"If you see me not serve my prince with faithful courage now," replied Stanley, "account, me for ever a coward. Living or dying I will stand err lie by you in friendship."
As they were speaking these words the young Earl of Essex, general of the horse, cried to his, handful of troopers:
"Follow me, good fellows, for the honour of England and of England's
Queen!"
As he spoke he dashed, lance in rest, upon the enemy's cavalry, overthrew the foremost man, horse and rider, shivered his own spear to splinters, and then, swinging his cartel-axe, rode merrily forward. His whole little troop, compact, as an arrow-head, flew with an irresistible shock against the opposing columns, pierced clean through them, and scattered them in all directions. At the very first charge one hundred English horsemen drove the Spanish and Albanian cavalry back upon the musketeers and pikemen. Wheeling with rapidity, they retired before a volley of musket-shot, by which many horses and a few riders were killed; and then formed again to renew the attack. Sir Philip Sidney, an coming to the field, having met Sir William Pelham, the veteran lord marshal, lightly armed, had with chivalrous extravagance thrown off his own cuishes, and now rode to the battle with no armour but his cuirass. At the second charge his horse was shot under him, but, mounting another, he was seen everywhere, in the thick of the fight, behaving himself with a gallantry which extorted admiration even from the enemy.
For the battle was a series of personal encounters in which high officers were doing the work of private, soldiers. Lord North, who had been lying "bed-rid" with a musket-shot in the leg, had got himself put on horseback, and with "one boot on and one boot off," bore himself, "most lustily" through the whole affair. "I desire that her Majesty may know;" he said, "that I live but to, serve her. A better barony than I have could not hire the Lord North to live, on meaner terms." Sir William Russell laid about him with his curtel-axe to such purpose that the Spaniards pronounced him a devil and not a man. "Wherever," said an eye- witness, "he saw five or six of the enemy together; thither would he, and with his hard knocks soon separated their friendship." Lord Willoughby encountered George Crescia, general of the famed Albanian cavalry, unhorsed him at the first shock, and rolled him into the ditch. "I yield me thy prisoner," called out the Epirote in French, "for thou art a 'preux chevalier;'" while Willoughby, trusting to his captive's word, galloped onward, and with him the rest of the little troop, till they seemed swallowed up by the superior numbers of the enemy. His horse was shot under him, his basses were torn from his legs, and he was nearly taken a prisoner, but fought his way back with incredible strength and good fortune. Sir William Stanley's horse had seven bullets in him, but bore his rider unhurt to the end of the battle. Leicester declared Sir William and "old Reads" to be "worth their, weight in pearl."
Hannibal Gonzaga, leader of the Spanish cavalry, fell mortally wounded a The Marquis del Vasto, commander of the expedition, nearly met the same fate. An Englishman was just cleaving his head with a battle-axe, when a Spaniard transfixed the soldier with his pike. The most obstinate struggle took place about the train of waggons. The teamsters had fled in the beginning of the action, but the English and Spanish soldiers, struggling with the horses, and pulling them forward and backward, tried in vain to get exclusive possession of the convoy which was the cause of the action. The carts at last forced their way slowly nearer and nearer to the town, while the combat still went on, warm as ever, between the hostile squadrons. The action, lasted an hour and a half, and again and again the Spanish horsemen wavered and broke before the handful of English, and fell back upon their musketeers. Sir Philip Sidney, in the last charge, rode quite through the enemy's ranks till he came upon their entrenchments, when a musket-ball from the camp struck him upon the thigh, three inches above the knee. Although desperately wounded in a part which should have been protected by the cuishes which he had thrown aside, he was not inclined to leave the field; but his own horse had been shot under him at the-beginning of the action, and the one upon which he was now mounted became too restive for him, thus crippled, to control. He turned reluctantly away, and rode a mile and a half back to the entrenchments, suffering extreme pain, for his leg was dreadfully shattered. As he past along the edge of the battle-field his attendants brought him a bottle of water to quench his raging thirst. At, that moment a wounded English soldier, "who had eaten his last at the same feast," looked up wistfully, in his face, when Sidney instantly handed him the flask, exclaiming, "Thy necessity is even greater than mine." He then pledged his dying comrade in a draught, and was soon afterwards met by his uncle. "Oh, Philip," cried Leicester, in despair, "I am truly grieved to see thee in this plight." But Sidney comforted him with manful words, and assured him that death was sweet in the cause of his Queen and country. Sir William Russell, too, all blood-stained from the fight, threw his arms around his friend, wept like a child, and kissing his hand, exclaimed, "Oh! noble Sir Philip, never did man attain hurt so honourably or serve so valiantly as you." Sir William Pelham declared "that Sidney's noble courage in the face of our enemies had won him a name of continuing honour."
The wounded gentleman was borne back to the camp, and thence in a barge to Arnheim. The fight was over. Sir John Norris bade Lord Leicester "be merry, for," said he, "you have had the honourablest day. A handful of men has driven the enemy three times to retreat. "But, in truth, it was now time for the English to retire in their turn. Their reserve never arrived. The whole force engaged against the thirty-five hundred Spaniards had never exceeded two hundred and fifty horse and three hundred foot, and of this number the chief work had beer done by the fifty or sixty volunteers and their followers. The heroism which had been displayed was fruitless, except as a proof—and so Leicester wrote to the Palatine John Casimir—"that Spaniards were not invincible." Two thousand men now sallied from the Loor Gate under Verdugo and Tassis, to join the force under Vasto, and the English were forced to retreat. The whole convoy was then carried into the city, and the Spaniards remained masters of the field.
Thirteen troopers and twenty-two foot soldiers; upon the English side, were killed. The enemy lost perhaps two hundred men. They were thrice turned from their position, and thrice routed, but they succeeded at last in their attempt to carry their convoy into Zutphen. Upon that day, and the succeeding ones, the town was completely victualled. Very little, therefore, save honour, was gained by the display of English valour against overwhelming numbers; five hundred against, near, four thousand. Never in the whole course of the war had there been such fighting, for the troops upon both sides were picked men and veterans. For a long time afterwards it was the custom of Spaniards and Netherlanders, in characterising a hardly-contested action, to call it as warm as the fight at Zutphen.
"I think I may call it," said Leicester, "the most notable encounter that hath been in our age, and it will remain to our posterity famous."
Nevertheless it is probable that the encounter would have been forgotten by posterity but for the melancholy close upon that field to Sidney's bright career. And perhaps the Queen of England had as much reason to blush for the incompetency of her general and favourite as to be proud. of the heroism displayed by her officers and soldiers.