On the 10th of June, Louis XIV. appeared before Maestricht with an
army of forty thousand men. This place, esteemed one of the keys of
the Netherlands and the United Provinces, was defended by a garrison
of five thousand men, and by an intrepid governor, named Farjaux, a
Frenchman by birth, but in the service of Holland. On the 17th the
trenches were opened, and five batteries were directed against the
city. Vauban, who in this siege first distinguished himself, employed
the parallels invented by some Italian engineers in the service of
the Turks, before Candia. He added places of arms in the trenches, to
draw up troops in battle order, and the better to rally them in the
event of sorties. Louis proved himself, in this famous expedition,
more particular and laborious than he had ever been. By his example
he accustomed a nation till that time accused of having nothing but
a brilliant courage which fatigue easily exhausted, to patience in
labour and endurance in protracted operations. As long as the siege
lasted, he was up the whole night, from ten o’clock in the evening
till five in the morning. After having ordered everything he thought
necessary for the attack, he retired to his tent to take some repose
till dinner-time. On leaving table, he mounted on horseback to make
the tour of the lines and visit the quarters: in consequence of this,
the companions of his labours went to the assaults and performed their
duties in the most exemplary manner. The most furious assault was
that of the 24th of June, and was made at the counterscarp of the
Tongres gate; in it the French and the Dutch were by turns conquerors
and conquered, whilst disputing an advanced half-moon. The first
company of musketeers was commanded to fall upon this half-moon,
whilst the second precipitated itself upon the palisades between that
post and the hornwork. “The signal was given,” says M. de Saint-Foix;
“they marched, and in spite of the vigorous resistance of the enemy,
in spite of the fire of the _fourneaux_ which were sprung, and the
terrible reports of the grenades which were incessantly cast among
them, these works were carried almost at the same moment.” Four bloody
conflicts were necessary; and they only triumphed in the last, after
losing many men. Night separated the combatants. The action of the
morrow was still more warm and murderous; it was believed that the
lodgments were secured, and the musketeers had returned to the camp.
The enemy sprang a _fourneau_, which the French had not discovered,
in the half-moon: there was reason to think it was not the only one.
Farjaux, who had placed himself at the head of the best troops of
his garrison, profiting by this moment of alarm, entered the work
and drove out the French soldiers. The musketeers were ordered to
take it again, and they did retake it. In an obstinate and sanguinary
conflict, fifty-three musketeers were wounded and thirty-seven killed,
with the famous count d’Artagnan, commander of the first company. “The
musketeers who returned from this fight,” says Pelisson, “had all their
swords blooded up to the guards, and bent and notched with the blows
they had given.” So many repeated and terrible attacks destroyed the
defenders of Maestricht without weakening the courage of the survivors.
Farjaux in particular was determined to hold out to the last minute;
he preferred a glorious death to life at the hands of a conqueror, and
he formed the resolution of making one more attempt. A mine was dug,
and set fire to with too much precipitation; the soldiers of Farjaux
were blown up by it instead of the French. This accident so completely
disconcerted the besieged, that even their bold governor was forced to
think of composition. They were satisfied, on the 29th of June, with a
favourable capitulation. The remains of the garrison retired with the
honours of war, and the inhabitants retained their privileges. This
conquest cost France nearly eight thousand men; the besieged lost more
than three thousand.