By the light of torches, in an
atmosphere heavy with the fumes of gunpowder, surrounded by piled-up
barrels of wine, the defenders and assailants maintained a terrible
conflict, men staggering up exhausted by their exertion and by the
stifling atmosphere while others took their places below, and so, night
and day, the desperate struggle continued.
All these weeks no serious effort had been made for the relief of the
hardly beleaguered town. Captains Hall and Allen had several times swum
down at night through the bridge of boats with letters from the
governor entreating a speedy succour. The States had sent a fleet which
sailed some distance up the Zwin, but returned without making the
slightest effort to break through the bridge of boats. The Earl of
Leicester had advanced with a considerable force from Ostend against
the fortress of Blankenburg, but had retreated hastily as soon as Parma
despatched a portion of his army against him; and so the town was left
to its fate.
The last letter that the governor despatched said that longer
resistance was impossible.
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