“We remained thus some three hours,” says Captain James, an English officer who fought in the action, and described it in rough, soldierly fashion to Walsingham the same day, “thinking all things to be secure.”  Yet in the very supreme moment of victory, the leaders, both of the Hollanders and of the Antwerpers, proved themselves incompetent to their position.  With deep regret it must be admitted, that not only the reckless Hohenlo, but the all-accomplished Sainte Aldegonde, committed the gravest error.  In the hour of danger, both had comported themselves with perfect courage and conduct.  In the instant of triumph, they gave way to puerile exultation.  With a celerity as censurable as it seems incredible, both these commanders sprang into the first barge which had thus floated across the dyke, in order that they might, in person, carry the news of the victory to Antwerp, and set all the bells ringing and the bonfires blazing.  They took with them Ferrante Spinola, a mortally-wounded Italian officer of rank, as a trophy of their battle, and a boatload of beef and flour, as an earnest of the approaching relief.

While the conquerors were thus gone to enjoy their triumph, the conquered, though perplexed and silenced, were not yet disposed to accept their defeat.  They were even ignorant that they were conquered.  They had been forced to abandon the field, and the patriots had entrenched themselves upon the dyke, but neither Fort Saint George nor the Palisade had been carried, although the latter was in imminent danger.

Old Count Peter Ernest Mansfeld—­a grizzled veteran, who had passed his childhood, youth, manhood, and old age, under fire—­commanded at the land-end of the dyke, in the fortress of Stabroek, in which neighbourhood his whole division was stationed.  Seeing how the day was going, he called a council of war.  The patriots had gained a large section of the dyke.  So much was certain.  Could they succeed in utterly demolishing that bulwark in the course of the day?  If so, how were they to be dislodged before their work was perfected?  It was difficult to assault their position.  Three thousand Hollanders, Antwerpers, Englishmen—­“mad bulldogs all,” as Parma called them—­showing their teeth very mischievously, with one hundred and sixty Zeeland vessels throwing in their broadsides from both margins of the dyke, were a formidable company to face.

“Oh for one half hour of Alexander in the field!” sighed one of the Spanish officers in council.  But Alexander was more than four leagues away, and it was doubtful whether he even knew of the fatal occurrence.  Yet how to send him a messenger.  Who could reach him through that valley of death?  Would it not be better to wait till nightfall?  Under the cover of darkness something might be attempted, which in the daylight would be hopeless.  There was much anxiety, and much difference of opinion had been expressed, when Camillo Capizucca, colonel of the Italian Legion,