A. D. 1574
The besieged city① was at its last gasp. The burghers had been in a state of uncertainty for many days; being aware that the fleet had set forth for their relief, but knowing full well the thousand obstacles which it had to surmount. They had guessed its progress by the illumination from the blazing villages; they had heard its salvos of artillery on its arrival at North Aa; but since then all had been dark and mournful again, hope and fear, in sickening alternation, distracting every breast. They knew that the wind was unfavourable, and at the dawn of each day every eye was turned wistfully to the vanes of the steeples. So long as the easterly breeze prevailed, they felt, as they anxiously stood on towers and house-tops, that they must look in vain for the welcome ocean.
Yet, while thus patiently waiting, they were literally②starving; for even the misery endured at Haar"lemhad notreached that depth and intensity of agony to which Ley"den was now reduced. Bread, malt-cake, horse-flesh, had entirely disappeared; dogs, cats, rats and other vermin, were esteemed luxuries. A small number of cows, kept as long as possible for their milk, still remained; but a few were killed from day to day, and distributed in minute portions, hardly sufficient to support life, among the famishing population. Starving wretches swarmed daily around the shambles where these cattle were slaughtered, contending for any morsel which might fall, and lapping eagerly the blood as it ran along the pavement; while the hides, chopped and boiled, were greedily devoured.
Women and children, all day long, were seen searching gutters and dunghills for morsels of food, which they disputed fiercely with the famishing dogs. The green leaves were stripped from the trees, every living herb was converted into human food; but these expedients could not avert starvation. The daily mortality was frightful. Infants starved to death on the maternal breasts which famine had parched and withered; mothers dropped dead in the streets, with their dead children in their arms.
In many a house the watchmen, in their rounds, found a whole family of corpses-father, mother, children-side by side; for a disorder called "the Plague," naturally engendered of hardship and famine, now came, as if in kindness, to abridge the agony of the people. Pestilence stalked at noonday through the city, and the doomed inhabitants fell like grass beneath his scythe. From six thousand to eight thousand human beings sank before this scourge alone; yet the people resolutely held out, women and men mutually encouraging each other to③resist the entrance of their foreign foethan pest or famine.
-an evil more horrible
Leyden was sublime in its despair. A few murmurs were, however, occasionally heard at the steadfastness of the magistrates; and a dead body was placed at the door of the burgomaster, as a silent witness against his inflexibility. A party of the more faint-hearted even assailed the heroic Adrian Vander Werf④ with threats and reproaches as he passed alongthe streets. A crowd had gathered around him as he reached a triangular place in the centre of the town, into which many of the principal streets emptied themselves, and upon one side of which stood the church of St. Pancras.
There stood the burgomaster, a tall, haggard, imposing figure, with dark visage and a tranquil but commanding eye. He waved his broad-leaved felt hat for silence, and then exclaimed, in language which has been almost literallypreserved, "What would ye, my friends? Why do ye murmur that we do not break our vows and surrender the city to the Spaniards?-a fate more horrible than the agony which she now endures. I tell you I have made an oath to hold the city; and may God give me strength to keep my oath! I can die but once, whether by your hands, the enemy"s, or by the hand of God. My own fate is indifferent to me; not so that of the city intrusted to my care. I know that we shall starve if not soon relieved; but starvation is preferable to the dishonoured death which is the only alternative. Your menaces move me not. My life is at your disposal. Here is my sword; plunge it into my breast, and divide my flesh among you. Take my body to appease your hunger, but expect no surrender so long as I remain alive."……On the 28th of September a dove flew into the city, bringing⑤a letter from Admiral Boisot.
In this despatch the position
of the fleet at North Aa was described in encouraging terms, and the inhabitants were assured that, in a very few days at furthest, the long-expected relief would enter their gates.
The tempest came to their relief. A violent equinoctial gale,on the night of the 1st and 2nd of October, came storming from the north-west, shifting after a few hours fully eight points, and then blowing still more violently from the south- west. The waters of the North Sea were piled in vast masses upon the southern coast of Holland, and then dashed furiously landward, the ocean rising over the earth and sweeping with unrestrained power across the ruined dikes. In the course of twenty-four hours the fleet at North Aa, instead of nine inches, had more than two feet of water……On it went, sweeping over the broad waters. As they approached some shallows which led into the great Mere, the Zeelanders dashed into the sea, and with sheer strength shouldered every vessel through!
