"....Concerning my own journey I desire to say as much as the time will allow me, leaving to others to tell you more at length how I shall go. I journey to Flanders in disguise through France, and, next to God, the disguise will save me. I go, not a little contented to be able to do you some service;--(Don John had busied himself much in procuring for Don Garcia the promise of a grandeeship of the first class);--"desiring to encounter perils, and by no means fatiguing myself with these new labours which I have undertaken. Money is short, and my present necessities great. In the end God hath to take up this his cause in every way, and to aid me individually with a miracle. You must let me know where I shall receive your letters, and I will advise you, God willing, of my safe arrival: and I beseech you to tell me alway of your health, and to advertise me, as is your habit, of your opinion as to my doings; and to make use of me in all ways as a sincere friend, and as such I congratulate you on the marriage of Don Pedro, and on the state in which the Señora Doña Elvira is; and may it all turn out as you may best desire. From the Pardo, the 17th Oct., 1576. At your service, DON JUAN."[35] We gather the particulars of his journey through France from Brantôme, who says that "Don John without any great suite, and in order to go with greater certainty, rode post with six companions only; having with him Señor Don Otavio Gonzagua as his confidant, and a French postilion, whom he found in Spain, as his guide; the latter was, moreover, an excellent companion, and knew every road, lane, and bye-path in France. This man led Don John across France in most dangerous and unquiet times: in Guyenne they were on the eve of a war, which indeed broke out some three months after. Don John arrived in Paris, and got off his horse at the hotel of the Spanish Ambassador in the street of St Anthoine."[36] That same night he seems to have gone to a great ball at the Louvre, where he was much struck with the beauty of the Queen of Navarre, before whom he stood like one entranced. The following day, Don John, still full of Marguerite of Navarre, saw the palace and the other sights of Paris, and started again on his journey,--no one having an idea, till he was gone, that he had been in Paris at all. He travelled again in disguise, and on horseback, to the Duchy of Luxemburg, and thence to Flanders, where he found that Antwerp had just been taken and sacked. Shortly after his arrival peace was concluded; one of the first conditions of which was the departure of all Spanish troops by land. We shall see that they were forced to go to Italy instead of by sea to England, and were said to be so charged with booty that they could scarce walk. We find Don John writing in the following terms to Don Garcia de Toledo, on the 21st February, 1577, after peace had been concluded.