Catholic general was before Olden-zaal which he
took in three days, and then advanced to Lingen. Should that place
fall--and the city was known to be most inadequately garrisoned and
supplied--it would be easy for the foe to reduce Coeworden, and so seize
the famous pass over the Bourtanger Morass, march straight to
Embden--then in a state of municipal revolution on account of the chronic
feuds between its counts and the population, and therefore an easy
prey--after which all Friesland and Groningen would be at his mercy, and
his road open to Holland and Utrecht; in short, into the very bowels of
the republic.

On the 4th August Maurice broke up his camp in Flanders, and leaving five
thousand men under Colonel Van der Noot, to guard the positions there,
advanced rapidly to Deventer, with the intention of saving Lingen. It was
too late. That very important place had been culpably neglected. The
garrison consisted of but one cannoneer, and he had but one arm. A
burgher guard, numbering about three hundred, made such resistance as
they could, and the one-armed warrior fired a shot or two from a rusty
old demi-cannon. Such opposition to the accomplished Italian was
naturally not very effective. On the 18th August the place capitulated.
Maurice, arriving at Deventer, and being now strengthened by his cousin
Lewis William with such garrison troops as could be collected, learned
the mortifying news with sentiments almost akin to despair. It was now to
be a race for Coeworden, and the fleet-footed Spinola was a day's march
at least in advance of his competitor. The key to the fatal morass would
soon be in his hands. To the inexpressible joy of the stadholder, the
Genoese seemed suddenly struck with blindness. The prize was almost in
his hands and he threw away all his advantages. Instead of darting at
once upon Coeworden he paused for nearly a month, during which period he
seemed intoxicated with a success so rapidly achieved, and especially
with his adroitness in outwitting the great stadholder. On the 14th
September he made a retrograde movement towards the Rhine, leaving two
thousand five hundred men in Lingen. Maurice, giving profound thanks to
God for his enemy's infatuation, passed by Lingen, and having now, with
his cousin's reinforcements, a force of nine thousand foot and three
thousand horse, threw himself into Coeworden, strengthened and garrisoned
that vital fortress which Spinola would perhaps have taken as easily