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They were nearly all Walloons, soldiers who had already seen much active service, but unfortunately of a race warlike and fiery indeed, but upon whose steadiness not much more dependence could be placed at that day than in the age of Civilis. Champagny, brother of Granvelle, was Governor of the city. He was a sincere Catholic, but a still more sincere hater of the Spaniards.
Letters could pass to and fro only at extreme peril to the messengers, and all possibility of reinforcing the city at the moment was cut off. While this eventful siege was proceeding, the negotiations with the Walloons were ripening. The siege and the conferences went hand in hand.
Such events, with the hatred growing daily more intense between the Walloons and the Ghenters, made it highly important that some kind of an accord should be concluded, if possible.
The Spaniards were so reduced by sickness that it was pitiful to see them. The Italians were not in much better condition, nor the Germans. "As for the Walloons," said he, "they are deserting, as they always do.
As for the town, it has perhaps twenty-five hundred people Walloons and Flemish folk living in tall, bleak, stone houses built flush with the little crooked streets.
The Prince of Parma, at the head of a few regiments of Walloons, making an attack on a body of troops by which Anjou had been escorted into Flanders, the troops retreated in good order, and without much loss, under the walls of Ghent, where a long and sharp action took place, much to the disadvantage of Parma, The Prince, of Orange and the Duke; of Anjou were on the city walls during the whole skirmish giving orders and superintending the movements of their troops, and at nightfall Parma was forced, to retire, leaving a large number of dead behind him.
On both he planted artillery, placing a force of eight hundred Netherlanders under Count Bossu in the one, and an equal number of the same nation, Walloons chiefly, under Barlotte in the other.
And these were the legions these very men or their immediate predecessors these Italians, Spaniards, Germans, and Walloons, who during so many terrible years had stormed and sacked almost every city of the Netherlands, and swept over the whole breadth of those little provinces as with the besom of destruction.
This was an exaggeration, for his Majesty would have been well pleased to receive the whole of the country on the same terms which had been accepted by the Walloons. Meantime, those southern provinces had made their separate treaty, and the Netherlands were permanently dissevered. Maestricht had fallen. Disunion and dismay had taken possession of the country.
"We marched out at 2 P.M.," wrote the duke to his master, "with closed ranks, colours displayed, and drums beating. First came the Italians and then the Spaniards, in the midst of whom was myself on horseback, with the Walloons marching near me.
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