Villages were burned and rifled, highways infested, cities threatened, and the whole country subjected to perpetual black mail (brandschatzung)--fire-insurance levied by the incendiaries in person--by the supporters of the rival bishops.

Truchsess had fled to Delft, where he had been countenanced and supported by Orange.

Two cities still held for him, Rheinberg and Neuss.

On the other hand, his rival, Ernest of Bavaria; supported by Philip II., and the occasional guest of Alexander of Parma, had not yet succeeded in establishing a strong foothold in the territory.

Two pauper archbishops, without men or means of their own, were thus pushed forward and back, like puppets, by the contending highwaymen on either side; while robbery and murder, under the name of Protestantism or Catholicism, were for a time the only motive or result of the contest.
Thus along the Rhine, as well as the Maas and the Scheldt, the fires of civil war were ever burning.