38. The thought of the Prince of Orange night and day was how to
render assistance to the citizens of Leyden--how to convey provisions
into the town. He had collected a large supply, but, with all his
exertions, could not raise a sufficient force to break through the
blockade. In this desperate extremity the Dutch resolved to have
recourse to that expedient which they had kept in reserve until it
should be clear that no other was left--they would break their dikes,
open their sluices, inundate the whole level country around Leyden,
and wash the Spaniards and their forts utterly away!
39. It was truly a desperate measure, and it was only in the last
extremity that they could bring themselves to think of it. All that
fertile land, which the labor of ages had drained and cultivated--to
see it converted into a sheet of water! There could not possibly be a
sight more unseemly and melancholy to a Dutchman's eyes. But, when the
measure was once resolved upon, they set to work with a heartiness and
zeal greater than that which had attended their building. Hatchets,
hammers, spades, and pickaxes were in requisition; and by the labor of
a single night the work of ages was demolished and undone. The water,
availing itself of the new inlets, poured over the flat country, and
in a short time the whole of the region between Leyden and Rotterdam
was flooded.
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