The military preparations in Flanders were no less formidable.

Troops from all quarters were every moment assembling to reenforce the duke of Parma.

Capizuchi and Spinelli conducted forces from Italy: the marquis of Borgaut, a prince of the house of Austria, levied troops in Germany; the Walloon and Burgundian regiments were completed or augmented: the Spanish infantry was supplied with recruits and an army of thirty-four thousand men was assembled in the Netherlands, and kept in readiness to be transported into England.
The duke of Parma employed all the carpenters whom he could procure, either in Flanders or in Lower Germany and the coasts of the Baltic; and he built at Dunkirk and Newport, but especially at Antwerp, a great number of boats and flat-bottomed vessels, for the transporting of his infantry and cavalry.

The most renowned nobility and princes of Italy and Spain were ambitious of sharing in the honor of this great enterprise.

Don Amadseus of Savoy, Don John of Medicis, Vespasian Gonzaga, duke of Sabionetta, and the duke of Pastrana, hastened to join the army under the duke of Parma.