Note 1025 — Chapter II

Thus, for example, when Alva states that the council had declared all those who signed the Compromise guilty of treason, Philip notes, in his own handwriting, on the margin of the letter, "The same should he done with all who aided and abetted them, as in fact the more guilty party." (Correspondance de Philippe II., tom. I. p. 590.) These private memoranda of Philip are of real value to the historian, letting him behind the curtain, where the king's own ministers could not always penetrate.