With these extensive powers, and with an army of about 10,000 men, chiefly composed of Spanish veterans, Alva reached Genoa on the 17th of May. Thence he marched to the Mont Cenis, and, passing the Alps, pressed northwards. His advance caused considerable apprehension at once to the city of Geneva and the French court. Condé, indeed, offered to raise a force and overwhelm him as he deployed from the mountain passes. But Catherine declined, and contented herself with levying a body of Swiss Catholics to watch his progress. Alva, however, was careful to give no pretext for attack; enforcing the strictest discipline, he proceeded by way of Franche-Comté and Lorraine to Luxemburg. This he reached on August 8, and entered Brussels on the 22nd. Margaret, hurt at the way in which she had been treated, demanded her recall. Her request was not granted till December 1567, but her authority was at an end, and even her protests against the tyranny and cruelty of Alva’s rule were disregarded. The horrors which followed have, perhaps, served to place her eight years’ administration in too favourable a light. And yet, if she had at first acquiesced in the unpopular measures of Granvella, she had subsequently joined the greater nobles and backed their demands for some mitigation of the Inquisition, and for the summoning of the Estates-General. She had, indeed, put down the Iconoclasts with a severe hand, but in this she had been supported by the higher nobility, and probably would not have dissociated herself from their cause. With no great administrative ability, and with some want of initiative, she had a real interest in her charge, and a belief in the loyalty of the greater nobles and in their fitness to rule the country. She would probably not have altogether opposed their request for an extension of the authority of the Estates-General, for a reform of the Council of State, and for some toleration; and, had these been granted, the troubles might have ceased. There was, however, no prospect that Philip would grant such concessions, and under these circumstances a continuation of her rule was impossible. | Egmont and Hoorne arrested, Sept. 9, 1567. Council of | Blood erected.