The Sun Over Breda

Captain Bragado’s company was among the first to march off, leaving behind the fires of the fortified town and camp and plunging into darkness along a dike bordering vast salt marshes and peat bogs. The word ran down the line of soldiers that we were marching to the Ruyter mill, a place the Dutch would have to pass en route to Breda because the land was narrow there, and according to what we’d been told, it was not possible to ford the river anywhere else. I was walking with the other mochileros from Diego Alatriste’s company, carrying his and Sebastián Copons’s harquebuses. I stayed close behind them, for I was also carrying a store of powder and balls and part of their supplies. Despite the dubious privilege of being loaded like a mule, this daily exercise had the benefit of strengthening my arms and legs. We Spaniards always do find a way to shrug off our troubles: From every ill some good will come, or vice versa.

Well, my brothers and señores,you know without my explanationan honor is never, ever, won

except with extreme extenuation.

The march was not easy in that murky light, for the moon was new and almost always hidden behind the clouds, so now and again some soldier would stumble, or the line would stop and you would bump into the person ahead of you, and then all along the dike the “’Pon my lifes” and “Pardiezes” erupted like a hailstorm of shot. My master was, as usual, a silent silhouette I followed like the shadow of a shadow. As we walked along, my head and my heart were filled with conflicting emotions: on one hand, a youth’s normal excitement about imminent action, but on the other, misgivings about the darkness and the prospect of battling a substantial number of enemies on open ground. Perhaps that was why it had made such an impression on me when, still in Oudkerk and just as the tercio had fallen in by the torchlight, even the most vocal nonbelievers had taken a moment to kneel and bare their heads as Chaplain Salanueva went up and down the rows giving us general absolution, just in case. For although the padre was a sullen and stupid priest who in his cups always tangled his Latin, he was, after all, the closest thing to a holy man we had. In any case, one thing does not cancel the other, and in a bad situation our soldiers always preferred an Ego te absolvo

from a sinner’s hand to heading toward the next world with nothing to cover their sins.

One detail disturbed me greatly, however, and from the comments I heard around me, the veteran soldiers had also given it some thought. As we crossed one of the bridges near the dike, we saw by the light of some lanterns that sappers—those entrusted with disarming the mines—with axes and mattocks were preparing to tear down the bridge behind us, no doubt to deprive the Dutch of a passage through that area. However, that also meant that we ourselves could not expect reinforcements from the rear. And also, if it eventually came to “every man for himself,” it would be impossible to retreat in that direction. There were other bridges, no doubt, but imagine, Your Mercies, the effect that had on us as we marched toward the enemy in that black night.

Nevertheless, with or without a bridge behind us, we reached the Ruyter mill before dawn. From there you could hear the distant bursts of shots as our most advanced harquebusiers kept the Dutch entertained. A bonfire was burning, and in its splendor we could see the miller and his family, a woman and four very young children, all frightened and in their nightclothes, who had been driven from their home and were watching, powerless, as soldiers broke down doors and windows, fortified the upper floor, and piled up demolished furnishings to form a bulwark. As the flames reflected off helmets and corselets, the children sobbed from terror of those rough men clad in steel, and the miller held his head in his hands, watching as his livelihood was ruined, his property devastated, and no one was moved in the least by his fate. In war, tragedy becomes routine, and the soldier’s heart is hardened as much by the misfortune of others as by his own. As for the mill, our colonel had chosen it as a lookout and command post, and we could see don Pedro de la Daga in the doorway, conferring with the Walloon commander, each surrounded by his principal officers and flag bearers. From time to time they turned to look toward the distant fires a half league or so away as well as the hamlets burning in the distance, where the main body of the Dutch seemed to be concentrated.