against inquisition into household or conscience. The garrison
went out with the honours of war, and thus the place, whose military
value caused it to change hands almost as frequently as a counter in a
game, was once more in possession of the republic. In the course of the
following week Maurice laid siege to the city of Meurs, a little farther
up the Rhine, which immediately capitulated. Thus the keys to the
debatable land of Cleves and Juliers, the scene of the Admiral of
Arragon's recent barbarities, were now held by the stadholder.

These achievements were followed by an unsuccessful attempt upon
Bois-le-Duc in the course of November. The place would have fallen
notwithstanding the slenderness of the besieging army had not a sudden
and severe frost caused the prudent prince to raise the siege. Feeling
that his cousin Frederic van den Berg, who had been despatched from
before Ostend to command the relieving force near Bois-le-Duc, might take
advantage of the prematurely frozen canals and rivers to make an
incursion into Holland, he left his city just as his works had been
sufficiently advanced to ensure possession of the prize, and hastened to
protect the heart of the republic from possible danger.

Nothing further was accomplished by Maurice that year, but meantime
something had been doing within and around Ostend.

For now the siege of Ostend became the war, and was likely to continue to
be the war for a long time to come; all other military operations being
to a certain degree suspended, as if by general consent of both
belligerants, or rendered subsidiary to the main design. So long as this
little place should be beleaguered it was the purpose of the States, and
of Maurice, acting in harmony with those authorities, to concentrate
their resources so as to strengthen the grip with which the only scrap of
Flanders was held by the republic.

And as time wore on, the supposed necessities of the wealthy province,
which, in political importance, made up a full half of the archduke's
dominions, together with self-esteem and an exaggerated idea of military
honour, made that prelate more and more determined to effect his purpose.

So upon those barren sands was opened a great academy in which the
science and the art of war were to be taught by the most skilful
practitioners to all Europe; for no general, corporal, artillerist,
barber-surgeon, or engineer, would be deemed to know his trade if he had
not fought at Oste