History of Protestantism in the Netherlands - James Aitken Wylie

which defended the Gate of the Cross was carried -
- -a conquest that was to cost the enemy dear. The
besiegers pressed tumultuously into the fortress,
expecting to find a clear path into the city; but a
most mortifying check awaited them. The
inhabitants, labouring incessantly, had reared a
half-moon battery behind the breached portion of
the wall,[4] and instead of the various spoil of the
city, for which the Spaniards were so greedily
athirst, they beheld the cannon of the new erection
frowning defiance upon them. The defenders
opened fire upon the mass of their assailants pent
up beneath, but a yet greater disaster hung over the
enemy.
The ravelin had been previously undermined,
the citizens foreseeing its ultimate capture, and
now when they saw it crowded with the besiegers
they knew that the moment was come for firing it.
They lighted the match, and in a few moments
came the peal of the explosion, and the huge mass,
with the hundreds of soldiers and officers whom it
enclosed, was seen to soar into the air, and then
descend in a mingled shower of stones and
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