Orange used all his influence and persuasiveness to induce them to accept Anjou.

Anjou, as we have seen, had already agreed to the conditions under which he should, when invited, become "prince and lord" of the Netherlands.

In the autumn of 1581 the position was an ambiguous one.

The States-General claimed that, after the abjuration of Philip, the sovereignty of the provinces had reverted to them, as the common representative of a group of provinces that were now sovereign in their own right, and that the conferring of that sovereignty on another overlord was their prerogative.

The position of Orange was peculiar, for _de facto_ under one title or another he exercised the chief authority in each one of the rebel provinces, but in the name of the States-General, instead of the king.