History of the United Netherlands from the Death of William the Silent to the Twelve Year's Truce, 1600-02Motley, John Lothrop
History
History of the United Netherlands from the Death of William the Silent to the Twelve Year's Truce, 1600-02
Motley, John Lothrop
Netherlands -- History -- Eighty Years' War, 1568-1648
paying him all his cash on hand and giving hostages for the remainder,
carried off six hundred of the men and women, promising soon to
return and complete the transaction. Meantime the imperial general,
Schwartzenberg, came before the place, urging the mutineers with promises
of speedy payment, and with appeals to their sense of shame, to abstain
from the disgraceful work. He might as well have preached to the wild
swine swarming in the adjacent forests. Siege thereupon was laid to the
place. In a sortie the brave Schwartzenberg was killed, but Colonitz
coming up in force the mutineers were locked up in the town which they
had seized, and the Turk never came to their relief. Famine drove them
at last to choose between surrender and a desperate attempt to cut their
way out. They took the bolder course, and were all either killed or
captured. And now--the mutineers having given the Turk this lesson in
Christian honour towards captives--their comrades and the rest of the
imperial forces showed them the latest and most approved Christian method
of treating mutineers. Several hundred of the prisoners were distributed
among the different nationalities composing the army to be dealt with at
pleasure. The honest Germans were the most straightforward of all
towards their portion of the prisoners, for they shot them down at once,
without an instant's hesitation. But the Lorrainers, the remainder of
the French troops, the Walloons, and especially the Hungarians--whose
countrymen and women had been sold into captivity--all vied with each
other in the invention of cruelties at which the soul sickens, and which
the pen almost refuses to depict.
These operations and diversions had no sensible effect upon the progress
of the war, which crept on with the same monotonous and sluggish cruelty
as ever; but the incidents narrated paint the course of civilization more
vividly than the detailed accounts of siege and battle; mining and
countermining, assaults and ambuscades can do, of which the history books
are full. The leaguers of Buda and of other cities and fortresses in
Hungary went their course; and it was destined to remain for a still
longer season doubtful whether Cross or Crescent should ultimately wave
over the whole territory of Eastern Europe, and whether the vigorous
Moslem, believing in himself, his mission, his discipline, and his
resources, should ultimately absorb what was left of the ancient Roman
Empire.
Meantime, such of the Walloons, Lorrainers, Germans, and Frenchmen as had
grown wearied of the fighting on the Danube and the Theiss--might have
recourse for variety to the perpetual carnage on the Meuse, the Rhine,
and the Scheld. If there was not bloodshed enough for all, it was surely
not the fault of Mahomet, nor Clement, nor Philip.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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