I
As for the rest, 'tis in the domain of history. Not only Maître Manuchet, but Le Carpentier in his splendid History of Cambray, has told us how the Duke of Parma's armies, demoralized by that day of disasters, took as many weeks to recuperate and to rally as did the valiant city to recover from her wounds.
Too late did Parma discover that he had been hoaxed, that the massed French troops, who had terrified his armies, consisted of a handful of men, who had been made to shout and to make much noise, so as to scare those whom they could not have hoped to conquer in open fight. It was too late now for the great general to retrieve his blunder; but not too late to prepare a fresh line of action, wait for reinforcements, reorganize the forces at his command and then to resume the siege of Cambray, with the added hope of inflicting material punishment upon the rebel city for the humiliation which she had caused him to endure.
The French armies were still very far away. Parma's numerous spies soon brought him news that Monsieur Duc d'Anjou, was only now busy in collecting and training a force which eventually might hope to vie in strength and equipment with the invincible Spanish troops, whilst the King of France would apparently have nothing to do with the affair and openly disapproved of his brother's intervention in the business of the Netherlands.
The moment therefore was all in favour of the Spanish commander; but even so he did not again try to take Cambray by storm. Many historians have averred that a nameless superstition was holding him back, that he had seen in the almost supernatural resistance of the city, the warning finger of God. Be that as it may, he became, after the day of disaster, content to invest the approaches to the French frontier, and after awhile, when his reinforcements had arrived, he formed with his armies a girdle around Cambray with a view to reducing her by starvation.
A less glorious victory mayhap, but a more assured one!