Research into this period will amply repay the explorer with enlarged ideas of its meaning and its issues. Of the Queen-mother "naught extenuate nor aught set down in malice." Catherine compares more than favorably with Marie de' Medici, whom history has painted in brighter hue. Bigotry has blasted the name of one who for her time was at least the equal of any ruler in Europe. HEROIC AGE OF THE NETHERLANDS SIEGE OF LEYDEN A.D. 1573 THOMAS HENRY DYER Events followed one another rapidly after the rising of the Netherlanders in 1566. The organization of the Gueux ("beggars"), the league of noblemen pledged to resist the introduction of the Inquisition into the Low Countries by Philip II of Spain, had shown itself prepared for extreme action in self-defence. The name Gueux, first used in contempt, was borne in honor by the patriots in the ensuing war, which Philip conducted as a "war of extermination." In 1567 the Duke of Alva, a famous veteran of the wars of Charles V and of Philip, was sent to the Netherlands as governor, where his cruelties soon made him notorious. He established the court known as the Council of Blood, which first sat in September, 1567. In less than three months this tribunal put to death eighteen hundred persons, including Horn, Egmont, and other eminent patriots. As many as one hundred thousand of the population are said to have emigrated at this time to England. William of Orange, the great leader of the Netherlanders, refused to appear before the Council of Blood. He had resigned his offices, civil and military, and now retired to Dillenburg, still proclaiming his adhesion to the Protestant faith. But in 1568 he gathered two armies. Alva destroyed one of them, and the other was disbanded. In 1570 William issued letters of marque to seamen who were nicknamed "Sea Beggars," and bore a prominent part in the war of independence. In 1572 they captured Briel. That year Mons was captured by Louis of Nassau, William's brother, but in September it was retaken by Alva. In Dyer's narrative the subsequent course of events, to the Pacification of Ghent, is clearly and succinctly traced.