of which he had nearly fifty, were each regularly furnished with moat,
drawbridge, and bulwark. His counterscarp and parapet, his galleries,
covered ways and mines, were as elaborate, massive, and artistically
finished as if he were building a city instead of besieging one.
Buzanval, the French envoy, amazed at the spectacle, protested that his
works "were rather worthy of the grand Emperor of the Turks than of, a
little commonwealth, which only existed through the disorder of its
enemies and the assistance of its friends;" but he admitted the utility
of the stadholder's proceedings to be very obvious.

While the prince calmly sat before Grave, awaiting the inexorable hour
for burghers and garrison to surrender, the great Francis Mendoza,
Admiral of Arragon, had been completing the arrangements for his
exchange. A prisoner after the Nieuport battle, he had been assigned
by Maurice, as will be recollected, to his cousin, young Lewis Gunther,
whose brilliant services as commander of the cavalry had so much
contributed to the victory. The amount of ransom for so eminent a
captive could not fail to be large, and accordingly the thrifty Lewis
William had congratulated his brother on being able, although so young,
thus to repair the fortunes of the family by his military industry to a
greater extent than had yet been accomplished by any of the race.
Subsequently, the admiral had been released on parole, the sum of his
ransom having been fixed at nearly one hundred thousand Flemish crowns.
By an agreement now made by the States, with consent of the Nassau
family, the prisoner was definitely released, on condition of effecting
the exchange of all prisoners of the republic, now held in durance by
Spain in any part of the world. This was in lieu of the hundred thousand
crowns which were to be put into the impoverished coffers of Lewis
Gunther. It may be imagined, as the hapless prisoners afterwards poured
in--not only from the peninsula, but from more distant regions, whither