It was a brisk close contest, hand to hand and eye to eye—­a Homeric encounter, in which the chieftains were to prove a right to command by their personal prowess.  Alexander, descending suddenly—­dramatically, as it were—­when the battle seemed lost—­like a deity from the clouds-was to justify, by the strength of his arm, the enthusiasm which his name always awakened.  Having, at a glance, taken in the whole situation, he made his brief arrangements, going from rank to rank, and disposing his troops in the most effective manner.  He said but few words, but his voice had always a telling effect.

“The man who refuses, this day, to follow me,” he said, “has never had regard to his own honour, nor has God’s cause or the King’s ever been dear to his heart.”

His disheartened Spaniards and Italians—­roused as by a magic trumpet—­eagerly demanded to be led against the rebels.  And now from each end of the dyke, the royalists were advancing toward the central position occupied by the patriots.  While Capizucca and Aquila were occupied at Fort Victory, Parma was steadily cutting his way from Holy Cross to Saint George.  On foot, armed with sword and shield, and in coat of mail, and marching at the head of his men along the dyke, surrounded by Bevilacqua, Bentivoglio, Manriquez, Sforza, and other officers of historic name and distinguished courage, now upon the summit of the causeway, now on its shelving banks, now breast-high in the waters, through which lay the perilous path, contending at every inch with the scattered bands of the patriots, who slowly retired to their entrenched camp, and with the Antwerp and Zeeland vessels, whose balls tore through the royalist ranks, the General at last reached Saint George.  On the preservation of that post depended the whole fortune of the day, for Parma had already received the welcome intelligence that the Palisade—­now Fort Victory—­had been regained.  He instantly ordered an outer breast-work of wool-sacks and sand-bags to be thrown up in front of Saint George, and planted a battery to play point-blank at the enemy’s entrenchments.  Here the final issue was to be made.

The patriots and Spaniards were thus all enclosed in the mile-long space between St. George and the Palisade.  Upon that narrow strip of earth, scarce six paces in width, more than five thousand men met in mortal combat—­a narrow arena for so many gladiators, hemmed in on both sides by the sea.  The patriots had, with solemn ceremony, before starting upon their enterprise, vowed to destroy the dyke and relieve Antwerp, or to perish in the attempt.  They were true to their vow.  Not the ancient Batavians or Nervii had ever manifested more tenacity against the Roman legions than did their descendants against the far-famed Spanish infantry upon this fatal day.  The fight on the Kowenstyn was to be long remembered in the military annals of Spain and Holland.  Never, since the curtain first rose upon the great Netherland tragedy, had there been a fiercer encounter.  Flinching was impossible.  There was scant room for the play of pike and dagger, and, close packed as were the combatants, the dead could hardly fall to the ground.  It was a mile-long series of separate mortal duels, and the oozy dyke was soon slippery with blood.