inity, or sinks beneath the beasts of the
field--such tragical records of which the sanguinary story of mankind is
full--and no portion of them more so than the Netherland chronicles
appeal more vividly to the imagination than the neatest solution of
mathematical problems. Yet, if it be the legitimate end of military
science to accomplish its largest purposes at the least expense of human
suffering; if it be progress in civilisation to acquire by scientific
combination what might be otherwise attempted, and perhaps vainly
attempted, by infinite carnage, then is the professor with his diagrams,
standing unmoved amid danger, a more truly heroic image than
Coeur-de-Lion with his battle-axe or Alva with his truncheon.

The system--then a new one--which Maurice introduced to sustain that
little commonwealth from sinking of which he had become at the age of
seventeen the predestined chief, was the best under the circumstances
that could have been devised. Patriotism the most passionate, the most
sublime, had created the republic. To maintain its existence against
perpetual menace required the exertion of perpetual skill.

Passionless as algebra, the genius of Maurice was ready for the task.
Strategic points of immense value, important cities and fortresses, vital
river-courses and communications--which foreign tyranny had acquired
during the tragic past with a patient iniquity almost without a parallel,
and which patriotism had for years vainly struggled to recover--were the
earliest trophies and prizes of his art. But the details of his victories
may be briefly indicated, for they have none of the picturesqueness of
crime. The sieges of Naarden, Harlem, Leyden, were tragedies of maddening
interest, but the recovery of Zutphen, Deventer, Nymegen, Groningen, and
many other places--all important though they were--was accomplished with
the calmness of a consummate player, who throws down on the table the
best half dozen invincible cards which it thus becomes superfluous to
play.

There were several courses open to the prince before taking the field. It
was desirable to obtain control of the line of the Waal, by which that
heart of the republic--Holland--would be made entirely secure. To this
end, Gertruydenberg--lately surrendered to the enemy by the perfidy of
the Englishman Wingfield, to whom it had been entrusted--Bois le Duc, and
Nymegen were to be wrested from Spain.

It was also important to hold the Yssel, the course o