Ostend and Sluys, however, were still in the hands of the patriots, and with them the control of the whole Flemish coast.

The command of the sea was destined to remain for centuries with the new republic.
The Prince of Parma, thus encouraged by the great success of his intrigues, was determined to achieve still greater triumphs with his arms, and steadily proceeded with his large design of closing the Scheldt--and bringing about the fall of Antwerp.

The details of that siege-one of the most brilliant military operations of the age and one of the most memorable in its results--will be given, as a connected whole, in a subsequent series of chapters.

For the present, it will be better for the reader who wishes a clear view of European politics at this epoch, and of the position of the Netherlands, to give his attention to the web of diplomatic negotiation and court-intrigue which had been slowly spreading over the leading states of Christendom, and in which the fate of the world was involved.

If diplomatic adroitness consists mainly in the power to deceive, never were more adroit diplomatists than those of the sixteenth century.