The First of the English: A Novel
“Weerlicht! Cats are nothing to them!” gasps Haring, as he sees the way
they handle the Spanish veterans, who come on thinking the town is
already in their grasp; for this attack has been a surprise and nearly
succeeded.
To make preparations for the great sortie that is to be combined with
Orange’s attack from the lake, word of which has been brought into town
by carrier pigeons, the guards had been weakened upon the outer
ravelin, the great work just behind the moat running between the Kruys
and the St. Jan’s gates, and immediately facing Don Frederico’s
headquarters.
This ravelin having been crumbled down and breached under the
unremitting fire of the heavy Spanish batteries; during the night the
moat had been quickly bridged by pontoons thrown across by Vargas.
Crossing this the veterans of Romero, De Billy and Vargas had ensconced
themselves quietly at the foot of the ravelin.
Then taking breath, their advance had crawled up the breaches and
before the Dutch sentinels, worn out with watching, fatigue and hunger,
knew what they were about, had killed a good many of them and got
possession of the work the Spaniards think the key to the town.
Besides this, they have gained the great block house at the Kruys gate,
and Romero has captured the Jan’s gate.
“Cut in! Slay, kill—Haarlem is ours!” is the cry that reaches Don
Frederico’s happy ears as he orders up reinforcements to make his
success certain.
But even as the Spaniards spring over the ravelin to drop down right
into Haarlem, they find they have not captured it.
As the batteries, week after week, have crumbled the ravelin, the
besieged, chiefly the women and children, have erected directly behind
it a great demi-lune of sandbags and earth, stronger against cannon and
quite as difficult of escalade as the ravelin. This, masked from sight,
is unknown to the Spanish until they mount the first fortification to
see the second confronting them.
As Alva’s soldiers look on it, this demi-lune is being manned by the
hastily alarmed people of the neighboring streets. A moment after they
are joined by the German troops of the garrison—with a shout, the
Spaniards come on—the fight begins.
The weakest spot in Haarlem wall is that immediately next the block
house of the Kruys gate, the one now held by Vargas’s veterans. This
intrenchment is held by Kenau and her lady militia. This has been their
post of honor, and Ripperda, commander of the city, knows that into no
hands (and he has veterans of many wars, and eight hundred gallant
Scotchmen now reduced to one-half, and the French company under Courie)
could he so well trust this point of weakness as to those unto whom he
has given it.
For these women are fighting not only for all that manhood values, but
in addition to all that their safety from defilement. Every one of
them, maid, wife or widow, shudders as she thinks of Spanish mercy in a
stormed town to hapless womanhood.
Alva’s veterans come confidently on. They have conquered one rampart,
why not the other?
Up the slope they surge with cries of “Philip!” and “Don Frederico!” to
find a cordial welcome from Sorosis at the summit.
Behind the rampart is a great fire and a mighty cauldron full of
boiling brine. First comes a volley to make the enemy give back for one
fatal minute, each woman firing her musket in the faces of the coming
foe, who hesitate under the carnage.
“Wash out these Spaniards!—pass the water up!” cries the widow, and
seizing the first bucket-full of boiling stuff, she swashes it in the
face of an Italian captain, whose tried armor is not proof against this
cruel scalding. As he screams in agony she cuts him down.
Then with the deft hands of the washtub her women deluge with boiling
brine the Spaniards, who shriek and scream and writhe in agony.
But others from behind press on; at these the women go with
broadswords. Caring naught for death, they carry no shields, but swing
the big weapons with both arms. Against the weight of such a blow no
skill of fence from single arm is potent.
“Pikemen to the front!” screams De Billy, but a moment after he is
wounded and carried from the fray and the pikemen do not come soon
enough, for Kenau Hasselaer, heading her women veterans, charges down
the demi-lune and sweeps every living Spaniard into the block house by
the Kruys gate.
With this she laughs hoarsely: “We’ve got it full. Now, Vrouw
Jannaps—thy work!”
And a woman who has been waiting quietly on the top of the demi-lune
springs down and coming back a minute later cries, “I’ve fired the
mine!”
This is reported almost at the same moment by the mine itself and the
great block house of the Kruys gate, that has been prepared for its
Spanish visitors with some twenty barrels of gunpowder, goes up into
the air, and with it some hundred Walloon infantry of De Billy and a
detachment of Vargas veterans.
Then they pelt the last unwounded Spaniard back across the little
bridge and though Romero holds with his company the St. Jan’s gate on
the other side of the demi-lune, the fire from the gabled houses near
by, and two or three small cannon and sakers that have been brought up,
is so fierce, that not one of the sentries can put his head outside its
masonry and live. From this reception, Romero having had an eye shot
out leads back his men—those that can get away;—for now comes the
greatest horror of it all.
Taught by their adversaries’ many deeds of hideous cruelty, the Dutch
sally forth and slowly and in cold blood as butchers do their work,
dispatch the Spanish wounded, who cry in vain for quarter.
In all this fight Guy and Haring have stood side by side with Kenau
Hasselaer. Where the women have charged they have charged with them,
and she coming back laughs and pats them on the shoulders, crying:
“Good boys, you did well, almost as well as if you had been women! You
have the courage to fight, will you have the courage to starve with
us?”
But this starving matter is neither to Haring’s nor Guy’s liking;
besides this, they are there for a special purpose. So getting word
with Ripperda, who stands on the rampart surrounded by his officers,
Guy broaches his errand to him, asking permission to take Bodé
Volcker’s daughter from the place.
“I am right glad to see you again, First of the English, and supposed
you had come to stay with us,” answers the Holland commander.
“Oh! you don’t need fighters, men nor women,” returns Chester. “You’ve
got too many eaters in the town now.”
“You don’t think they’ll capture us?”
“Not by arms,” says the Englishman. “Therefore I say the fewer mouths
to feed the safer you are. A provision train or a few boat loads of
flour are worth more to you than a thousand veterans.”
“You are right,” responds Ripperda, his face growing gloomy. “But I and
those with me are here to stay, even with these horrors—Look!”
Daylight has now broken, and peering forth from an embrasure for fear
of Spanish arquebus balls, Guy sees the picture of a Dutch town
leaguered by the Spaniards. Before him is the demi-lune, its face
dotted with dead, its ditch filled with them. Opposite stands the other
rampart, the one won by the Spaniards and still occupied by them.
Behind this the moat fed by the Spaarne river, commanded by the Spanish
batteries of bombards and breaching cannon.
Then come clumps of trees to the left, and the Leprosy hospital; beyond
that and all around circling the view are the tents and huts of Alva’s
besieging army, cutting off this hapless town from friends and food.
To Chester’s ears come faintly on the morning breeze the clang of arms
and moving companies and reliefs marching to the intrenchments.
Scattered over this scene are half a dozen windmills, and in front of
them another erection, which makes Guy, soldier as he is, bite his
lips.
It is a huge gallows upon which twenty bodies dangle, some by the
necks, others by the feet.
And now, horror of horrors, the Spanish executioner, comes with his
assistants quite early to his morning work. With him on hurdles are
despairing wretches bound hand and foot. So getting to their business,
they take down the dead to hang up the living who here, in sight of
their friends and townsmen, shall occupy it with their dying agonies
this day.
There is a cry of rage and anguish from the walls—these tortured ones
are neighbors they had talked with the day before, prisoners taken
during a sortie. And one woman screams: “Oh, merciful God, I see
him—they are hanging up my Klaas!” and falls down moaning.
“We’ll do the same,” says Ripperda, “head for head! Call the Provost
Captain!”
Soon some twenty Spaniards dangle from the walls in hideous reply to
savage challenge.
Enraged by this Alva’s soldiers on the neighboring ravelin toss
something into the Dutch demi-lune.
It falls almost at the feet of Guy and Ripperda.
The Dutch captain bending down inspects this, then mutters suddenly to
Guy: “This head is placarded ‘Captain Oliver, of Mons.’”
“Good God!” and with eyes filled with anguish Chester sees once more,
for the last time, the face of his dead friend.
“You knew he was dead?” asks Ripperda.
“Yes,” mutters Guy, “but I couldn’t tell of it here; his betrothed
would learn.”
“Yes, the girl Mina was to marry our patriot!” sighs the commander.
Then he says hoarsely: “Take her away if you can get her forth alive.
Take her away quickly; don’t tell her until you get her from the horror
of this. Good bye, my English friend. If we meet again Haarlem will be
free from Spanish butchers.”
And the two make their farewell with mutual respect.
From this Guy, going to Pieter Kies, says: “I have the Commandant’s
orders. Take me to Mina Bodé Volcker!”
Getting word with the girl, who is very pale from famine and anxiety,
she sobs to him: “You have come to take me to Antony. I know it. I see
it in your face.”
“Yes,” mutters Chester.
“Where is he? How was it Oliver didn’t come with you?”
“Oh he—he came part way,” falters Guy, and goes with Haring to make
arrangements for their journey.
The only chance to get the girl out is by the lake. To do that they
must escape at night.
Taking Mina down through the Schalkwyker gate by the little line of
intrenchments and fortifications along the left bank of the Spaarne, by
which the besieged still keep communication open with the lake, they
get to the fort upon its shore over which the flag of Orange flies, and
preparing their boat, wait for nightfall.
This comes, but scarce soon enough, they are so very hungry. But with
it also comes something that aids their enterprise.
Five Spanish galleys are guarding the Fuik. Sails are seen to the
southeast. Four of these spreading their canvas, go out to reconnoiter,
and by night have not returned. There is now but one galley to avoid,
though she puts out two patrol boats.
“I think I can give a good account of those cursed bateaux that keep
provisions from us,” mutters the Holland commander of the fort.
Forthwith he prepares three boats to attack the patrolling ones of the
Spaniards at nightfall.
As these go out to make attack, Chester and Haring set sail upon the
little skiff, and, dodging the galley, which is now engaged with the
Haarlemers, are soon out upon the open lake, scudding to the south
before a fair wind.
Before daylight they are at the Kaag, and passing from there to Delft;
the next evening, Guy finds himself acquitted of his oath.
Having placed his charge in comfort and retirement in the inn called
the Gilded Tower, Chester strolls into the wine room of the hostelry to
meet astonishment. A wild-eyed creature on seeing him rises up, his
teeth chattering as he mutters: “Hel en duivel! It is a dead man!”
It is the merchant Bodé Volcker, who has been at Delft for months