. He has the chief
merit of being the inventor of those terrible fire-ships which
gained the title of "infernal machines"; and with some of these
formidable instruments and the Zealand fleet, the long-projected
attack was at length made.

Early on the night of the 4th of April, the prince of Parma and
his army were amazed by the spectacle of three huge masses of
flame floating down the river, accompanied by numerous lesser
appearances of a similar kind, and bearing directly against the
prodigious barrier, which had cost months of labor to him and
his troops, and immense sums of money to the state. The whole
surface of the Scheldt presented one sheet of fire; the country
all round was as visible as at noon; the flags, the arms of the
soldiers, and every object on the bridge, in the fleet, or the
forts, stood out clearly to view; and the pitchy darkness of
the sky gave increased effect to the marked distinctness of all.
Astonishment was soon succeeded by consternation, when one of the
three machines burst with a terrific noise before they reached
their intended mark, but time enough to offer a sample of their
nature. The prince of Parma, with numerous officers and soldiers
rushed to the bridge, to witness the effects of this explosion;
and just then a second and still larger fire-ship, having burst
through the flying bridge of boats, struck against one of the
estoccades. Alexander, unmindful of danger, used every exertion
of his authority to stimulate the sailors in their attempts to
clear away the monstrous machine which threatened destruction to
all within its reach. Happily for him, an ensign who was near,
forgetting in his general's peril all rules of discipline and
forms of ceremony, actually forced him from the estoccade. He had
not put his foot on the river bank when the machine blew up. The
effects were such as really baffle description. The bridge was burst
through; the estoccade was shattered almost to atoms, and, with all
that it supported--men, cannon, and the huge machinery employed
in the various works--dispersed in the air. The cruel marquis
of Roubais, many other officers, and eight hundred soldiers,
perished in all varieties of death--by flood, or flame, or the
horrid wounds from the missiles with which the terrible machine
was overcharged. Fragments of bodies and limbs were flung far
and wide; and many gallant soldiers were destroyed, without a
vestige of the human form being left to prove that they h