It was resolved that a sortie, in conjunction with theoperations of Boisot, should be made against Lam"men⑥ with the earliest dawn. Night descended upon the scene-a pitch- dark night, full of anxiety to the Spaniards, to the Arma"da, to Leyden. Strange sights and sounds occurred at different moments to bewilder the anxious sentinels. A long procession of lights issuing from the fort was seen to flit across the black face of the waters, in the dead of night; and the whole of the city wall between the Cowgate and the town of Burgundy fell with a loud crash. The horror-struck citizens thought that the Spaniards were upon them at last; the Spaniards imagined the noise to indicate a desperate sortie of the citizens. Everything was vague and mysterious.
Day dawned at length after the feverish night, and the admiral prepared for the assault. Within the fortress reigned a death-like stillness, which inspired a sickening suspicion. Had the city indeed been carried in the night? had the massacre already commenced? had all this labour and audacity been expended in vain?
Suddenly a man was descried wading breast-high through the water from Lammen towards the fleet, while at the same time one solitary boy was seen to wave his cap from the summit of the fort. After a moment of doubt, the happy mystery was solved. The Spaniards had fled panic-struck during the darkness. Their position would still have enabled them, with firmness, to frustrate the enterprise of the patriots; but the hand of God, which had sent the ocean and the tempest to the deliverance of Leyden, had struck her enemies with terror likewise.
The lights which had been seen moving during the night were the lanterns of the retreating Spaniards; and the boy who was now waving his triumphant signal from the battlements had alone witnessed the spectacle. So confident was he in the conclusion to which it led him, that he had volunteered at daybreak to go thither alone.
The magistrates, fearing a trap, hesitated for a moment to believe the truth, which soon, however, became quite evident. Val"dez,⑦ flying himself from Ley"derdorp, had ordered Colonel Borgia to retire with all his troops from Lammen.
Thus the Spaniards had retreated at the very moment that an extraordinary accident had laid bare a whole side of the city for their entrance! The noise of the wall as it fell only inspired them with fresh alarm; for they believed that the citizens had sallied forth in the darkness to aid the advancing flood in the work of destruction.
All obstacles being now removed, the fleet of Boisot sweptby Lammen, and entered the city on the morning of the 3rd of⑧October. Leyden was relieved!
- J. L. MOTLEY
WORDS
appease, satisfy. audacity, daring. bewilder, perplex.
conjunction, combination. deliverance, relief. disputed, contended for. distracting, tormenting. distributed, dispensed. engendered, produced. extraordinary, remarkable. furiously, violently. imagined, fancied. indifferent, immaterial. inflexibility, pertinacity. inspired, suggested.
intensity, extremity. massacre, butchery. mortality, death-rate.
mysterious, incomprehensible. obstacles, hindrances. occurred, happened.
panic-struck, terrified. preferable, more to be wished. spectacle, sight.
summit, highest point. surmount, overcome. tranquil, calm. uncertainty, doubt. unrestrained, unchecked. wistfully, longingly.
NOTES
① The besieged city.-Leyden, now a flourishing manufacturing town of South Holland. It was besieged by the Spaniards when they tried to subdue the Netherlands under their yoke. The siege began on 31st October 1573, and ended on 3rd October 1574. It was relieved by the dikes being cut, and the sea let in on the Spanish works. Fifteen hundred Spaniards were slain or drowned.
② At Haarlem.-"Frederick, the son of Alva,starved the little garrison of Haarlem (20 miles north of Leyden)into a surrender (1573); and then, enraged at the gallant defence they had made, butchered them without mercy. When the executioners were worn outwith their bloody work, he tied the three hundred citizens that remained back to back, andflung them into the sea."-COLLIER"S Great Events of History .
③ Foreign foe, the Spaniards.
④ Adrian Van der Werf, the burgomaster, or chief magistrate of Leyden.
⑤ Admiral Boisot, the commander oi the Dutch fleet.
⑥ Lammen, a fort occupied by the Spaniards, which formed the sole remaining obstacle between the fleet and the city. It swarmed with soldiers, and bristled with cannon; and so serious an impediment did Boisot consider it, that he wrote that very night in desponding terms regarding it to the Prince of Orange.
⑦ Valdez, the Spanish commander. His head-quarters were at Ley"derdorp, a mile and a half to the right of Lammen.
⑧ Leyden was relieved.-The University of Leyden was erected as a memorial of this gallant defence and happy deliverance. The relief of Leyden was a fatal blow to Spanish power in the Netherlands.
QUESTIONS
What means did the burghers of Leyden know were being taken to relieve them? What was unfavourable to the advance of the fleet? In what condition were the citizens at this time? What added its horrors to those of famine? Whom did some of the faint-hearted assail? How did he address the people? What news arrived on the 28th of September? What at last came to their relief? What did the citizens resolve upon, on the night of the 2nd October? What strange sight occurred during the night? What strange sound was heard? By what was it caused? What had the Spaniards supposed it to be? What were the lights which had been seen moving? Who was the only occupant of Lammen visible in the morning? When was Leyden relieved?