at the risk of his life, to wipe away these stains from the French arms, and to attempt the capture of Calais, the only remaining possession held at that time by the English on the soil of France, and which had been retained by them ever since the reign of Edward III. The long tenure of Calais by the English had made them neglectful of the proper defences of the fortress; they, notwithstanding the contrary and urgent representations of Philip, considering its position impregnable. The Duke of Guise, in consequence, easily made himself master of the place; and thus terminated the campaign by a brilliant achievement.

Philip and Henry of France, whose finances were in any thing but a flourishing condition, were mutually anxious for peace, being aware that neither of them had any great end to gain by a continuation of the war. The hot-headed Constable de Montmorency, who was by this time tired of his long residence in prison, opened negotiations on the part of his master, which were afterwards continued by more able agents at Cateau Cambresis, where the Duke of Alva, the Prince of Orange, and Cardinal Granvelle, on the part of Philip, ably distinguished themselves. The whole of the dominions of the Duke of Savoy which had been conquered during the war were restored, and Philip's allies regained what they had lost in the contest.

Fortune was somewhat a harder goddess to Henry, who did not come off better in negotiation than he had done in war, the claims of his allies being neglected, and he himself only compensated for the expense and defeats of war by the cession of Calais.

Philip, we are told, found great difficulty in persuading the English envoy to relinquish Calais; and, in the midst of negotiations on this point, Mary, Queen of England, died. It was at length settled that Calais should be yielded up to the French, be retained by them for the period of five years, and that it should then either be restored to the English, or else that the conquerors should pay the sum of five thousand crowns in gold as a compensation.

Although the Emperor Charles V had abdicated the imperial

throne of Germany soon after that of Spain and the Low Countries, he was still considered Emperor, as Philip little desired that a new Emperor should be crowned during the disturbed state in which Europe then was. Charles V had in vain endeavoured to induce the electors to appoint his son Philip King of the Romans; and, with as little success, attempted to persuade his brother Ferdinand to relinquish that dignity in favour of his nephew. Philip's character was still less suited to the Germans than to the Flemings, as it is probable that, had he been crowned Emperor of Germany, he would have annulled the concessions to the Protestants made by his father at the treaty of Passau, in 1550, and have endeavoured to reduce the princes of the Empire to the same condition as the nobles in the other countries of Europe, and have thus hastened the disasters of the thirty years' war, a century earlier than they actually occurred. However, since the advantageous peace of Cateau Cambresis had been signed, there was nothing to hinder the coronation of the Emperor from taking place; and Ferdinand, the uncle of Philip, duly received the insignia of the Empire, and was crowned with great splendour.

An entirely new set of actors now took possession of the stage. The haughty Pontiff, Paul IV, no longer lived, having passed away without being regretted by his subjects; though history looks somewhat lightly on his faults, and admires the courage he displayed in attempting to carry out the policy of Julius II, by driving the barbarians from Italy. His ally, Henry II of France, whose brilliant qualities rather gave him popularity amongst his subjects than fame amongst his contemporaries, had been killed at a tournament, in the year 1559; and, in England, the Bloody Queen Mary had been succeded by her sister Elizabeth, one of the wisest princesses whom that or any other age had produced.

Philip, as is well known, no sooner heard of Elizabeth's accession, than he at once made proposals of marriage to his deceased wife's sister; and was not at first rejected, though his advances were but coldly received. It was not, however, until he made it a sine qua non that the Queen should adopt the Roman Catholic religion in the event of becoming his wife, that she decidedly refused his advances; from which period, Elizabeth became the staunch upholder of the Protestant religion, and consequently the bitterest enemy of the Catholic Philip.

Mr.

Philip remained in the Netherlands for some time after the peace was proclaimed, and occupied himself in the affairs of that country, where the Protestant religion was making great progress. Prescott has thought proper to give us some account of the early history and government of the Low Countries, in which he has shown great research; for, although the general reader might have

been perfectly aware that the towns of Liege, Ghent, Bruges, Antwerp, and Amsterdam, were the great marts for the exchange of goods from the Hanse towns and the North, for those of the Republics of Venice and Genoa, India and the Levant; yet, until his history appeared, there was no book which gave a clear account of their early government and languages.

Mr. Hume had cursorily informed us, in his History of England, that our Edward III joined the courts of Heinault and Brabant, and aided the people of Flanders in their revolt against their Count and liege lord, Philip VI; and also states, in the earlier portion of his work, that two of the Flemish counts were celebrated in the wars of the Crusades. It was not, however, the object of Mr. Hume to enter very fully into an account of the Flemish government; though the readers of his History may gain from his brief notice of their doings that the Flemings were early distinguished for their free and independent spirit.

Sir W. Scott has also, in his amusing novel of Quentin Durward, ably described the courts and policy of Louis XI of France, and Charles the Bold of Burgundy, and has furnished us with many interesting particulars of Flemish manners and customs. He enters into a very full description of the contests which took place between the good Burghers of Liege and their Bishop; but, as his work is a novel and not a history, he could not well afford to give any previous account of the country.

Bentivoglio, a contemporary historian, who lived about the time of the Dutch war, and wrote his famous history of that very celebrated contest, although he enters very fully into the motives which led to its commencement, and gives almost word for word the speeches of the Prince of Eboli and the Duke of Alva, at the council board, when their opinions were demanded upon the measures about to be taken against the Protestants in Holland, yet does not give us any very clear idea of what either the previous Flemish government had been, or what it was at the time when this famous struggle began. It was reserved, therefore, for Mr. Prescott, with his clear judgment, untiring industry, and amusing style, to give us an early sketch of these important provinces of the Spanish monarchy. It would appear, from his account, that they were not originally united together, but that each followed its own mode of constitution; though all seem to have had a legislative body, some more liberally formed than others. They also differed in language, as the inhabitants of those states which bordered on France spoke French as their native language; whilst those who were in the vicinity of Germany used a kind of bad German, which is now known by the name of Dutch. The affairs of the whole community were administered by the States General, which were composed of the

nobles, the clergy, and deputies from different states or towns. Their powers seem to have been much the same as the Parliament in England; as they could pass laws, levy taxes, and petition the sovereign against abuses. The sovereign nevertheless held in his hands the appointment of officers and the conferring of all dignities; and thus was enabled, towards the sixteenth century, to acquire a very large share of power. The towns were, however, very much left to their own government; and, as Mr. Prescott well remarks, "they greatly remind us of the early Italian republics."

The Flemings do not seem to have been much engaged in war with their neighbours, as they were more profitably employed in commerce; and the common people were remarkable for a freedom of spirit and a degree of information rarely to be met with in the same class amongst the other nations of Europe at that period. The vast territories of the Emperor Charles V, coupled with the fact that he himself was a Fleming, gave great extension to their trade in all parts of the world. This sagacious prince could not but be aware that his own power would increase in the same ratio as the prosperity of his subjects, and he therefore gave all due encouragement to their commerce and enterprise; and under his sway the Flemish increased both in wealth and prosperity. It was not to be wondered at that, with their foreign trade, their independent spirit, and their proximity to Germany, where the Reformation first took its rise, that the Lutheran doctrines should have made great progress, and it was still less to be expected that a prince like Charles V, who connected the idea of Protestantism with civil liberty, and who had used his most strenuous efforts to put down the Lutheran princes in Germany, would sit calmly by and see the reformed faith taking deep root without making an attempt to stem its torrent. We, accordingly, find that he promulgated several edicts against those who held the new doctrines, and even attempted to establish the Inquisition in the Netherlands, although such a proceeding was in direct violation of the constitution. As many as fifty thousand persons are said to have suffered in the Netherlands for their religious opinions; but we quite agree with Mr. Prescott in thinking it unlikely that such a number could have been sacrificed for their creed, as it would have occasioned a similar resistance to Charles's authority as was afterwards encountered by his son. Notwithstanding this religious oppression, and the numerous efforts Charles was obliged to make to curb the turbulent spirit of his Flemish subjects, he neverthelss was proud of them, and governed them with comparative leniency; whilst they, in return, loved, admired, and respected their great monarch, being willing to bear the burdens of the wars in which they took but little part and from which they could derive but scanty advantage. Many

of their leaders, however, in the subsequent struggle with Spain, had learned their first lessons in war and politics under Charles V; while, with his son, the case was far otherwise. Philip was a foreigner, and, having been brought up a Spaniard, he, no doubt, looked with contempt on the Flemings, and would have attempted to reduce them to greater subjection, even in their civil governments, had they been all staunch Catholics; but he was a still more uncompromising supporter of the Catholic Church than his father had been; and never allowed reasons of policy to stand between him and his darling object of rendering the Roman Catholic faith the one universal religion of his dominions.

(To be continued.)

THE LITTLE MERMAID.

Translated from the German of Hans Andersen.

FAR out in the sea, the water is as blue as the petals of the most beautiful corn-flower, and as clear as the purest glass; but it is very deep-deeper than the cable of any anchor can reach; you must place many church towers one on the other before you can reach from the bottom to the top. Below, yonder dwell the sea-people.

Now, it must not be believed that there is only barren, white sand-soil there. No; there grow the most wonderful trees and plants, which are so pliant in stalk and leaves that they are affected by the slightest movement of the water, just as if they were alive. All fish, great and small, glide through the branches exactly as the birds above through the trees. In the deepest place of all lies the SeaKing's castle. The walls are of coral, and the long-pointed windows of the clearest amber; but the roof is formed of muscle-shells, which open and shut themselves, as the water flows. They look splendid; for in every one there are beaming pearls, a single one of which would be of great value in a queen's crown.

The Sea-King had been a widower for many years; and his old mother kept house for him. She was a clever woman; but proud of her birth, because she bore twelve oysters on her tail, whilst the