Having attended to his spiritual concerns, Egmont called for writing materials, and wrote a letter to his wife, whom he had not seen during his long confinement; and to her he now bade a tender farewell. He then addrest another letter, written in French, in a few brief and touching sentences, to the King--which fortunately has been preserved to us. "This morning," he says, "I have been made acquainted with the sentence which it has pleased your majesty to pass upon me. And altho it has never been my intent to do aught against the person or the service of your majesty, or against our true, ancient, and Catholic faith, yet I receive in patience what it has pleased God to send me. If during these troubles I have counseled or permitted aught which might seem otherwise, I have done so from a sincere regard for the service of God and your majesty, and from what I believed the necessity of the times. Wherefore I pray your majesty to pardon it, and for the sake of my past services to take pity on my poor wife, my children, and my servants. In this trust I commend myself to the mercy of God." The letter is dated Brussels, "on the point of death," June 5th, 1568. Having time still left, the count made a fair copy of the two letters, and gave them to the bishop, entreating him to deliver them according to their destination. He accompanied that to Philip with a ring, to be given at the same time to the monarch. It was of great value, and, as it had been the gift of Philip himself during the count's late visit to Madrid, it might soften the heart of the King by reminding him of happier days, when he had looked with an eye of favor on his unhappy vassal. Having completed all his arrangements, Egmont became impatient for the hour of his departure; and he exprest the hope that there would be no unnecessary delay. At ten in the morning the soldiers appeared who were to conduct him to the scaffold. They brought with them cords, as usual, to bind the prisoner's hands. But Egmont remonstrated, and showed that he had himself cut off the collar of his doublet and shirt, in order to facilitate the stroke of the executioner. This he did to convince them that he meditated no resistance; and on his promising that he would attempt none, they consented to his remaining with his hands unbound.