History of the United Netherlands, 1588-89 | Page 7

followers, with whose assistance he could easily have mastered the city
in the first moments of surprise, was mysteriously delayed. He could
not account for their prolonged, absence, and was meanwhile supported
only by those who had arrived with him in the foremost barges.
The truth--of which he was ignorant--was, that the remainder of the
flotilla, borne along by the strong and deep current of the Waal, then in
a state of freshet, had shot past the landing-place, and had ever since
been vainly struggling against wind and tide to force their way back to
the necessary point. Meantime Schenk and his followers fought
desperately in the market-place, and desperately in the house which he

had seized. But a whole garrison, and a town full of citizens in arms
proved too much for him, and he was now hotly besieged in the
mansion, and at last driven forth into the streets.
By this time day was dawning, the whole population, soldiers and
burghers, men, women, and children, were thronging about the little
band of marauders, and assailing them with every weapon and every
missile to be found. Schenk fought with his usual ferocity, but at last
the musketeers, in spite of his indignant commands, began rapidly to
retreat towards the quay. In vain Martin stormed and cursed, in vain
with his own hand he struck more than one of his soldiers dead. He was
swept along with the panic-stricken band, and when, shouting and
gnashing his teeth with frenzy, he reached the quay at last, he saw at a
glance why his great enterprise had failed. The few empty barges of his
own party were moored at the steps; the rest were half a mile off,
contending hopelessly against the swollen and rapid Waal. Schenk,
desperately wounded, was left almost alone upon the wharf, for his
routed followers had plunged helter skelter into the boats, several of
which, overladen in the panic, sank at once, leaving the soldiers to
drown or struggle with the waves. The game was lost. Nothing was left
the freebooter but retreat. Reluctantly turning his back on his enemies,
now in full cry close behind him, Schenk sprang into the last remaining
boat just pushing from the quay. Already overladen, it foundered with
his additional weight, and Martin Schenk, encumbered with his heavy
armour, sank at once to the bottom of the Waal.
Some of the fugitives succeeded in swimming down the stream, and
were picked up by their comrades in the barges below the town, and so
made their escape. Many were drowned with their captain. A few days
afterwards, the inhabitants of Nymegen fished up the body of the
famous partisan. He was easily recognized by his armour, and by his
truculent face, still wearing the scowl with which he had last rebuked
his followers. His head was taken off at once, and placed on one of the
turrets of the town, and his body, divided in four, was made to adorn
other portions of the battlements; so that the burghers were enabled to
feast their eyes on the remnants of the man at whose name the whole
country had so often trembled.
This was the end of Sir Martin Schenk of Niddegem, knight, colonel,
and brigand; save that ultimately his dissevered limbs were packed in a

chest, and kept in a church tower, until Maurice of Nassau, in course of
time becoming master of Nymegen, honoured the valiant and on the
whole faithful freebooter with a Christian and military burial.
A few months later (October, 1589) another man who had been playing
an important part in the Netherlands' drama lost his life. Count Moeurs
and Niewenaar, stadholder of Utrecht, Gelderland, and Overysael,
while inspecting some newly-invented fireworks, was suddenly killed
by their accidental ignition and explosion. His death left vacant three
great stadholderates, which before long were to be conferred upon a
youth whose power henceforth was rapidly to grow greater.
The misunderstanding between Holland and England continuing,
Olden- Barneveld, Aerssens, and Buys, refusing to see that they had
done wrong in denouncing the Dutch and English traitors who had sold
Gertruydenberg to the enemy, and the Queen and her counsellors
persisting in their anger at so insolent a proceeding, it may easily be
supposed that there was no great heartiness in the joint expedition
against Spain, which had been projected in the autumn of 1588, and
was accomplished in the spring and summer of 1589.
Nor was this well-known enterprise fruitful of any remarkable result. It
had been decided to carry the war into Spain itself, and Don Antonio,
prior of Crato, bastard of Portugal, and pretender to its crown, had
persuaded himself and the English government that his name would be
potent to conjure with in that kingdom, hardly yet content with the