in setting fire to the inflammable materials heaped about the ravelin to
such effect that the fire burned for days, notwithstanding the flooding
of the works at each high tide. The men, working day and night,
scorching in the flames, yet freezing kneedeep in the icy slush of the
trenches and perpetually under fire of the hostile batteries, became
daily more and more exhausted, notwithstanding their determination to
hold the place. Christmas drew nigh, and a most gloomy, festival it was
like to be, for it seemed as if the beleaguered garrison had been
forgotten by the States. Weeks had passed away without a single company
being sent to repair the hideous gaps made daily in the ranks of those
defenders of a forlorn hope. It was no longer possible to hold the
external works; the Square, the Polder, and the other forts on the
southwest which Vere had constructed with so much care and where he had
thus far kept his headquarters. On Sunday morning,--23rd December, he
reluctantly gave orders that they should be abandoned on the following
day and the whole garrison concentrated within the town.

The clouds were gathering darkly over the head of the gallant Vere; for
no sooner had he arrived at this determination than he learned from a
deserter that the archduke had fixed upon that very Sunday evening for
a general assault upon the place. It was hopeless for the garrison to
attempt to hold these outer forts, for they required a far larger number
of soldiers than could be spared from the attenuated little army. Yet
with those forts in the hands of the enemy there would be nothing left
but to make the best and speediest terms that might be obtained. The
situation was desperate. Sir Francis called his principal officers
together, announced his resolve not to submit to the humiliation of a
surrender after all their efforts, if there was a possibility of escape
from their dilemma, reminded them that reinforcements might be expected
to arrive at any moment, and that with even a few hundred additional