his followers before his eyes, he forced them to submission
by the assistance of the citizens of Ghent, who sanctioned
the banishment of the chief men of the vanquished
town. But some years later Ghent was in its turn
oppressed and punished for having resisted the payment
of some new tax. It found no support from the
rest of Flanders. Nevertheless this powerful
city singly maintained the war for the space of two
years; but the intrepid burghers finally yielded to
the veterans of the duke, formed to victory in the
French wars. The principal privileges of Ghent
were on this occasion revoked and annulled.
During these transactions the province of Holland,
which enjoyed a degree of liberty almost equal to
Flanders, had declared war against the Hanseatic towns
on its own proper authority. Supported by Zealand,
which formed a distinct country, but was strictly united
to it by a common interest, Holland equipped a fleet
against the pirates which infested their coasts and
assailed their commerce, and soon forced them to submission.
Philip in the meantime contrived to manage the conflicting
elements of his power with great subtlety. Notwithstanding
his ambitious and despotic character, he conducted
himself so cautiously that his people by common consent
confirmed his title of “the Good,” which
was somewhat inappropriately given to him at the very
epoch when he appeared to deserve it least. Age
and exhaustion may be adduced among the causes of the
toleration which signalized his latter years; and
if he was the usurper of some parts of his dominions,
he cannot be pronounced a tyrant over any.
Philip had an only son, born and reared in the midst
of that ostentatious greatness which he looked on
as his own by divine right; whereas his father remembered
that it had chiefly become his by fortuitous acquirement,
and much of it by means not likely to look well in
the sight of Heaven. This son was Charles, count
of Charolois, afterward celebrated under the name
of Charles the Rash. He gave, even in the lifetime
of his father, a striking specimen of despotism to
the people of Holland. Appointed stadtholder of
that province in 1457, he appropriated to himself several
important successions; forced the inhabitants to labor
in the formation of dikes for the security of the
property thus acquired; and, in a word, conducted
himself as an absolute master. Soon afterward
he broke out into open opposition to his father, who
had complained of this undutiful and impetuous son
to the states of the provinces, venting his grief
in lamentations instead of punishing his people’s
wrongs. But his private rage burst forth one day
in a manner as furious as his public expressions were
tame. He went so far as to draw his sword on
Charles and pursue him through his palace; and a disgusting
yet instructive spectacle it was, to see this father
and son in mutual and disgraceful discord, like two
birds of prey quarrelling in the same eyry; the old
count outrageous to find he was no longer undisputed
