of the age. Moreover there was a deficiency of regular troops: The
burgher-militia were well trained and courageous, but not distinguished
for their docility. There was also a regiment of English under Colonel
Morgan, a soldier of great experience, and much respected; but, as
Stephen Le Sieur said, "this force, unless seconded with more, was but a
breakfast for the enemy." Unfortunately, too, the insubordination, which
was so ripe in the city, seemed to affect these auxiliaries. A mutiny
broke out among the English troops. Many deserted to Parma, some escaped
to England, and it was not until Morgan had beheaded Captain Lee and
Captain Powell, that discipline could be restored.

And into this scene of wild and deafening confusion came Philip de
Marnix, Lord of Sainte Aldegonde.

There were few more brilliant characters than he in all Christendom. He
was a man, of a most rare and versatile genius. Educated in Geneva at
the very feet of Calvin, he had drunk, like mother's milk, the strong and
bitter waters of the stern reformer's, creed; but he had in after life
attempted, although hardly with success, to lift himself to the height of
a general religious toleration. He had also been trained in the severe
and thorough literary culture which characterised that rigid school. He
was a scholar, ripe and rare; no holiday trifler in the gardens of
learning. He spoke and wrote Latin like his native tongue. He could
compose poignant Greek epigrams. He was so familiar with Hebrew, that he
had rendered the Psalms of David out of the original into flowing Flemish
verse, for the use of the reformed churches. That he possessed the
modern tongues of civilized Europe, Spanish, Italian, French, and German,
was a matter of course. He was a profound jurisconsult, capable of
holding debate against all competitors upon any point of theory or
practice of law, civil, municipal, international. He was a learned