Leatherface: A Tale of Old Flanders

When Orange begged for money and men that he might continue the fight for liberty, the goodly burghers of Ghent forgot their glorious traditions and preferred to bend their neck to the yoke rather than risk the fate of Mons and of Mechlin. But now that danger is within their doors, now that they and their wives and daughters are at the mercy of the same brutal soldiery whom Alva and de Vargas take pleasure in driving to bestial excesses and inhuman cruelties, now that they realise that the fate of Mechlin is already inevitably theirs-their dormant courage rises once more to its most sublime altitude. Die they must-that they know! – how can they, within the enclosure of their own city walls, stand up against the armies of Spain, which can at any moment be brought up in their thousands to reinforce the tyrant's troops? But at least they will die with muskets or pikes in their hands, and their wives and daughters will be spared the supreme outrage which they count worse than death.

Thus close on five thousand volunteers file past their leaders this night in the refectory of St. Agneten and tender their oath of allegiance to fight to the last man for Orange and liberty. On the faces of those leaders-of Messire van Beveren, of Lievin van Deynse, of Laurence van Rycke and Jan van Migrode, there is plainly writ the determination to keep up the fight to the end, and the knowledge that the end can only be death for them all.

But in Mark van Rycke's deep-set eyes there is something more than mere determination. There is a latent belief that God will intervene-there is a curious exultation in their merry depths-a kind of triumphant hope: and those who stand before him and swear that they will fight for Orange and liberty with the last drop of their blood look him straight in the face for a moment and then turn away feeling less grim and more courageous with a courage not altogether born of despair.

The angel of liberty has unsheathed his sword and infused his holy breath into these men-easy-going burghers for the most part, untrained soldiers or even undisciplined rabble-who have dared to defy the might of Alva.

VII

And when the first streak of dawn folds the night in its embrace and lifts from off the stricken city the veil of oblivion and of sleep, we see some five thousand Orangists prepared to stand up before Alva's forces which still number close on eight. The streets are littered with dead, with pikes and lances hastily cast aside, with muskets and plumed bonnets, with broken rubbish and wheelless wagons, and scraps of cloth or shoes or leather belts.

And in the cemetery of St. Jakab the flag of liberty still flaunts its blazing orange in the pale morning light and around it men still rally, defiant and unconquered. The Guild House of the Tanners close by is in flames, and the tower of St. Jakab a crumbling ruin; the hostel of St. Juan ten Dullen is a charred mass of debris, and the houses that front on the Vridachmart a fast crumbling heap of masonry and glass.

The situation of the insurgents is more desperate than even Alva knows. Of their three captains, Pierre van Overbeque is dead, Jan van Migrode severely wounded, and Laurence van Rycke exhausted. Of their company of halberdiers, all the provosts except two have fallen. The investing lines around the Kasteel have five officers killed and twenty of their artillerymen have fallen. Six hundred of their wounded encumber the Vridachmart. The narrow streets which debouch upon the gates are deserted save by the dead.

But as soon as the rising day hath touched the ruined tower of St. Jakab with its pale silvery light, Mark van Rycke, their commander, intrepid and undaunted, wakes the sleeping echoes with his cry: "Burghers of Ghent! to arms! we are not vanquished yet!"

A volley of arrows from the crossbowmen upon the Waalpoort answers the defiant cry: one arrow pierces a loose corner of Mark's doublet.

"Van Rycke!" cries the provost who stands nearest to him, "spare thyself in the name of God! What shall we do if you fall?"

And Mark, unmoved, the fire of enthusiasm unquenched in his eyes, cries loudly in response:

"Do? What alone can burghers of Ghent do in face of what lies before them if they give in? Do? Why, die like heroes-to the last man."

His doublet hangs from him in rags, his hose is torn, his head bare, his face black with powder. He grasps musket or crossbow, halberd, lance or pike, whichever is readiest to his hand, whichever company hath need of a leader; a beam from the burning building has fallen within a yard of him and singed his hair: "Heroes of Ghent!" he cries, "which of you will think of giving in?"

The morning Angelus begins to ring. For a few minutes while the pure clear tones of the church bells reverberate above the din of waking men and clash of arms, Spaniards and Walloons and Flemings pause in their hate and their fight in order to pray.

Up in the council chamber of the Kasteel, Alva and de Vargas and del Rio on their knees mock the very God whom they invoke, and when the last "Amen!" has left their lips, Alva struggles to his feet and murmurs fiercely:

"And now for revenge!"

Through the wide open windows, he gazes upon the spires and roofs of the beautiful city which he hath sworn to destroy. Already many of these are crumbling ruins, and from far away near the church of St. Jakab a column of black smoke rises upwards to the sky. The windows give upon an iron balcony which runs along the entire width of the Meeste-Toren: from this balcony an open staircase leads down into the castle-yard. The yard and vaulted cellars opposite are filled with horses, and the corridors of the palace swarm with men. And as the Duke, anon, steps out upon the balcony he sees before him the five breaches in the castle-walls which testify to the power of the insurgents' culverins. He hears the groans of the wounded who lie all round the walls upon the litters of straw, he sees the faces of innumerable dead, floating wide-eyed upon the waters of the moat, and the carcasses of horses in the yard which add to the horror of the scene by their pathetic hideousness.

And seeing all this, he hath not a thought of pity for all the innocent whom he vows to punish along with the guilty.

"Now for revenge!" he reiterates fiercely and shakes a clenched fist toward the tower of St. Jakab, "and if only I had my Spaniards with me, we would have burned the town down before now."

VIII

The day drags on in the weary monotony of incessant firing, incessant fighting-constant attacks to be repulsed, numbers of wounded to be added to those who already encumber the yard-numbers of dead to be added to those who encumber the waters of the moat.

The finest general the victorious Spanish armies have ever known is besieged in his stronghold by a few hundred undisciplined, untaught, unseasoned rebel troops. What is happening beyond the wide tract of open ground which lies all round the Kasteel the Duke cannot get to know. The Orangist lines are all round him screened by the buildings which face the further bank of the Schelde; and though his culverins have turned the magnificent Vleeshhuis into a smoking ruin, those of the Orangists have made serious havoc in the castle walls.

The last onslaught delivered a couple of hours after noonday resulted in the crumbling together of three of the widest breaches already existing, making one huge yawning cavity, which has to be strongly and persistently defended-a defence which exacts an enormous toll of wounded and dead every time the Orangist artillery and musketry return to the attack.

"We cannot hold out till nightfall!" Captain de Avila cries despairingly. "We have lost two hundred men in less than two hundred minutes. If we get no help we are undone!"

"Help!" cries Alva fiercely, "where are we to get help from if those oafs at the city gates do not find us some?"

On the north-east side of the Kasteel lies the open way to Dendermonde-where Captain Gonzalo de Bracamonte is quartered with a garrison of five thousand men, and between that open way of salvation, and those who hold the Kasteel, there lies a league of spongy morass. The way through it is free from the Orangist musketry. Nature alone bars it, and does so effectually.

Three times to-day has Alva tried to send runners through that way. Stripped to the skin they are lowered by ropes from the parapet, and at first find firm foothold at the base of the walls. From up above Alva and his captains watch the naked men who walk on boldly, proud of their achievement; their skins shine like metal beneath the grey, autumnal sky on which the smouldering ruins of a devastated city have painted a crimson tint. Alva watches them until they appear as mere black dots upon the low horizon-tiny black specks that move for a while, slowly along, with arms swinging as the mud gets deeper and walking heavier. Then suddenly the speck ceases to move … the arms are thrown up with frantic wheelings and beatings of the air … sometimes the speck will turn and move back slowly toward the castle, but more often than not it grows shorter and shorter still, till even the tall arms disappear-engulfed in the morass.

Three times have men been sent out on this errand of death … three or four at a time … twice has one man come back from those hideous, yawning jaws of a loathsome death-livid, covered with green slime, trembling in every limb as if stricken with ague. After that, men refuse to go … Alva commands and threatens … another batch go off … another spectre returns from the shores of another world… Then the men are obstinate … to insist, to command, to threaten further would provoke mutiny, and the stronghold once more lapses into utter isolation.

The din of musketry from end to end of the city drowns every other sound, smoke from smouldering ruins obscures the view beyond the Schelde. What has happened in the centre of the city during all these hours, whilst the high and mighty Lieutenant-Governor and Captain-General of the Force of Occupation is a virtual prisoner in the hands of the rebels, he himself cannot possibly tell.

"The rebels have lost more heavily than we have," says de Avila, whilst he snatches a brief rest during the afternoon, "and they must be getting short of powder."

"So are we," says Alva grimly.

"Surely Captain Lodrono has come in touch with Captain Serbelloni by now. It is inconceivable that the garrisons at the gate-houses can do nothing."

"Those Netherlanders are fighting like devils," says de Vargas with his evil sneer, "they have nothing to lose … they know that they are doomed, every man, woman and child of them … aye! if I had my way, every man who speaks the Flemish tongue."

"Aye!" retorts Alva with a curse, "but in the meanwhile, if Serbelloni or Lodrono have not sent a runner to Dendermonde, those Flemish louts will carry this castle by storm, and when I am a prisoner in their hands, they'll either slaughter us all or dictate their own terms."

"Ah!" says Avila quietly, "they have not got the Kasteel yet."

"How long can we hold out?" queries de Vargas, who at Alva's grimly prophetic words, had become livid with fear.

"Unless those rebels have lost more heavily than we hope, we cannot hold out more than another few hours. We still have three thousand men and a goodly stock of powder… The breach we can defend with stones of which there is a large store; we killed or wounded over a hundred of those louts at their last assault … we can go on like this until nightfall. But if at dawn they attack us again in full force-and we lose many more men to-day … why…"

"Hold thy tongue," cried Alva fiercely, for at the senior captain's words, many of the younger ones have exchanged quick, significant glances. "Shall I have to hang some of my captains so as to discourage the men from playing the coward too?"

IX

The evening Angelus has just ceased to ring, and a man is ushered into the presence of the Captain-General; he is naked, and his body is covered with sticky mud and dripping with slime; his face is hardly recognisable through a thick mask of sweat and grime.

"I come from Braepoort, Magnificence," he says in a low, quaking voice, for obviously he is all but exhausted. "I ran round the town, and struck into the morass … I am a man of Ghent … I know a track … that's why Captain Serbelloni sent me."

"With what news?" queries Alva impatiently.

"None too good, Magnificence," replies the man. "The commandants at the gates are sorely pressed … I hailed the guard at the Brügge and Waalpoorts as I passed … they are isolated … every one of them … and each separately attacked by bands of rebels who fight desperately… The Braepoort cannot hold out much longer … Captain Serbelloni asks for help even before nightfall."

"Help?" vociferates Alva savagely, "how can I send them help? We are besieged in this accursed place; we cannot fight our way through the rabble, unless some of those oafs at the city gates come to our assistance. Help? 'Tis I want help here."

"The gates are being bravely defended, Magnificence. But the rebels still hold the centre of the city. They have seized 'Sgravensteen. Two thousand Walloons have surrendered to them…"

"Two thousand!" exclaims Alva with a fierce oath, "the miserable poltroons."

"At least three thousand rebels threaten the Kasteel."

"I know that well enough," retorts Alva roughly. "They have made five breaches in our wall! … the bandits! Help! 'tis I want help!" he reiterates with a loud curse.

"Captain Serbelloni bade me tell your Highness that he hath sent to Dendermonde for immediate reinforcements. He hoped your Highness would forgive him if he hath done wrong."