Count Hoogstraaten, with the rear-guard, consisting of about three thousand men, were alone left upon the hither bank, in order to provoke or to tempt the enemy, who, as usual, was encamped very near.  Alva refused to attack the main army, but Frederic with a force of four thousand men, were alone left on the hither bank, in order to provoke or to tempt the enemy, who as usual, was encamped very near.  Alva refused to attack the main army but rapidly detached his son, Don Fredrick, with a force of four thousand foot and three thousand horse, to cut off the rear-guard.  The movement was effected in a masterly manner, the hill was taken, the three thousand troops which had not passed the river were cut to pieces, and Vitelli hastily despatched a gentleman named Barberini to implore the Duke to advance with the main body, cross the river, and, once for all, exterminate the rebels in a general combat.  Alva, inflamed, not with ardor for an impending triumph, but with rage, that his sagely-conceived plans could not be comprehended even by his son and by his favorite officers, answered the eager messenger with peremptory violence.  “Go back to Vitelli,” he cried.  “Is he, or am I, to command in this campaign?  Tell him not to suffer a single man to cross the river.  Warn him against sending any more envoys to advise a battle; for should you or any other man dare to bring me another such message, I swear to you, by the head of the King, that you go not hence alive.”

With this decisive answer the messenger had nothing for it but to gallop back with all haste, in order to participate in what might be left of the butchery of Count Hoogstraaten’s force, and to prevent Vitelli and Don Frederic in their ill-timed ardor, from crossing the river.  This was properly effected, while in the meantime the whole rear-guard of the patriots had been slaughtered.  A hundred or two, the last who remained, had made their escape from the field, and had taken refuge in a house in the neighbourhood.  The Spaniards set the buildings on fire, and standing around with lifted lances, offered the fugitives the choice of being consumed in the flames or of springing out upon their spears.  Thus entrapped some chose the one course, some the other.  A few, to escape the fury of the fire and the brutality of the Spaniards, stabbed themselves with their own swords.  Others embraced, and then killed each other, the enemies from below looking on, as at a theatrical exhibition; now hissing and now applauding, as the death struggles were more or less to their taste.  In a few minutes all the fugitives were dead.  Nearly three thousand of the patriots were slain in this combat, including those burned or butchered after the battle was over.  The Sieur de Louverwal was taken prisoner, and soon afterwards beheaded in Brussels; but the greatest misfortune sustained by the liberal party upon this occasion was the death of Antony de Lalaing, Count of Hoogstraaten.  This brave and generous nobleman,