At this point the conflagration was stayed--for the flames refused to consume these holy relics--but almost the whole of the town was destroyed, while at least four thousand people, citizens and soldiers, had perished by sword or fire.
Three hundred survivors of the garrison took refuge in a tower.

Its base was surrounded, and, after brief parley, they descended as prisoners.

The Prince and Haultepenne attempted in vain to protect them against the fury of the soldiers, and every man of them was instantly put to death.
The next day, Alexander gave orders that the wife and sister of the commandant should be protected--for they had escaped, as if by miracle, from all the horrors of that day and night--and sent, under escort, to their friends! Neusz had nearly ceased to exist, for according to contemporaneous accounts, but eight houses had escaped destruction.
And the reflection was most painful to Leicester and to every generous Englishman or Netherlander in the country, that this important city and its heroic defenders might have been preserved, but for want of harmony and want of money.

Twice had the Earl got together a force of four thousand men for the relief of the place, and twice had he been obliged to disband them again for the lack of funds to set them in the field.
He had pawned his plate and other valuables, exhausted his credit, and had nothing for it but to wait for the Queen's tardy remittances, and to wrangle with the States; for the leaders of that body were unwilling to accord large supplies to a man who had become personally suspected by them, and was the representative of a deeply-suspected government.
Meanwhile, one-third at least of the money which really found its way from time to time out of England, was filched from the "poor starved wretches," as Leicester called his soldiers, by the dishonesty of Norris, uncle of Sir John and army-treasurer.

This man was growing so rich on his peculations, on his commissions, and on his profits from paying the troops in a depreciated coin, that Leicester declared the whole revenue of his own landed estates in England to be less than that functionary's annual income.