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Here they long waited in vain for a master willing to purchase their services; till the Dutch, pressed by the Spanish General Spinola, offered to take them into pay. After a bloody fight at Fleurus with the Spaniards, who attempted to intercept them, they reached Holland, where their appearance compelled the Spanish general forthwith to raise the siege of Bergen-op-Zoom.
Looking at the refugees in the camp at Bergen-op-Zoom, an observer might share some of the contempt of the Germans for the Belgians. Crowded in temporary huts in the chill, misty weather of a Dutch winter, they seemed listless, marooned human wreckage. They would not dig ditches to drain their camp; they were given to pilfering from one another the clothes which the world's charity supplied.
The French king declared, that should they advance farther, he would demolish the fortifications of Maestricht and Bergen-op-Zoom. This dispute was referred to the plenipotentiaries, who, in the beginning of August, concluded a convention, importing that the Russian troops should return to their own country; and that the French king should disband an equal number of his forces.
Twice during the summer campaign of this year Du Terrail, an enterprising French refugee in the service of the archdukes, had attempted to surprise the important city of Bergen-op-Zoom. On the 21st August the intended assault had been discovered in time to prevent any very serious conflict on, either side. On the 20th September the experiment was renewed at an hour after midnight.
The castle of Wauw, within a league of Bergen-op-Zoom, which had been entrusted to one Le Marchand, a Frenchman in the service of the republic, was delivered by him to Parma for 16,000 florins. "'Tis a very important post," said the Duke, "and the money was well laid out." The loss of the city of Gelder, capital of the Province of the same name, took place in the summer.
All Carleton's sons went into the Army and all died on active service. The fourth was killed in 1814 at Bergen-op-Zoom carrying the same sword that Carleton himself had used there sixty-seven years before. A picture of the first siege of Bergen-op-Zoom hangs in the dining-room of the family seat at Greywell Hill to remind successive generations of their martial ancestors.
A few French garrisons remained shut up in strong places, of which the most important was Bergen-op-Zoom; and Bernadotte now co-operated with the Russian corps of Witzingerode, the Prussians of Bulow, and a British force of 10,000, under Sir T. Graham, with the view of completing the deliverance of Holland; which was ere long effected, with the exception of Bergen-op-Zoom, from whose walls the English were repulsed with dreadful slaughter.
On the other hand, in case of an infraction of the truce by the enemy, the two kings agreed to lend assistance to the States in the manner provided by the treaties concluded with the republic previously to the negotiation of the truce. The treaty had been at once ratified by the States-General, assembled for the purpose with an extraordinary number of deputies at Bergen-op-Zoom.
The extraordinary assembly held at Bergen-op-Zoom for confirmation of the truce was estimated by, Bentivoglio at eight hundred. Bentivoglio, who was on the spot, being then nuncius at Brussels, ought to have been able to count them, yet it is very certain that the number was grossly exaggerated. At any rate the usual assembly at the Hague rarely amounted to one hundred members.
Twice during the summer campaign of this year Du Terrail, an enterprising French refugee in the service of the archdukes, had attempted to surprise the important city of Bergen-op-Zoom. On the 21st August the intended assault had been discovered in time to prevent any very serious conflict on, either side. On the 20th September the experiment was renewed at an hour after midnight.
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