Palisade was tottering, a fleet from both sides was cannonading the
Spanish entrenchments, the salt water was flowing across the breach
already made. His seven months' work, it seemed, had come to nought.
The navigation was already open from the sea to Antwerp, the Lowenstyn
was in the rebels' hands. But Alexander was not prone to premature
despair. "I arrived," said he to Philip in a letter written on the same
evening, "at the very nick of time." A less hopeful person might have
thought that he had arrived several hours too late. Having brought with
him every man that could be spared from Beveren and from the bridge,
he now ordered Camillo del Monte to transport some additional pieces of
artillery from Holy Cross and from Saint James to Fort Saint Georg. At
the same time a sharp cannonade was to be maintained upon the rebel fleet
from all the forts.

Mondragon, with a hundred musketeers and pikemen, was sent forward
likewise as expeditiously as possible to Saint George. No one could be
more alert. The battered veteran, hero of some of the most remarkable
military adventures that history has ever recorded,' fought his way on
foot, in the midst of the fray, like a young ensign who had his first
laurels to win. And, in truth, the day was not one for cunning
manoeuvres, directed, at a distance, by a skillful tactician. It was
a brisk close contest, hand to hand and eye to eye--a Homeric encounter,
in which the chieftains were to prove a right to command by their
personal prowess. Alexander, descending suddenly--dramatically, as it
were--when the battle seemed lost--like a deity from the clouds-was to
justify, by the strength of his arm, the enthusiasm which his name always
awakened. Having, at a glance, taken in the whole situation, he made his
brief arrangements, going from rank to rank, and disposing his troops in
the most effective manner. He said but few words, but his voice had
always a telling effect.