History of Protestantism in the Netherlands - James Aitken Wylie

yet there were no signs of his oration drawing to a
close. The councillors, who usually sat silent, or
contented themselves with merely giving a
decorous assent to the propositions of Granvelle,
might well be astonished at the eloquence that now
resounded through the Council-chamber. It was
now seven o'clock of the evening, and the orator
would not have ended even yet, had not the
Duchess of Parma hinted that the dinner-hour had
arrived, and that the debate must be adjourned for
the day. Viglius, who had taken the place of the
cardinal at the Council-table, went home to his
house in a sort of stupefaction at what he had
witnessed. He lay awake all night ruminating on
the line of argument he should adopt in reply to
Orange. He felt how necessary it was to efface the
impression the prince's eloquence had made. The
dawn found him still perturbed and perplexed. He
got up, and was dressing himself, when a stroke of
apoplexy laid him senseless upon the floor. The
disease left him shattered in mind as in body, and
his place at the Council-board had to be supplied
by his friend Joachin Hopper, a professor of
Louvain, but a man of very humble parts, and
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