into one great Spanish fortification,
guarding its every bastion and every point of the curtain, without far
more extensive armaments than the "Great King," as the Leaguers proposed
that Philip should entitle himself, had ever had at his disposal. It
might be a colossal scheme to stretch the rod of empire over so large a
portion of the earth, but the dwarfish attempts to carry the design into
execution hardly reveal the hand of genius. It is astonishing to
contemplate the meagre numbers and the slender funds with which this
world-empire was to be asserted and maintained. The armies arrayed at any
important point hardly exceeded a modern division or two; while the
resources furnished for a year would hardly pay in later days for a few
weeks' campaign.

When Alexander, the first commander of his time, moved out of Flanders
into France with less than twenty thousand men, he left most vital
portions of his master's hereditary dominions so utterly unprotected that
it was possible to attack them with a handful of troops. The young
disciple of Simon Stevinus now resumed that practical demonstration of
his principles which had been in the previous year so well begun.

On the 28th May, 1592, Maurice, taking the field with six thousand foot
and two thousand horse, came once more before Steenwyck. It will be
remembered that he had been obliged to relinquish the siege of this place
in order to confront the Duke of Parma in July, 1591, at Nymegen.

The city--very important from its position, being the key to the province
of Drenthe as well as one of the safeguards of Friesland--had been
besieged in vain by Count Renneberg after his treasonable surrender of
Groningen, of which he was governor, to the Spaniards, but had been
subsequently surprised by Tassis. Since that time it had held for the
king. Its fortifications were strong, and of the best description known
at that day. Its regular garrison was sixteen companies of foot and some
cavalry under Antoine de Quocqueville, military governor. Besides these
troops were twelve hundred Walloon infantry, commanded by Lewis, youngest
Count van den Berg, a brave lad of eighteen years, with whom were the
lord of Waterdyck and other Netherland nobles.

To the military student the siege may possess importance as marking a
transitional epoch in the history of the beleaguering science. To the
general reader, as in most of the exploits of the young Poliorcetes, its
details have but slender in