On the first day, called Pithoigia (opening of the casks), libations were offered from the newly opened casks to the god of wine, all the household, including servants and slaves, joining in the festivities.
Between them and the Samaritans on the north and the Edomites on the south there was the most implacable hostility, which would probably be sufficient in itself to keep them from joining in the revolts in which other parts of Syria were involved..
Though the vast ultimate consequences of this sudden appearance of the great western republic in the arena of international politics were not realized even by those in sympathy with Monroe's action, the weight of the United States thrown into the scale on the side of Great Britain made any effective protest by the European powers impossible; Russia, Austria and Prussia contented themselves with joining in a mild expression of regret that the action of Great Britain "tended to encourage that revolutionary spirit it had been found so difficult to control in Europe."
This experience did not deter him from joining in the defence of Zutphen in 1572, but this was his last campaign, and the troubles of the remaining years of his life were chiefly domestic.
The strike was universal, all classes joining in the movement, and it spread to all the industrial centres and even to the rural districts.
