been successively vacated by Margaret of Parma, by Alva, by the Grand Commander, and by Don John of Austria.  Of all the eminent personages to whom Philip had confided the reins of that most difficult and dangerous administration, the man who was now to rule was by far the ablest and the best fitted for his post.  If there were living charioteer skilful enough to guide the wheels of state, whirling now more dizzily than ever through “confusum chaos,” Alexander Farnese was the charioteer to guide—­his hand the only one which could control.

He was now in his thirty-third year—­his uncle Don John, his cousin Don Carlos, and himself, having all been born within a few months of each other.  His father was Ottavio Farnese, the faithful lieutenant of Charles the Fifth, and grandson of Pope Paul the Third; his mother was Margaret of Parma, first Regent of the Netherlands after the departure of Philip from the provinces.  He was one of the twins by which the reunion of Margaret and her youthful husband had been blessed, and the only one that survived.  His great-grandfather, Paul, whose secular name of Alexander he had received, had placed his hand upon the new-born infant’s head, and prophesied that he would grow up to become a mighty warrior.  The boy, from his earliest years, seemed destined to verify the prediction.  Though apt enough at his studies, he turned with impatience from his literary tutors to military exercises and the hardiest sports.  The din of arms surrounded his cradle.  The trophies of Ottavio, returning victorious from beyond the Alps, had dazzled the eyes of his infancy, and when but six years of age he had witnessed the siege of his native Parma, and its vigorous defence by his martial father.  When Philip was in the Netherlands—­in the years immediately succeeding the abdication of the Emperor—­he had received the boy from his parents as a hostage for their friendship.  Although but eleven years of age, Alexander had begged earnestly to be allowed to serve as a volunteer on the memorable day of Saint Quentin, and had wept bitterly when the amazed monarch refused his request.—­His education had been, completed at Alcala, and at Madrid, under the immediate supervision of his royal uncle, and in the companionship of the Infante Carlos and the brilliant Don John.  The imperial bastard was alone able to surpass, or even to equal the Italian prince in all martial and manly pursuits.  Both were equally devoted to the chase and to the tournay; both longed impatiently for the period when the irksome routine of monkish pedantry, and the fictitious combats which formed their main recreation, should be exchanged for the substantial delights of war.  At the age of twenty he had been affianced to Maria of Portugal; daughter of Prince Edward, granddaughter of King Emanuel, and his nuptials with that peerless princess were; as we have seen, celebrated soon afterwards with much pomp in Brussels.  Sons and daughters were born