Equation between the contending powers--Treaty of peace between King
James and the archdukes and the King of Spain--Position of the
Provinces--States envoy in England to be styled ambassador--Protest
of the Spanish ambassador--Effect of James's peace-treaty on the
people of England--Public rejoicings for the victory at Sluys--
Spinola appointed commander-in-chief of the Spanish forces--
Preparations for a campaign against the States--Seizure of Dutch
cruisers--International discord--Destruction of Sarmiento's fleet by
Admiral Haultain--Projected enterprise against Antwerp--Descent of
Spinola on the Netherland frontier--Oldenzaal and Lingen taken--
Movements of Prince Maurice--Encounter of the two armies--Panic of
the Netherlanders--Consequent loss and disgrace--Wachtendonk and
Cracow taken by Spinola--Spinola's reception in Spain--Effect of his
victories--Results of the struggle between Freedom and Absolutism--
Affairs in the East--Amboyna taken by Van der Hagen--Contest for
possession of the Clove Islands--Commercial treaty between the
States and the King of Ternate--Hostilities between the Kings of
Ternate and Tydor--Expulsion of the Portuguese from the Moluccas--
Du Terrail's attempted assault on Bergen-op-Zoom--Attack on the
Dunkirk pirate fleet--Practice of executing prisoners captured at
sea.
I have invited the reader's attention to the details of this famous siege
because it was not an episode, but almost the sum total, of the great war
during the period occupied by its events. The equation between the
contending forces indicated the necessity of peace. That equation seemed
for the time to have established itself over all Europe. France had long
since withdrawn from the actual strife, and kept its idle thunders in a
concealed although ever threatening hand. In the East the Pacha of Buda
had become Pacha of Pest. Even Gran was soon to fall before the Turk,
whose advancing horse-tails might thus almost be descried from the walls
of Vienna. Stephen Botschkay meantime had made himself master of
Transylvania, concluded peace with Ahmet, and laughed at the Emperor
Rudolph for denouncing him as a rebel.
Between Spain and England a far different result had been reached than
the one foreshadowed in the portentous colloquies between King James and
Maximilian de Bethune. Those conferences have been purposely described
with some minuteness, in order that the difference often existing between
vast projects and diametrically opposed and very insignificant
conclusions might once more be exhibited.
In the summer of 1603 it had been firmly but mysteriously arranged
between the monarchs of France and Great Britain that the House of
Austria should be crushed, its territories parcelled out at the
discretion of those two potentates, the imperial crown taken from the
Habsburgs, the Spaniards driven out of the Netherlands, an alliance
offensive and defensive made with the Dutch republic, while the East and
West Indies were, to be wrested by main force of the allies, from Spain,
whose subjects were thenceforth to be for ever excluded from those
lucrative regions. As for the Jesuits, who were to James as loathsome as
were the Puritans to Elizabeth, the British sovereign had implored the
ambassador of his royal brother, almost with tears, never to allow that
pestilential brood to regain an entrance into his dominions.
In the summer of 1604 King James made a treaty of peace and amity with
the archdukes and with the monarch of Spain, thus extending his friendly
relations with the doomed house of Austria. The republic of the
Netherlands was left to fight her battles alone; her imaginary allies
looking down upon her struggle with benevolent indifference. As for the
Indies, not a syllable of allusion in the treaty was permitted by Spain
to that sacred subject; the ambassador informing the British Government
that he gave them access to twelve kingdoms and two seas, while Spain
acquired by the treaty access only to two kingdoms and one sea. The new
world, however, east or west, from the Antilles to the Moluccas, was the
private and indefeasible property of his Catholic Majesty. On religious
matters, it was agreed that English residents in Spain should not be
compelled to go to mass, but that they should kneel in the street to the
Host unless they could get out of the ways. In regard to the Netherlands,
it was agreed by the two contracting powers that one should never assist
the rebels or enemies of the other. With regard to the cities and
fortresses of Brill, Flushing, Rammekens, and other cautionary places,
where English garrisons were maintained, and which King James was bound
according to the contracts of Queen Elizabeth never to restore except to
those who had pledged them to the English crown--the king would uphold
those contracts. He would, however, endeavour to make an arrangement with
the States by which they should agree within a certain period to make
their peace with Spain. Should they refuse or fail, he would then
consider himself liberated from these previous engagements and free to
act concerning those cities in an honourable and reasonable manner, as
became a friendly king? Meantime the garrisons should not in any way
assist the Hollanders in their hostilities with Spain. English subjects
were forbidden to carry into Spain or the obedient Netherlands any
property or merchandize belonging to the Hollanders, or to make use of
Dutch vessels in their trade with Spain. Both parties agreed to do their
best to bring about a pacification in the Netherlands.
No irony certainly could be more exquisite that this last-named article.
This was the end of that magnificent conception, the great Anglo-French
League against the house of Austria. King James would combine his efforts
with King Philip to pacify the Netherlands. The wolf and the watchdog
would unite to bring back the erring flock to the fold. Meantime James
would keep the cautionary towns in his clutches, not permitting their
garrisons or any of his subjects to assist the rebels on sea or shore. As
for the Jesuits, their triumphant re-appearance in France, and the
demolition of the pyramid raised to their dishonour on the site of the
house where John Castel, who had stabbed Henry IV., had resided, were
events about to mark the opening year. Plainly enough Secretary Cecil had
out-generalled the French party.
The secret treaty of Hampton Court, the result of the efforts of Rosny
and Olden-Barneveld in July of the previous year, was not likely to be of
much service in protecting the republic. James meant to let the dead
treaties bury their dead, to live in peace with all the world, and to
marry his sons and daughters to Spanish Infantes and Infantas. Meantime,
although he had sheathed the sword which Elizabeth had drawn against the
common enemy, and had no idea of fighting or spending money for the
States, he was willing that their diplomatic agent should be called
ambassador. The faithful and much experienced Noel de Caron coveted that
distinction, and moved thereby the spleen of Henry's envoy at the Hague,
Buzanval, who probably would not have objected to the title himself.
"'Twill be a folly," he said, "for him to present himself on the pavement
as a prancing steed, and then be treated like a poor hack. He has been
too long employed to put himself in such a plight. But there are lunatics
everywhere and of all ages."
Never had the Advocate seemed so much discouraged. Ostend had fallen, and
the defection of the British sovereign was an off-set for the conquest of
Sluys. He was more urgent with the French Government for assistance than
he had ever been before. "A million florins a year from France," he said
"joined to two millions raised in the provinces, would enable them to
carry on the war. The ship was in good condition," he added, "and fit for
a long navigation without danger of shipwreck if there were only biscuit
enough on board." Otherwise she was lost. Before that time came he should
quit the helm which he had been holding the more resolutely since the
peace of Vervins because the king had told him, when concluding it, that
if three years' respite should be given him he would enter into the game
afresh, and take again upon his shoulders the burthen which inevitable
necessity had made him throw down. "But," added Olden-Barneveld,
bitterly, "there is little hope of it now, after his neglect of the many
admirable occasions during the siege of Ostend."
So soon as the Spanish ambassador learned that Caron was to be accepted
into the same diplomatic rank as his own, he made an infinite
disturbance, protested moat loudly and passionately to the king at the
indignity done to his master by this concession to the representative of
a crew of traitors and rebels, and demanded in the name of the treaty
just concluded that Caron should be excluded in such capacity from all
access to court.
As James was nearly forty years of age, as the Hollanders had been rebels
ever since he was born, and as the King of Spain had exercised no
sovereignty over them within his memory, this was naturally asking too
much of him in the name of his new-born alliance with Spain. So he
assumed a position of great dignity, notwithstanding the Constable's
clamour, and declared his purpose to give audience to the agents of the
States by whatever title they presented themselves before him. In so
doing he followed the example, he said, of others who (a strange
admission on his part) were as wise as himself. It was not for him to
censure the crimes and faults of the States, if such they had committed.
He had not been the cause of their revolt from Spanish authority, and it
was quite sufficient that he had stipulated to maintain neutrality
between the two belligerents's. And with this the ambassador of his
Catholic Majesty, having obtained the substance of a very advantageous
treaty, was fain to abandon opposition to the shadowy title by which
James sought to indemnify the republic for his perfidy.
The treaty of peace with Spain gave no pleasure to the English public.
There was immense enthusiasm in London at the almost simultaneous fall of
Sluys, but it was impossible for the court to bring about a popular
demonstration of sympathy with the abandonment of the old ally and the
new-born affection for the ancient enemy. "I can assure your
mightinesses," wrote Caron, "that no promulgation was ever received in
London with more sadness. No mortal has shown the least satisfaction in
words or deeds, but, on the contrary, people have cried out openly, 'God
save our good neighbours the States of Holland and Zeeland, and grant
them victory!' On Sunday, almost all the preachers gave thanks from their
pulpits for the victory which their good neighbours had gained at Sluys,
but would not say a word about the peace. The people were admonished to
make bonfires, but you may be very sure not a bonfire was to be seen.
But, in honour of the victory, all the vessels in St. Catharine's Docks
fired salutes at which the Spaniards were like to burst with spite. The
English clap their hands and throw their caps in the air when they hear
anything published favourable to us, but, it must be confessed, they are
now taking very dismal views of affairs. 'Vox populi vox Dei.'"
The rejoicing in Paris was scarcely less enthusiastic or apparently less
sincere than in London. "The news of the surrender of Sluys," wrote
Aerasens, "is received with so much joy by small and great that one would
have said it was their own exploit. His Majesty has made such
demonstrations in his actions and discourse that he has not only been
advised by his council to dissemble in the matter, but has undergone
reproaches from the pope's nuncius of having made a league with your
Mightinesses to the prejudice of the King of Spain. His Majesty wishes
your Mightinesses prosperity with all his heart, yea so that he would
rather lose his right arm than see your Mightinesses in danger. Be
assured that he means roundly, and we should pray God for his long life;
for I don't see that we can expect anything from these regions after his
death."
It was ere long to be seen, however, roundly as the king meant it, that
the republic was to come into grave peril without causing him to lose his
right arm, or even to wag his finger, save in reproach of their
Mightinesses.
The republic, being thus left to fight its battles alone, girded its
loins anew for the conflict. During the remainder of the year 1604,
however, there were no military operations of consequence. Both
belligerents needed a brief repose.
The siege of Ostend had not been a siege. It was a long pitched battle
between the new system and the old, between absolutism and the spirit of
religious, political and mercantile freedom. Absolutism had gained the
lists on which the long duel had been fought, but the republic had
meantime exchanged that war-blasted spot for a valuable and commodious
position.
It was certainly an advantage, as hostilities were necessarily to have
continued somewhere during all that period, that all the bloodshed and
desolation had been concentrated upon one insignificant locality, and one
more contiguous to the enemy's possessions than to those of the united
States. It was very doubtful, however, whether all that money and blood
might not have been expended in some other manner more beneficial to the
cause of the archdukes. At least it could hardly be maintained that they
took anything by the capitulation of Ostend but the most barren and
worthless of trophies. Eleven old guns, partly broken, and a small
quantity of ammunition, were all the spoils of war found in the city
after its surrender.
The Marquis Spinola went to Spain. On passing through Paris he was
received with immense enthusiasm by Henry IV., whose friendship for the
States, and whose desperate designs against the house of Austria, did not
prevent him from warmly congratulating the great Spanish general on his
victory. It was a victory, said Henry, which he could himself have never
achieved, and, in recognition of so great a triumph, he presented Spinola
with a beautiful Thracian horse, valued at twelve hundred ducats.
Arriving in Spain, the conqueror found himself at once the object of the
open applause and the scarcely concealed hatred of the courtiers and
politicians. He ardently desired to receive as his guerdon the rank of
grandee of Spain. He met with a refusal. To keep his hat on his head in
presence of the sovereign was the highest possible reward. Should that be
bestowed upon him now, urged Lerma, what possible recompense could be
imagined for the great services which all felt confident that he was
about to render in the future? He must continue to remove his hat in the
monarch's company. Meantime, if he wished the title of prince, with
considerable revenues attached to his principality, this was at his
disposal. It must be confessed that in a monarchy where the sentiment of
honour was supposed to be the foundation of the whole structure there is
something chivalrous and stimulating to the imagination in this
preference by the great general of a shadowy but rare distinction to more
substantial acquisitions. Nevertheless, as the grandeeship was refused,
it is not recorded that he was displeased with the principality. Meantime
there was a very busy intrigue to deprive him of the command-in-chief of
the Catholic forces in Flanders, and one so nearly successful that Mexia,
governor of Antwerp citadel, was actually appointed in Spinola's stead.
It was only after long and anxious conferences at Valladolid with the
king and the Duke of Lerma, and after repeated statements in letters from
the archdukes that all their hopes of victory depended on retaining the
Genoese commander-in-chief, that the matter was finally arranged. Mexia
received an annual pension of eight thousand ducats, and to Spinola was
assigned five hundred ducats monthly, as commander-in-chief under the
archduke, with an equal salary as agent for the king's affairs in
Flanders.
Early in the spring he returned to Brussels, having made fresh
preparations for the new campaign in which he was to measure himself
before the world against Maurice of Nassau.
Spinola had removed the thorn from the Belgic lion's foot: "Ostendae
erasit fatalis Spinola spinam." And although it may be doubted whether
the relief was as thorough as had been hoped, yet a freedom of movement
had unquestionably been gained. There was now at least what for a long
time had not existed, a possibility for imagining some new and perhaps
more effective course of campaigning. The young Genoese
commander-in-chief returned from Spain early in May, with the Golden
Fleece around his neck, and with full powers from the Catholic king to
lay out his work, subject only to the approbation of the archduke. It was
not probable that Albert, who now thoroughly admired and leaned upon the
man of whom he had for a time been disposed to be jealous, would
interfere with his liberty of action. There had also been--thanks to
Spinola's influence with the cabinet at Madrid and the merchants of
Genoa--much more energy in recruiting and in providing the necessary
sinews of war. Moreover it had been resolved to make the experiment of
sending some of the new levies by sea, instead of subjecting them all to
the long and painful overland march through Spain, Italy, and Germany. A
terzo of infantry was on its way from Naples, and two more were expected
from Milan, but it was decided that the Spanish troops should be embarked
on board a fleet of transports, mainly German and English, and thus
carried to the shores of the obedient Netherlands.
The States-General got wind of these intentions, and set Vice-Admiral
Haultain upon the watch to defeat the scheme. That well-seasoned mariner
accordingly, with a sufficient fleet of war-galleots, cruised thenceforth
with great assiduity in the chops of the channel. Already the late treaty
between Spain and England had borne fruits of bitterness to the republic.
The Spanish policy had for the time completely triumphed in the council
of James. It was not surprising therefore that the partisans of that
policy should occasionally indulge in manifestations of malevolence
towards the upstart little commonwealth which had presumed to enter into
commercial rivalry with the British realm, and to assert a place among
the nations of the earth. An order had just been issued by the English
Government that none of its subjects should engage in the naval service
of any foreign power. This decree was a kind of corollary to the Spanish
treaty, was levelled directly against the Hollanders, and became the
pretext of intolerable arrogance, both towards their merchantmen and
their lesser war-vessels. Admiral Monson, an especial partisan of Spain,
was indefatigable in exercising the right he claimed of visiting foreign
vessels off the English coast, in search of English sailors violating the
proclamation of neutrality. On repeated occasions prizes taken by Dutch
cruisers from the Spaniards, and making their way with small prize crews
to the ports of the republic, were overhauled, visited, and seized by the
English admiral, who brought the vessels into the harbours of his own
country, liberated the crews, and handed ships and cargoes over to the
Spanish ambassador. Thus prizes fairly gained by nautical skill and hard
fighting, off Spain, Portugal, Brazil, or even more distant parts of the
world, were confiscated almost in sight of port, in utter disregard of
public law or international decency. The States-General remonstrated with
bitterness. Their remonstrances were answered by copious arguments,
proving, of course, to the entire satisfaction of the party who had done
the wrong, that no practice could be more completely in harmony with
reason and justice. Meantime the Spanish ambassador sold the prizes, and
appropriated the proceeds towards carrying on the war against the
republic; the Dutch sailors, thus set ashore against their will and
against law on the neutral coast of England, being left to get home as
they could, or to starve if they could do no better. As for the States,
they had the legal arguments of their late ally to console them for the
loss of their ships.
Simultaneously with these events considerable levies of troops were made
in England by the archduke, in spite of all the efforts of the Dutch
ambassador to prevent this one-sided; neutrality, while at the other ends
of the world mercantile jealousy in both the Indies was fast combining
with other causes already rife to increase the international discord. Out
of all this fuel it was fated that a blaze of hatred between the two
leading powers of the new era, the United Kingdom and the United
Republic, should one day burst forth, which was to be fanned by passion,
prejudice, and a mistaken sentiment of patriotism and self-interest on
both sides, and which not all the bloodshed of more than one fierce war
could quench. The traces of this savage sentiment are burnt deeply into
the literature, language, and traditions of both countries; and it is
strange enough that the epoch at which chronic wrangling and
international coolness changed into furious antipathy between the two
great Protestant powers of Europe--for great they already both were,
despite the paucity of their population and resources, as compared with
nations which were less influenced by the spirit of the age or had less
aptness in obeying its impulse--should be dated from the famous year of
Guy Fawkes.
Meantime the Spanish troops, embarked in eight merchant ships and a few
pinnaces, were slowly approaching their destination. They had been
instructed, in case they found it impracticable to enter a Flemish port,
to make for the hospitable shores of England, the Spanish ambassador and
those whom he had bribed at the court of James having already provided
for their protection. Off Dover Admiral Haultain got sight of Sarmiento's
little fleet. He made short work with it. Faithfully carrying out the
strenuous orders of the States-General, he captured some of the ships,
burned one, and ran others aground after a very brief resistance. Some of
the soldiers and crews were picked up by English vessels cruising in the
neighbourhood and narrowly watching the conflict. A few stragglers
escaped by swimming, but by far, the greater proportion of the
newly-arrived troops were taken prisoners, tied together two and two, and
then, at a given signal from the admiral's ship, tossed into the sea.
Not Peter Titelmann, nor Julian Romero, nor the Duke of Alva himself,
ever manifested greater alacrity in wholesale murder than was shown by
this admiral of the young republic in fulfilling the savage decrees of
the States-General.
Thus at least one-half of the legion perished. The pursuit of the ships
was continued within English waters, when the guns of Dover Castle opened
vigorously upon the recent allies of England, in order to protect her
newly-found friends in their sore distress. Doubtless in the fervour of
the work the Dutch admiral had violated the neutral coast of England, so
that the cannonade from the castle waw technically justified. It was
however a biting satire upon the proposed Protestant league against Spain
and universal monarchy in behalf of the Dutch republic, that England was
already doing her best to save a Spanish legion and to sink a Dutch
fleet. The infraction of English sovereignty was unquestionable if judged
by the more scrupulous theory of modern days, but it was well remarked by
the States-General, in answer to the remonstrances of James's Government,
that the Dutch admiral, knowing that the pirates of Dunkirk roamed at
will through English waters in search of their prey, might have hoped for
some indulgence of a similar character to the ships of the republic.
Thus nearly the whole of the Spanish legion perished. The soldiers who
escaped to the English coast passed the winter miserably in huts, which
they were allowed to construct on the sands, but nearly all, including
the lieutenant-colonel commanding, Pedro Cubiera, died of famine or of
wounds. A few small vessels of the expedition succeeded in reaching the
Flemish coast, and landing a slight portion of the terzo.
The campaign of 1605 opened but languidly. The strain upon the resources
of the Netherlands, thus unaided, was becoming severe, although there is
no doubt that, as the India traffic slowly developed itself, the
productive force of the commonwealth visibly increased, while the thrifty
habits of its citizens, and their comparative abstinence from
unproductive consumption, still enabled it to bear the tremendous burthen
of the war. A new branch of domestic industry had grown out of the India
trade, great quantities of raw silk being now annually imported from the
East into Holland, to be wrought into brocades, tapestries, damasks,
velvets, satins, and other luxurious fabrics for European consumption.
It is a curious phenomenon in the history of industry that while at this
epoch Holland was the chief seat of silk manufactures, the great
financier of Henry IV. was congratulating his sovereign and himself that
natural causes had for ever prevented the culture or manufacture of silk
in France. If such an industry were possible, he was sure that the
decline of martial spirit in France and an eternal dearth of good French
soldiers would be inevitable, and he even urged that the importation of
such luxurious fabrics should be sternly prohibited, in order to preserve
the moral health of the people. The practical Hollanders were more
inclined to leave silk farthingales and brocaded petticoats to be dealt
with by thunderers from the pulpit or indignant fathers of families.
Meantime the States-General felt instinctively that the little
commonwealth grew richer, the more useful or agreeable things its
burghers could call into existence out of nothingness, to be exchanged
for the powder and bullets, timber and cordage, requisite for its eternal
fight with universal monarchy, and that the richer the burghers grew the
more capable they were of paying their taxes. It was not the fault of the
States that the insane ambition of Spain and the archdukes compelled them
to exhaust themselves annually by the most unproductive consumption that
man is ever likely to devise, that of scientifically slaughtering his
brethren, because to practise economy in that regard would be to cease to
exist, or to accept the most intolerable form of slavery.
The forces put into the field in the spring of 1605 were but meagre.
There was also, as usual, much difference of opinion between Maurice and
Barneveld as to the most judicious manner of employing them, and as usual
the docile stadholder submitted his better judgment to the States. It can
hardly be too much insisted upon that the high-born Maurice always
deported himself in fact, and as it were unconsciously, as the citizen
soldier of a little republic, even while personally invested with many of
the attributes of exalted rank, and even while regarded by many of his
leading fellow-citizens as the legitimate and predestined sovereign of
the newly-born state.
Early in the spring a great enterprise against Antwerp was projected. It
failed utterly. Maurice, at Bergen-op-Zoom, despatched seven thousand
troops up the Scheld, under command of Ernest Casimir. The flotilla was a
long time getting under weigh, and instead of effecting a surprise, the
army, on reaching the walls of Antwerp, found the burghers and garrison
not in the least astonished, but on the contrary entirely prepared.
Ernest returned after a few insignificant skirmishes, having accomplished
nothing.
Maurice next spent a few days in reducing the castle of Wouda, not far
from Bergen, and then, transporting his army once more to the isle of
Cadzand, he established his headquarters at Watervliet, near Ysendyke.
Spinola followed him, having thrown a bridge across the Scheld. Maurice
was disposed to reduce a fort, well called Patience, lying over against
the isle of Walcheren. Spinola took up a position by which he defended
the place as with an impenetrable buckler. A game of skill now began.
between these two adepts in the art of war, for already the volunteer had
taken rank among the highest professors of the new school. It was the
object of Maurice, who knew himself on the whole outnumbered, to divine
his adversary's intentions. Spinola was supposed to be aiming at Sluys,
at Grave, at Bergen-op-Zoom, possibly even at some more remote city, like
Rheinberg, while rumours as to his designs, flying directly from his
camp, were as thick as birds in the air. They were let loose on purpose
by the artful Genoese, who all the time had a distinct and definite plan
which was not yet suspected. The dilatoriness of the campaign was
exasperating. It might be thought that the war was to last another half
century, from the excessive inertness of both parties. The armies had all
gone into winter quarters in the previous November, Spinola had spent
nearly six months in Spain, midsummer had came and gone, and still
Maurice was at Watervliet, guessing at his adversary's first move. On the
whole, he had inclined to suspect a design upon Rheinberg, and had
accordingly sent his brother Henry with a detachment to strengthen the
garrison of that place. On the 1st of August however he learned that
Spinola had crossed the Meuse and the Rhine, with ten thousand foot and
three thousand horse, and that leaving Count Bucquoy with six thousand
foot and one thousand five hundred horse in the neighbourhood of the
Rhine, to guard a couple of redoubts which had been constructed for a
basis at Kaiserswerth, he was marching with all possible despatch towards
Friesland and Groningen.
The Catholic general had concealed his design in a masterly manner. He
had detained Maurice in the isle of Cadzand, the States still dreaming of
a victorious invasion on their part of obedient Flanders, and the
stadholder hesitating to quit his position of inactive observation, lest
the moment his back was turned the rapid Spinola might whirl down upon
Sluys, that most precious and skilfully acquired possession of the
republic, when lo! his formidable antagonist was marching in force upon
what the prince well knew to be her most important and least guarded
frontier.
On the 8th August the Catholic general was before Olden-zaal which he
took in three days, and then advanced to Lingen. Should that place
fall--and the city was known to be most inadequately garrisoned and
supplied--it would be easy for the foe to reduce Coeworden, and so seize
the famous pass over the Bourtanger Morass, march straight to
Embden--then in a state of municipal revolution on account of the chronic
feuds between its counts and the population, and therefore an easy
prey--after which all Friesland and Groningen would be at his mercy, and
his road open to Holland and Utrecht; in short, into the very bowels of
the republic.
On the 4th August Maurice broke up his camp in Flanders, and leaving five
thousand men under Colonel Van der Noot, to guard the positions there,
advanced rapidly to Deventer, with the intention of saving Lingen. It was
too late. That very important place had been culpably neglected. The
garrison consisted of but one cannoneer, and he had but one arm. A
burgher guard, numbering about three hundred, made such resistance as
they could, and the one-armed warrior fired a shot or two from a rusty
old demi-cannon. Such opposition to the accomplished Italian was
naturally not very effective. On the 18th August the place capitulated.
Maurice, arriving at Deventer, and being now strengthened by his cousin
Lewis William with such garrison troops as could be collected, learned
the mortifying news with sentiments almost akin to despair. It was now to
be a race for Coeworden, and the fleet-footed Spinola was a day's march
at least in advance of his competitor. The key to the fatal morass would
soon be in his hands. To the inexpressible joy of the stadholder, the
Genoese seemed suddenly struck with blindness. The prize was almost in
his hands and he threw away all his advantages. Instead of darting at
once upon Coeworden he paused for nearly a month, during which period he
seemed intoxicated with a success so rapidly achieved, and especially
with his adroitness in outwitting the great stadholder. On the 14th
September he made a retrograde movement towards the Rhine, leaving two
thousand five hundred men in Lingen. Maurice, giving profound thanks to
God for his enemy's infatuation, passed by Lingen, and having now, with
his cousin's reinforcements, a force of nine thousand foot and three
thousand horse, threw himself into Coeworden, strengthened and garrisoned
that vital fortress which Spinola would perhaps have taken as easily as
he had done Lingen, made all the neighbouring positions secure, and then
fell back towards Wesel on the Rhine, in order to watch his antagonist.
Spinola had established his headquarters at Ruhrort, a place where the
river Ruhr empties into the Rhine. He had yielded to the remonstrances of
the Archbishop of Cologne, to whom Kaiserwerth belonged, and had
abandoned the forts which Bucquoy, under his directions, had constructed
at that place.
The two armies now gazed at each other, at a respectful distance, for a
fortnight longer, neither commander apparently having any very definite
purpose. At last, Maurice having well reconnoitred his enemy, perceived a
weak point in his extended lines. A considerable force of Italian
cavalry, with some infantry, was stationed at the village of Mulheim, on
the Ruhr, and apparently out of convenient supporting distance from
Spinola's main army. The stadholder determined to deliver a sudden blow
upon this tender spot, break through the lines, and bring on a general
action by surprise. Assembling his well-seasoned and veteran troopers in
force, he divided them into two formidable bands, one under the charge of
his young brother Frederic Henry, the other under that most brilliant of
cavalry officers, Marcellus Bax, hero of Turnhout and many another
well-fought field.
The river Ruhr was a wide but desultory stream, easily fordable in many
places. On the opposite bank to Mulheim was the Castle of Brock, and some
hills of considerable elevation. Bax was ordered to cross the river and
seize the castle and the heights, Count Henry to attack the enemy's camp
in front, while Maurice himself, following rapidly with the advance of
infantry and wagons, was to sustain the assault.
Marcellus Bax, rapid and dashing as usual, crossed the Ruhr, captured
Broek Castle with ease, and stood ready to prevent the retreat of the
Spaniards. Taken by surprise in front, they would naturally seek refuge
on the other side of the river. That stream was not difficult for
infantry, but as the banks were steep, cavalry could not easily extricate
themselves from the water, except at certain prepared landings. Bax
waited however for some time in vain for the flying Spaniards. It was not
destined that the stadholder should effect many surprises that year. The
troopers under Frederic Henry had made their approaches through an
intricate path, often missing their way, and in far more leisurely
fashion than was intended, so that outlying scouts had brought in
information of the coming attack. As Count Henry approached the village,
Trivulzio's cavalry was found drawn up in battle array, formidable in
numbers, and most fully prepared for their visitors from Wesel. The party
most astonished was that which came to surprise. In an instant one of
those uncontrollable panics broke out to which even veterans are as
subject as to dysentery or scurvy. The best cavalry of Maurice's army
turned their backs at the very sight of the foe, and galloped off much
faster than they had come.
Meantime, Marcellus Bax was assaulted, not only by his late handful of
antagonists, who had now rallied, but by troops from Mulheim, who began
to wade across the stream. At that moment he was cheered by the sight of
Count Henry coming on with a very few of his troopers who had stood to
their colours. A simultaneous charge from both banks at the enemy
floundering in the river was attempted. It might have been brilliantly
successful, but the panic had crossed the river faster than the Spaniards
could do, and the whole splendid picked cavalry force of the republic,
commanded by the youngest son of William the Silent, and by the favourite
cavalry commander of her armies, was, after a hot but brief action, in
disgraceful and unreasonable flight. The stadholder reached the bank of
that fatal stream only to witness this maddening spectacle, instead of
the swift and brilliant triumph which he was justified in expecting. He
did his best to stem the retreating tide. He called upon the veterans, by
the memory of Turnhout and Nieuport, and so many other victories, to
pause and redeem their name before it was too late. He taunted them with
their frequent demands to be led to battle, and their expressed
impatience at enforced idleness. He denounced them as valiant only for
plundering defenceless peasants, and as cowards against armed men; as
trusting more to their horses' heels than to their own right hands. He
invoked curses upon them for deserting his young brother, who,
conspicuous among them by his gilded armour, the orange-plumes upon his
calque, and the bright orange-scarf across his shoulders, was now sorely
pressed in the struggling throng.
It was all in vain. Could Maurice have thrown himself into the field, he
might, as in the crisis of the republic's fate at Nieuport, have once
more converted ruin into victory by the magic of his presence. But the
river was between him and the battle, and he was an enforced spectator of
his country's disgrace.
For a few brief moments his demeanour, his taunts, and his supplications
had checked the flight of his troops.
A stand was made by a portion of the cavalry and a few detached but
fierce combats took place. Count Frederic Henry was in imminent danger.
Leading a mere handful of his immediate retainers, he threw himself into
the thickest of the fight, with the characteristic audacity of his house.
A Spanish trooper aimed his carbine full at his face. It missed fire, and
Henry, having emptied his own pistol, was seized by the floating scarf
upon his breast by more than one enemy. There was a brief struggle, and
death or capture seemed certain; when an unknown hand laid his nearest
antagonist low, and enabled him to escape from over powering numbers. The
soldier, whose devotion thus saved the career of the youngest
Orange-Nassau destined to be so long and so brilliant, from being cut off
so prematurely, was never again heard of, and doubtless perished in the
fray.
Meantime the brief sparkle of valour on the part of the States' troops
had already vanished. The adroit Spinola, hurrying personally to the
front, had caused such a clangor from all the drums and trumpets in Broek
and its neighbourhood to be made as to persuade the restive cavalry that
the whole force of the enemy was already upon them. The day was obviously
lost, and Maurice, with a heavy heart, now him self gave the signal to
retreat. Drawing up the greater part of his infantry in solid mass upon
the banks to protect the passage, he sent a force to the opposite side,
Horace Vere being the first to wade the stream. All that was then
possible to do was accomplished, and the panic flight converted into
orderly retreat, but it was a day of disaster and disgrace for the
republic.
About five hundred of the best States' cavalry were left dead on the
field, but the stain upon his almost unsullied flag was more cutting to
the stadholder's heart than the death of his veterans. The material
results were in truth almost even. The famous cavalry general, Count
Trivulzio, with at least three hundred Spaniards, fell in the combat, but
the glory of having defeated the best cavalry of Europe in a stricken
field and under the very eyes of the stadholder would have been
sufficient compensation to Spinola for much greater losses.
Maurice withdrew towards Wesel, sullen but not desponding. His forces
were meagre, and although he had been out-generalled, out-marched, and
defeated in the open field, at least the Genoese had not planted the blow
which he had meditated in the very heart of the republic.
Autumn was now far advanced, and dripping with rain. The roads and fields
were fast becoming impassable sloughs, and no further large operations
could be expected in this campaign. Yet the stadholder's cup was not
full, and he was destined to witness two more triumphs of his rival, now
fast becoming famous, before this year of disasters should close. On the
27th October, Spinola took the city of Wachtendonk, after ten days'
siege, and on the 5th of November the strong place of Cracow.
Maurice was forced to see these positions captured almost under his eyes,
being now quite powerless to afford relief. His troops had dwindled by
sickness and necessary detachments for garrison-work to a comparatively,
insignificant force, and very soon afterwards both armies went into
winter quarters.
The States were excessively disappointed at the results of the year's
work, and deep if not loud were the reproaches cast upon the stadholder.
Certainly his military reputation had not been augmented by this
campaign. He had lost many places, and had not gained an inch of ground
anywhere. Already the lustre of Sluys, of Nieuport, and Turnhout were
growing dim, for Maurice had so accustomed the republic to victories that
his own past triumphs seemed now his greatest enemies. Moreover he had
founded a school out of which apt pupils had already graduated, and it
would seem that the Genoese volunteer had rapidly profited by his
teachings as only a man endowed with exquisite military genius could have
done.
Yet, after all, it seems certain that, with the stadholder's limited
means, and with the awful consequences to the country of a total defeat
in the open field, the Fabian tactics, which he had now deliberately
adopted, were the most reasonable. The invader of foreign domains, the
suppressor of great revolts, can indulge in the expensive luxury of
procrastination only at imminent peril. For the defence, it is always
possible to conquer by delay, and it was perfectly understood between
Spinola and his ablest advisers at the Spanish court that the blows must
be struck thick and fast, and at the most vulnerable places, or that the
victory would be lost.
Time was the ally not of the Spanish invaders, who came from afar, but of
the Dutch burghers, who remained at home. "Jam aut Nunquam," was the
motto upon the Italian's banners.
In proportion to the depression in the republic at the results of this
year's campaigning was the elation at the Spanish court. Bad news and
false news had preceded the authentic intelligence of Spinola's
victories. The English envoy had received unquestionable information that
the Catholic general had sustained an overwhelming defeat at the close of
the campaign, with a loss of three thousand five hundred men.
The tale was implicitly believed by king and cabinet, so that when, very
soon afterwards, the couriers arrived bringing official accounts of the
victory gained over the veteran cavalry of the States in the very
presence of the stadholder, followed by the crowning triumph of
Wachtendonk, the demonstrations of joy were all the more vivacious in
consequence of the previous gloom. Spinola himself followed hard upon the
latest messengers, and was received with ovations. Never, since the days
of Alexander Farnese, had a general at the Spanish court been more
cordially caressed or hated. Had Philip the Prudent been still upon the
throne, he would have felt it his duty to make immediate arrangements for
poisoning him. Certainly his plans and his popularity would have been
undermined in the most artistic manner.
But Philip III., more dangerous to rabbits than to generals, left the
Genoese to settle the plans of his next campaign with Lerma and his
parasites.
The subtle Spinola, having, in his despatches, ascribed the chief merit
of the victories to Louis Velasco, a Spaniard, while his own original
conception of transferring the war to Friesland was attributed by him
with magnificent effrontery to Lerma and to the king--who were probably
quite ignorant of the existence of that remote province--succeeded in
maintaining his favourable position at court, and was allowed, by what
was called the war-council, to manage matters nearly at his pleasure.
It is difficult however to understand how so much clamour should have
been made over such paltry triumphs. All Europe rang with a cavalry fight
in which less than a thousand saddles on both sides had been emptied,
leading to no result, and with the capture of a couple of insignificant
towns, of which not one man in a thousand had ever heard.
Spinola had doubtless shown genius of a subtle and inventive order, and
his fortunate audacity in measuring himself, while a mere apprentice,
against the first military leader living had been crowned with wonderful
success. He had nailed the stadholder fast to the island of Cadzand,
while he was perfecting his arrangements and building boats on the Rhine;
he had propounded riddles which Maurice had spent three of the best
campaigning months in idle efforts to guess, and when he at last moved,
he had swept to his mark with the swiftness and precision of a bird of
prey. Yet the greatest of all qualities in a military commander, that of
deriving substantial fruits from victory instead of barren trophies, he
had not manifested. If it had been a great stroke of art to seize reach
Deventer, it was an enormous blunder, worthy of a journeyman soldier, to
fail to seize the Bourtange marshes, and drive his sword into the fiery
vitals of the republic, thus placed at his mercy.
Meantime, while there had been all these rejoicings and tribulations at
the great doings on the Rhine and the shortcoming in Friesland, the real
operations of the war had been at the antipodes.
It is not a very unusual phenomenon in history that the events, upon
whose daily development the contemporary world hangs with most
palpitating interest, are far inferior in permanent influence upon the
general movement of humanity to a series of distant and apparently
commonplace transactions.
Empires are built up or undermined by the ceaseless industry of obscure
multitudes often slightly observed, or but dimly comprehended.
Battles and sieges, dreadful marches, eloquent debates, intricate
diplomacy--from time to time but only perhaps at rare intervals--have
decided or modified the destiny of nations, while very often the clash of
arms, the din of rhetoric, the whiz of political spindles, produce
nothing valuable for human consumption, and made the world no richer.
If the age of heroic and religious passion was rapidly fading away before
the gradual uprising of a politico-mercantile civilization--as it
certainly was--the most vital events, those in which the fate of coming
generations was most deeply involved, were those inspired by the spirit
of commercial-enterprise.
Nor can it be denied that there is often a genial and poetic essence even
among things practical or of almost vulgar exterior. In those early
expeditions of the Hollanders to the flaming lands of the equator there
is a rhythm and romance of historical movement not less significant than
in their unexampled defence of fatherland and of the world's liberty
against the great despotism of the age.
Universal monarchy was baffled by the little republic, not within its own
populous cities only, or upon its own barren sands. The long combat
between Freedom and Absolutism had now become as wide as the world. The
greatest European states had been dragged by the iron chain of necessity
into a conflict from which they often struggled to escape, and on every
ocean, and on almost every foot of soil, where the footsteps of mankind
had as yet been imprinted, the fierce encounters were every day renewed.
In the east and the west, throughout that great vague new world, of which
geographers had hardly yet made a sketch, which comprised both the
Americas and something called the East Indies, and which Spain claimed as
her private property, those humbly born and energetic adventurers were
rapidly creating a symmetrical system out of most dismal chaos.
The King of Spain warned all nations from trespassing upon those outlying
possessions.
His edicts had not however prevented the English in moderate numbers, and
the Hollanders in steadily increasing swarms, from enlarging and making
profitable use of these new domains of the world's commerce.
The days were coming when the People was to have more to say than the
pope in regard to the disposition and arrangements of certain large
districts of this planet. While the world-empire, which still excited so
much dismay, was yielding to constant corrosion, another empire, created
by well-directed toil and unflinching courage, was steadily rising out of
the depths. It has often been thought amazing that the little republic
should so long and so triumphantly withstand the enormous forces brought
forward for her destruction. It was not, however, so very surprising.
Foremost among nations, and in advance of the age, the republic had found
the strength which comes from the spirit of association. On a wider scale
than ever before known, large masses of men, with their pecuniary means,
had been intelligently banded together to advance material interests.
When it is remembered that, in addition to this force, the whole
commonwealth was inspired by the divine influence of liberty, her power
will no longer seem so wonderful.
A sinister event in the Isle of Ceylon had opened the series of
transactions in the East, and had cast a gloom over the public sentiment
at home. The enterprising voyager, Sebald de Weerdt, one of the famous
brotherhood of the Invincible Lion which had wintered in the straits of
Magellan, had been murdered through the treachery of the King of Candy.
His countrymen had not taken vengeance on his assassins. They were
perhaps too fearful of losing their growing trade in those lucrative
regions to take a becoming stand in that emergency. They were also not as
yet sufficiently powerful there.
The East India Company had sent out in May of this year its third fleet
of eleven large ships, besides some smaller vessels, under the general
superintendence of Matelieff de Jonghe, one of the directors. The
investments for the voyage amounted to more than nineteen hundred
thousand florins.
Meantime the preceding adventurers under Stephen van der Hagen, who had
sailed at the end of 1603, had been doing much thorough work. A firm
league had been made with one of the chief potentates of Malabar,
enabling them to build forts and establish colonies in perpetual menace
of Goa, the great oriental capital of the Portuguese. The return of the
ambassadors sent out from Astgen to Holland had filled not only the
island of Sumatra but the Moluccas, and all the adjacent regions, with
praises of the power, wealth, and high civilization of that distant
republic so long depicted by rivals as a nest of uncouth and sanguinary
savages. The fleet now proceeded to Amboyna, a stronghold of the
Spanish-Portuguese, and the seat of a most lucrative trade.
On the arrival of those foreign well-armed ships under the guns of the
fortress, the governor sent to demand, with Castilian arrogance, who the
intruders were, and by whose authority and with what intent they presumed
to show themselves in those waters. The reply was that they came in the
name and by the authority of their High Mightinesses the States-General,
and their stadholder the Prince of Orange; that they were sworn enemies
of the King of Spain and all his subjects, and that as to their intent,
this would soon be made apparent. Whereupon, without much more ado, they
began a bombardment of the fort, which mounted thirty-six guns. The
governor, as often happened in those regions, being less valiant against
determined European foes than towards the feebler oriental races on which
he had been accustomed to trample, succumbed with hardly an effort at
resistance. The castle and town and whole island were surrendered to the
fleet, and thenceforth became virtually a colony of the republic with
which, nominally, treaties of alliance and defence were, negotiated.
Thence the fleet, after due possession had been taken of these new
domains, sailed partly to Bands and partly to two small but most
important islands of the Moluccas.
In that multitude of islands which make up the Eastern Archipelago there
were but five at that period where grew the clove--Ternate, Tydor,
Motiel, Makian, and Bacia.
Pepper and ginger, even nutmegs, cassia, and mace, were but vulgar drugs,
precious as they were already to the world and the world's commerce,
compared with this most magnificent spice.
It is wonderful to reflect upon the strange composition of man. The world
had lived in former ages very comfortably without cloves. But by the
beginning of the seventeenth century that odoriferous pistil had been the
cause of so many pitched battles and obstinate wars, of so much
vituperation, negotiation, and intriguing, that the world's destiny
seemed to have almost become dependent upon the growth of a particular
gillyflower. Out of its sweetness had grown such bitterness among great
nations as not torrents of blood could wash away. A commonplace condiment
enough it seems to us now, easily to be dispensed with, and not worth
purchasing at a thousand human lives or so the cargo, but it was once the
great prize to be struggled for by civilized nations. From that fervid
earth, warmed from within by volcanic heat, and basking ever beneath the
equatorial sun, arose vapours as deadly to human life as the fruits were
exciting and delicious to human senses. Yet the atmosphere of pestiferous
fragrance had attracted, rather than repelled. The poisonous delights of
the climate, added to the perpetual and various warfare for its
productions, spread a strange fascination around those fatal isles.
Especially Ternate and Tydor were objects of unending strife. Chinese,
Malays, Persians, Arabs, had struggled centuries long for their
possession; those races successively or simultaneously ruling these and
adjacent portions of the Archipelago. The great geographical discoveries
at the close of the fifteenth century had however changed the aspect of
India and of the world. The Portuguese adventurers found two rival
kings--in the two precious islands, and by ingeniously protecting one of
these potentates and poisoning the other, soon made themselves masters of
the field. The clove trade was now entirely in the hands of the strangers
from the antipodes. Goa became the great mart of the lucrative traffic,
and thither came Chinese, Arabs, Moors, and other oriental traders to be
supplied from the Portuguese monopoly: Two-thirds of the spices however
found their way directly to Europe.
Naturally enough, the Spaniards soon penetrated into these seas, and
claimed their portion of the spice trade. They insisted that the coveted
islands were included in their portion of the great Borgian grant. As
there had hardly yet been time to make a trigonometrical survey of an
unknown world, so generously divided by the pope, there was no way of
settling disputed boundary questions save by apostolic blows. These were
exchanged with much earnestness, year after year, between Spaniards,
Portuguese, and all who came in their way. Especially the unfortunate
natives, and their kings most of all, came in for a full share. At last
Charles V. sold out his share of the spice islands to his Portuguese
rival and co-proprietor, for three hundred and fifty thousand ducats. The
emperor's very active pursuits caused him to require ready money more
than cloves. Yet John III. had made an excellent bargain, and the
monopoly thenceforth brought him in at least two hundred thousand ducats
annually. Goa became more flourishing, the natives more wretched, the
Portuguese more detested than ever. Occasionally one of the royal line of
victims would consent to put a diadem upon his head, but the coronation
was usually the prelude to a dungeon or death. The treaties of alliance,
which these unlucky potentates had formed with their powerful invaders,
were, as so often is the case, mere deeds to convey themselves and their
subjects into slavery.
Spain and Portugal becoming one, the slender weapon of defence which
these weak but subtle Orientals sometimes employed with success--the
international and commercial jealousy between their two oppressors--was
taken away. It was therefore with joy that Zaida, who sat on the throne
of Ternate at the end of the sixteenth century, saw the sails of a Dutch
fleet arriving in his harbours. Very soon negotiations were opened, and
the distant republic undertook to protect the Mahometan king against his
Catholic master. The new friendship was founded upon trade monopoly, of
course, but at that period at least the islanders were treated with
justice and humanity by their republican allies. The Dutch undertook to
liberate their friends from bondage, while the King of Ternate, panting
under Portuguese oppression, swore to have no traffic, no dealings of any
kind, with any other nation than Holland; not even with the English. The
Dutch, they declared, were the liberators of themselves, of their
friends, and of the seas.
The international hatred, already germinating between England and
Holland, shot forth in these flaming regions like a tropical plant. It
was carefully nurtured and tended by both peoples. Freedom of commerce,
freedom of the seas, meant that none but the Dutch East India Company--so
soon as the Portuguese and Spaniards were driven out--should trade in
cloves and nutmegs. Decrees to that effect were soon issued, under very
heavy penalties, by the States-General to the citizens of the republic
and to the world at large. It was natural therefore that the English
traders should hail the appearance of the Dutch fleets with much less
enthusiasm than was shown by the King of Ternate.
On the other hand, the King of Tydor, persisting in his oriental hatred
towards the rival potentate in the other island, allowed the Portuguese
to build additional citadels, and generally to strengthen their positions
within his dominions. Thus when Cornelius Sebastian, with his division of
Ver Hagen's fleet, arrived in the Moluccas in the summer of 1605, he
found plenty of work prepared for him. The peace recently concluded by
James with Philip and the archdukes placed England in a position of
neutrality in the war now waging in the clove islands between Spain and
the republic's East India Company. The English in those regions were not
slow to avail themselves of the advantage. The Portuguese of Tydor
received from neutral sympathy a copious supply of powder and of
pamphlets. The one explosive material enabled them to make a more
effective defence of their citadel against the Dutch fleet; the other
revealed to the Portuguese and their Mussulman allies that "the
Netherlanders could not exist without English protection, that they were
the scum of nations, and that if they should get possession of this clove
monopoly, their insolence would become intolerable." Samples of polite
literature such as these, printed but not published, flew about in
volleys. It was an age of pamphleteering, and neither the English nor the
Dutch were behind their contemporaries in the science of attack and
self-defence. Nevertheless Cornelius Sebastian was not deterred by paper
pellets, nor by the guns of the citadel, from carrying out his purpose.
It was arranged with King Zaida that the islanders of Ternate should make
a demonstration against Tydor, being set across the strait in Dutch
vessels. Sebastian, however, having little faith in oriental tenacity,
entrusted the real work of storming the fortress to his own soldiers and
sailors. On a fine morning in May the assault was delivered in
magnificent style. The resistance was obstinate; many of the assailants
fell, and Captain Mol, whom we have once before seen as master of the
Tiger, sinking the galleys of Frederic Spinola off the Gat of Sluys,
found himself at the head of only seven men within the interior defences
of the citadel. A Spanish soldier, Torre by name, rushed upon him with a
spear. Avoiding the blow, Mol grappled with his antagonist, and both
rolled to the ground. A fortunate carbine-shot from one of the Dutch
captain's comrades went through the Spaniard's head. Meantime the little
band, so insignificant in numbers, was driven out of the citadel. Mol
fell to the ground with a shattered leg, and reproached his companions,
who sought to remove him, for neglecting their work in order to save his
life. Let them take the fort, he implored them, and when that was done
they might find leisure to pick him up if they chose. While he was
speaking the principal tower of the fortress blew up, and sixty of the
garrison were launched into the air. A well-directed shot had set fire to
the magazine. The assault was renewed with fresh numbers, and the Dutch
were soon masters of the place. Never was a stronghold more audaciously
or more successfully stormed. The garrison surrendered. The women and
children, fearing to be at the mercy of those who had been depicted to
them as cannibals, had already made their escape, and were scrambling
like squirrels among the volcanic cliffs. Famine soon compelled them to
come down, however, when they experienced sufficiently kind treatment,
but were all deported in Dutch vessels to the Philippine islands. The
conquerors not only spared the life of the King of Tydor, but permitted
him to retain his crown. At his request the citadel was razed to the
ground. It would have been better perhaps to let it stand, and it was
possible that in the heart of the vanquished potentate some vengeance was
lurking which might bear evil fruit at a later day. Meantime the
Portuguese were driven entirely out of the Moluccas, save the island of
Timos, where they still retained a not very important citadel.
The East India Company was now in possession of the whole field. The
Moluccas and the clove trade were its own, and the Dutch republic had
made manifest to the world that more potent instruments had now been
devised for parcelling out the new world than papal decrees, although
signed by the immaculate hand of a Borgia.
During the main operations already sketched in the Netherlands, and
during those vastly more important oriental movements to which the
reader's attention has just been called, a detached event or two deserves
notice.
Twice during the summer campaign of this year Du Terrail, an enterprising
French refugee in the service of the archdukes, had attempted to surprise
the important city of Bergen-op-Zoom. On the 21st August the intended
assault had been discovered in time to prevent any very serious conflict
on, either side. On the 20th September the experiment was renewed at an
hour after midnight. Du Terrail, having arranged the attack at three
different points, had succeeded in forcing his way across the moat and
through one of the gates. The trumpets of the foremost Spaniards already
sounded in, the streets. It was pouring with rain; the town was pitch
dark. But the energetic Paul Bax was governor of the place, a man who was
awake at any hour of the twenty-four, and who could see in the darkest
night. He had already informed himself of the enemy's project, and had
strengthened his garrison by a large intermixture of the most trustworthy
burgher guards, so that the advance of Du Terrail at the southern gate
was already confronted by a determined band. A fierce battle began in the
darkness. Meantime Paul Bax, galloping through the city, had aroused the
whole population for the defence. At the Steinberg gate, where the chief
assault had been prepared, Bax had caused great fires of straw and pitch
barrels to be lighted, so that the invaders, instead of finding, as they
expected, a profound gloom through the streets, saw themselves
approaching a brilliantly illuminated city, fully prepared to give their
uninvited guests a warm reception. The garrison, the townspeople, even
the women, thronged to the ramparts, saluting the Spaniards with a rain
of bullets, paving-stones, and pitch hoops, and with a storm of gibes and
taunts. They were asked why they allowed their cardinal thus to send them
to the cattle market, and whether Our Lady of Hall, to whom Isabella was
so fond of making pilgrimages, did not live rather too far off to be of
much use just then to her or to them. Catholics and Protestants all stood
shoulder to shoulder that night to defend their firesides against the
foreign foe, while mothers laid their sleeping children on the ground
that they might fill their cradles with powder and ball, which they
industriously brought to the soldiers. The less energetic women fell upon
their knees in the street, and prayed aloud through the anxious night.
The attack was splendidly repulsed. As morning dawned the enemy withdrew,
leaving one hundred dead outside the walls or in the town, and carrying
off thirty-eight wagon loads of wounded. Du Terrail made no further
attempts that summer, although the list of his surprises was not yet
full. He was a good engineer, and a daring partisan officer. He was also
inspired by an especial animosity to the States-General, who had refused
the offer of his services before he made application to the archdukes.
At sea there was no very important movement in European waters, save that
Lambert Heinrichzoon, commonly called Pretty Lambert, a Rotterdam
skipper, whom we have seen the sea-fights with Frederic Spinola, of the
Dunkirk pirate fleet, Adrian Dirkzoon. It was a desperate fight.--Pretty
Lambent, sustained at a distance by Rear-Admiral Gerbrantzon, laid
himself yard-arm to yard-arm alongside the pirate vessel, boarded her,
and after beating down all resistance made prisoners such of the crew as
remained alive, and carried them into Rotterdam. Next day they were
hanged, to the number of sixty. A small number were pardoned on account
of their youth, and a few individuals who effected their escape when led
to the gallows, were not pursued. The fact that the townspeople almost
connived at the escape of these desperadoes showed that there had been a
surfeit of hangings in Rotterdam. It is moreover not easy to distinguish
with exactness the lines which in those days separated regular sea
belligerents, privateers, and pirates from each other. It had been laid
down by the archdukes that there was no military law at sea, and that
sick soldiers captured on the water should be hanged. Accordingly they
were hanged. Admiral Fazardo, of the Spanish royal navy, not only
captured all the enemy's merchant vessels which came in his way, but
hanged, drowned, and burned alive every man found on board. Admiral
Haultain, of the republican navy, had just been occupied in drowning a
whole regiment of Spanish soldiers, captured in English and German
transports. The complaints brought against the English cruisers by the
Hollanders for capturing and confiscating their vessels, and banging,
maiming, and torturing their crews--not only when England was neutral,
but even when she was the ally of the republic--had been a standing topic
for diplomatic discussion, and almost a standing joke. Why, therefore,
these Dunkirk sea-rovers should not on the same principle be allowed to
rush forth from their very convenient den to plunder friend and foe, burn
ships, and butcher the sailors at pleasure, seems difficult to
understand. To expect from the inhabitants of this robbers' cave--this
"church on the downs"--a code of maritime law so much purer and sterner
than the system adopted by the English, the Spaniards, and the Dutch, was
hardly reasonable. Certainly the Dunkirkers, who were mainly
Netherlanders--rebels to the republic and partisans of the Spanish
crown--did their best to destroy the herring fishery and to cut the
throats of the fishermen, but perhaps they received the halter more often
than other mariners who had quite as thoroughly deserved it. And this at
last appeared the prevailing opinion in Rotterdam.
ETEXT EDITOR'S BOOKMARKS:
Abstinence from unproductive consumption
Defeated garrison ever deserved more respect from friend or foe
His own past triumphs seemed now his greatest enemies
Hundred thousand men had laid down their lives by her decree
John Castel, who had stabbed Henry IV.
Looking down upon her struggle with benevolent indifference
No retrenchments in his pleasures of women, dogs, and buildings
Sick soldiers captured on the water should be hanged
The small children diminished rapidly in numbers
When all was gone, they began to eat each other
HISTORY OF THE UNITED NETHERLANDS
From the Death of William the Silent to the Twelve Year's Truce--1609
By John Lothrop Motley
History United Netherlands, Volume 78, 1605-1607