The
defenders of the camp yielded at the third charge and fled in dismay,
while the Spaniards, leaping the barriers, scattered hither and thither
in the ardour of pursuit. The routed Englishmen fled swiftly along the
oozy dyke, in hopes of joining the main body of the relieving party, who
were expected to advance, with the dawn, from their position six miles
farther down the river. Two miles long the chace lasted, and it seemed
probable that the fugitives would be overtaken and destroyed, when, at
last, from behind a line of mounds which stretched towards Batenburg and
had masked their approach, appeared Count Hohenlo and Sir John Norris, at
the head of twenty-five hundred Englishmen and Hollanders. This force,
advanced as rapidly as the slippery ground and the fatigue of a two
hours' march would permit to the rescue of their friends, while the
retreating English rallied, turned upon their pursuers, and drove them
back over the path along which they had just been charging in the full
career of victory. The fortune of the day was changed, and in a few
minutes Hohenlo and Norris would have crossed the river and entered
Grave, when the Spanish companies of Bobadil and other commanders were
seen marching along the quaking bridge.

Three thousand men on each side now met at push of pike on the bank of
the Meuse. The rain-was pouring in torrents, the wind was blowing a gale,
the stream was rapidly rising, and threatening to overwhelm its shores.
By a tacit and mutual consent, both armies paused for a few moments in
full view of each other. After this brief interval they closed again,
breast to breast, in sharp and steady conflict. The ground, slippery with
rain and with blood, which was soon flowing almost as fast as the rain,
afforded an unsteady footing to the combatants. They staggered like
drunken men, fell upon their knees, or upon their backs, and still,
kneeling or rolling prostrate, maintained the deadly conflict. For the
space of an hour and a half the fierce encounter of human passion
outmastered the fury of the elements. Norris and Hohenlo fought at the
head of their columns, like paladins of old. The Englishman was wounded
in the mouth and breast, the Count was seen to gallop past one thousand
musketeers and caliver-men of the enemy, and to escape unscathed. But as
the strength of the soldiers exhausted itself, the violence of the
tempest increased. The floods of rain and the blasts of the hurricane at
last termin