OSTEND.
A.D. 1601–1604.
This celebrated siege, undertaken by the Spaniards, lasted three years and seventy-eight days, and, up to the moment of its termination, doubts were entertained of their success. The besieged, constantly succoured both by sea and land, were unable to tire out the courage and patience of the besiegers, who pushed on their attacks without relaxation, amidst the greatest obstacles. It would be difficult to count the number of batteries they erected, the assaults they made, or the mines they sprung. The last were so frequent, that they might be said to work more beneath the earth than upon its surface. All the resources of art were exhausted in the attack and defence. Machines were invented. The earth and the ocean by turns favoured the two parties, seconding and destroying alternately the works of the Spaniards and the Dutch, who advanced no work upon the land which the sea did not appear to hasten to destroy. This siege cost the Dutch more than seventy thousand men, and more than ten millions of French money. Their adversary likewise lost immensely. The slaughter was terrible on both sides. Both parties were more eager to inflict death upon their enemies than to save their own lives. At length the besieged, after having seen nine commanders perish successively, did not abandon the little heap of ruins on which they had concentrated themselves, and which they contested foot by foot, until it seemed to disappear from under them: an honourable capitulation was granted. The enemy was surprised to see march from untenable ruins more than four thousand vigorous soldiers, whom the abundance they had lived in during the whole siege had kept in the best health. In addition to a numerous artillery, a prodigious quantity of provisions and munitions was found in the city. The archduke, who had begun this celebrated expedition, with the infanta his wife, had the curiosity to go and view the melancholy remains of Ostend. They found nothing but a shapeless heap of ruins, and could trace no vestige of the besieged place. Spinola, who had taken it, was loaded with honours and elevated to the highest dignities. The Dutch, who during the siege had taken Rhenberg, Grave, and Ecluse, very easily consoled themselves for their loss; and to mark by a public monument that they thought they had received full amends, had a medal struck, with the inscription, Jehova plus dederat quam perdidimus:—God has given us more than we have lost.
In a work like this it would be impossible to pass by such a siege as that of Ostend, but at the same time it is equally impossible for us to do the subject justice: the interesting details of this siege would fill a volume.