but courage to recommend him as a leader in a military expedition. He was
a mere boy, utterly without experience in the field. His troops were raw
levies, vagabonds and outlaws.

Such as it was, however, his army was soon posted at Ostrawell in a
convenient position, and with considerable judgment. He had the Scheld
and its dykes in his rear, on his right and left the dykes and the
village. In front he threw up a breastwork and sunk a trench. Here then
was set up the standard of rebellion, and hither flocked daily many
malcontents from the country round. Within a few days three thousand men
were in his camp. On the other handy Brederode was busy in Holland, and
boasted of taking the field ere long with six thousand soldiers at the
very least. Together they would march to the relief of Valenciennes, and
dictate peace in Brussels.

It was obvious that this matter could not be allowed to go on. The
Duchess, with some trepidation, accepted the offer made by Philip de
Lannoy, Seigneur de Beauvoir, commander of her body-guard in Brussels, to
destroy this nest of rebels without delay. Half the whole number of these
soldiers was placed at his disposition, and Egmont supplied De Beauvoir
with four hundred of his veteran Walloons.

With a force numbering only eight hundred, but all picked men, the
intrepid officer undertook his enterprise, with great despatch and
secrecy. Upon the 12th March, the whole troop was sent off in small
parties, to avoid suspicion, and armed only with sword and dagger. Their
helmets, bucklers, arquebusses, corselets, spears, standards and drums,
were delivered to their officers, by whom they were conveyed noiselessly
to the place of rendezvous. Before daybreak, upon the following morning,
De Beauvoir met his soldiers at the abbey of Saint Bernard, within a