Wilhelm Raabe

“ Myga sat in her little room behind the city walls along the quayside in Antwerp. She was in her black mourning clothes, a beautiful young woman still pale from her long vigils at the bed of her dying father. She was spinning. Her eyes were full of tears and her heart was full of pent-up grief and care. The poor child had been quite alone in the great town since the death of her father and the times were so unruly that the weak in society were virtually at the mercy of all random oppression and insolence. ”

“ Have you not allowed yourself to dream of having such a rival? Down with the beggar! To the gallows with him!"
Genoese swords flew from their scabbards.
"God protect you, Myga!" shouted Jan Norris, swinging his own blade. "Get back, you foreign rogues!"
Uttering the beggars' piercing cry: "Sultan before Pope!" the helmsman of the black galley eluded the guard of Leone della Rota's sword, stabbed out and with a cry Antonio Valani, the captain of the Andrea Doria turned and stumbled, his sword falling clattering from his hand and with it Antonio valani himself. ”

“ The waves of the Scheldt have swallowed up her betrothed, who was impotent to prevent the depraved corruption of his beloved and who had precipitated himself into the river's cold waters so as not to participate in her dishonour.
And where is God in all this? Woe is me, the night is too dark and the mind of the unfortunate maiden too disturbed to be able to remember the great Redeemer from all of life's troubles. No power on heaven or on earth can protect her from scandal and disgrace. Poor Myga van Bergen! ”

“ The black galley rescued both of us. Long live the black galley!"
"Long live the black galley!" cheered the crew of the Andrea Doria and, further on to starboard, the black ship itself thundered a riposte, sailing on under the walls of Fort Lillo.
"Leave me be," said Captain Jeronimo to his comrades, who wanted to take him below from the ramparts. "Let me die in the open air. I'll die happier. God be with you, comrades. God be with you all. Look after yourselves. All I can see are young and youthful faces around me. Comrades, I wish you more luck than was granted to Spain's former army here. ”

“ Fort Liefkenhoek.
The commander himself held back for a while and, sighing, leant his elbows on the parapet, cupping his chin in his hands. He stared out in this wise over the waters and gazed at the night and murmured:
"He's right. This war has a curse on it. For fourteen years now the Spanish flag has flown yet again on these walls and on the walls and the towers of Antwerp, but are we for all that one step nearer in our conquest of this heroic stiff-necked people? How many men have fought and bled for this tiny flooded lump of clay! How many men have struggled to possess this wilderness! ”

“ Fire! Fire! It's a living hell! Leone, look after the ship. Look after the ship, Leone. It's all over for us. Woe is me. The beggars' flag. Man the guns. All is lost. All is lost. Look after the ship, look after the ship, Leone!"
The sick man fell back. The lieutenant straightened his pillow for him. Then he approached the kneeling maiden:
"What are you afraid of, signorina? Get up. What is it keeps you down on the floor? I won't harm you, my sweet little dove. You ought to be a queen, the absolute ruler of this good ship of ours. That's war for you. Someone has to strike their colours. ”

“ We did our duty. Dig for us on the battlefield of Jemmingen, in Mockerheide, near Gembloers and Antwerp. It is not to our dishonour that we still occupy the same piece of ground. God be with you, comrades. The old army is going to its grave. God be with you and with Spain forever. Poor Spain!"
Captain Jeronimo was dead, and the officers and soldiers of Fort
Liefkenhoek's garrison surrounded him in silence.
The noise of cannon fire had died away. All the Dutch ships had gone by the enemy Spanish forts with their sea-borne prize. ”

“ Then their banter started and, to begin with, all the talk was of our intrepid deed, of the dance we had led them the previous night, of the journey to kingdom come of the Immaculate Conception. I rejoiced much to hear this, but I suddenly froze for they mentioned a familiar name. They started to talk about you, Myga!"
"About me?" cried the young woman. "God in heaven, the Italian captain spoke about me! Jan! Jan! Protect me from him! He frightens me!"
"So the dog has set his snares to catch you!" shouted Jan in a hollow voice and Myga hid her face upon her breast and nodded trembling. ”

“ The untamed dove, Myga van Bergen, will be captured by Antonio Valani with the help of Satan and lieutenant Leone della Rota. This house will be pounced on, but so discreetly that no neighbour will be disturbed thereby, that no cock in the whole of Antwerp will crow to reveal the dark deed. On to the galleon with Myga! What larks! Hoist up the anchor, boys, and off we go to hunt down the rebellious heretics, out into the open sea, for who can hear at sea the cries for help and the weeping of little Myga? ”

“ Me as captain of the Andrea Doria, himself a corpse at the bottom of the sea."
The lieutenant stopped.
"And yet, Leone, will the same fate not befall you yourself perhaps soon, maybe even tomorrow? Who fears death? Death is annihilation. Long live life! ”

“ A light comes up on the right—Fort Liefkenhoek!
The cries of the Spanish sentries fall clearly and audibly on every ear on board the black galley and its accompanying convoy.
Each knife, each grappling hook is kept in readiness. The concealed fuses glimmer near the weapons. The hearts of these daring men are beating strongly.
"Keep good watch! Keep good watch!" can be heard echoing into the distance. A great danger lies behind these bold seamen now. Long live the luck of the sea beggars! ”

“ Only a bent very old woman strode bravely forth with a lamp in her trembling hand in the direction of the intruders and insisted in a screeching voice that no-one had slipped into the house and certainly not a sea devil from Zeeland. God forbid she should grant protection to any of the sea beggars—had not her husband, her poor departed husband, been thrown from his fishing smack into the water by those raging pirates and come to a wretched end? But what good were her asseverations? Nobody listened to them and the house was full of Spanish soldiers, Italian sailors and the dregs of the streets. ”

“ Like dazzling stars shining through the mists of time the names appear of both friends and foes, names like Alexander Farnese, Mansfeld, Mondragone, Johannes Pettin of Utrecht, Aldegonde, Gianibelli, Giovanni Baptista Plato, Barrai, Capisucchi, Olivera, Paz, La Motta, Delmonte and a hundred others. But thousands of nameless fighters lie buried under the sand and under the waves—how many more will sink there without leaving a trace? ”

“ One of Myga's principal worries was that she was not entirely alone.
There was still someone to watch over Michael van Bergen's daughter. The orphan knew full well that at least one heart had remained faithful to her, that Jan Norris of Amsterdam would have shed his blood to the last drop for her. Jan Norris, however, was an outcast, under threat of the gallows if he fell into the hands of the Spaniards in the streets of Antwerp. And Jan Norris the sea beggar often appeared in various disguises in the streets of Antwerp. ”

“ But I had to cruise off the coast of Dunkirk to send those pirates to the bottom—oh, it's hard, Myga, and yet I could do no other and I can do no other tonight either. Each of us has to be prepared to give his life to uphold the sacred honour of the fatherland. Ah, Myga, Myga, love me just a little even though I am a bad provider. ”

“ What is coming from South Beveland towards the western arm of the Scheldt where river and sea meet up with each other and can no longer be told apart? What is gliding over the waves under cover of darkness? It is propelled by a hundred strange arms, flying swift as an arrow just like the ghost ship, the Flying Dutchman. A ship's mighty form cuts through the waves and others come after it, less powerful ones.
What do the men of Zeeland care about darkness? They can find their way over these waters for these waters are their native land. One dark shadow comes after another ”

“ Where are the divine Tullus and Ancus?" laughed a young ensign, who was fresh out of upper school in Salamanca; but no-one paid attention to him, and Captain Jeronimo continued. "Enough, comrades. Let each man do his duty and think himself an honest man. Let the company stand easy, mi coronel, or we'll all be down with red dysentery tomorrow. That nasty business down there on the estuary has been put an end to now—and His Catholic Majesty Philip the Third and his Genoese Excellency, Signor Federigo Spinola, have one good ship less. ”

“ It was a dark and stormy night in the first days of November of the year 1599 when the Spanish sentry in Fort Liefkenhoek on the Flemish side of the Scheldt sounded the alarm, urgent drumming woke the sleeping garrison and each man there, commander-in-chief and ordinary soldier alike, took up their posts on the fortress's walls. ”

“ They had never been able like other children born in happier times to tumble out of danger in shady woods and on the green grass of meadows. They had never been able to make crowns from the blue cornflowers and the red poppies which grew at the edge of tilled fields. ”

“ Death would be a less terrible fate than that!"
"Calm down, Myga, calm down! There's plenty of time from now till midnight. Sitting round the fire in Amsterdam we'll remember this story. Trust me, love of my life, nothing untoward will happen to you as long as Jan Norris can still stand on his own two feet. But keep listening; my story isn't over yet. I still have to tell you how it came about that they sniffed me out as helmsman of the black galley. ”

“ But I had to control myself so that I wouldn't give myself away, and that was hard work, but Jan Norris managed it and acted as if he didn't understand a word of Italian. By Count Lumey, they were discussing with each other a piece of knavery blacker than night, but I succeeded in understanding everything they were saying. In the early hours of morning, the day after tomorrow, the Andrea Doria sets sail—her orders to do so come straight from the admiral himself—and, because the opportunity is such a favourable one, their clever plan will come into operation the night before. ”

“ Only the cabin boy came ashore alive, landing at Fort Bats clinging on to an empty water barrel. There was great jubilation among the heretics and the fishwives of Zeeland—frighteningly ugly creatures, Antonio— dried the boy off and sent him here to give their regards to His Excellency the Governor. They took the boy into the citadel. Well, we'll soon be hearing from the admiral himself."
"God grant it may be so," cried out the Andrea Doria's captain, stamping the deck with his foot in a temper. "Leone, I can't stand this enforced idleness of lying at anchor any longer!"
"Idleness?" ”

“ When had a sea beggar ever been afraid of a stormy sea and darkness when it came to annihilating the enemy, to outmanoeuvring his deadliest enemies, those who had laid waste to and oppressed his homeland won back from the waves. ”

“ What did this Genoese good-for-nothing care about the affairs of the rebel provinces and His Spanish Catholic Majesty? Heretic women could be very pretty and female members of the one true church extremely ugly. Leone definitely preferred charming heretics to ugly Catholics and did all that he could not to depart from the old proverb that went the rounds in Italy about his home town, namely that Genoa has a sea without fish, a landscape without trees and men who cannot be trusted. ”

“ All booty and all the ships captured from the heretics became the property of Admiral Spinola and so he went with an impressive array of galleys and galleons, manned with sixteen hundred bold sailors, out of Genoa, went through the Straits of Gibraltar, rounded Cape Saint Vincent, was joined by a large number of audacious Viscayan pirates and privateers in the Bay of Biscay and later by a large number of Dunkirk freebooters and appeared on 11 September 1599 in the port of Sluys, where he dropped anchor and from where he commenced his activities in the North Sea. ”

“ At noon Leone della Rota had heard with equanimity from Admiral Spinola and the governor of Antwerp that the escape of the sea beggar was attributable to him. With somewhat less equanimity he had also received the news that, in the absence of someone more suitable, he was to be entrusted with the overall command of the Genoese galleon for the expedition of the following day. ”

“ Put out to sea and capture that accursed black galley. String up the whole of its crew from its own yardarms and the devil take their souls. Tomorrow at daybreak I want the four galleys that are lying here at anchor to weigh anchor. Do you hear me, gentlemen? The Andrea Doria will stay here and await further orders. But the galleys will make sail tomorrow good and early. The message has already been given to the ships' captains at Sluys to put out to sea with every ship available. The black galley—bring me the black galley or bring me back Satan himself. ”

“ Open up! Open in the name of His Catholic Majesty of Spain! Open up! Traitors and enemies have sought shelter in this house!"
Immediately there streamed from all sides soldiers, sailors and citizens of Antwerp towards the door that led to Myga's lodging. The crowd of people grew from one moment to the next. Half in desperation Captain Valani tried to put a stop to the noise being made by his crazy friend, but it was already too late. ”

“ Each one on board knows what his duty is, each one is bound by the most solemn of oaths to stick a knife through his neighbour's jaw if his neighbour, by making a noise or by crying out thoughtlessly, jeopardizes the success of the enterprise. ”