CHAP. other side of Mons, and surprised the passage near Obourg, at two in the morning of the 6th, and at noon 1709. entered the French lines of the Trouille without opposition, the enemy retiring with precipitation as he advanced. 36. taken by Marlborough after the lines were passed. Marlborough was not slow in improving the advanPositions tage thus gained by his adventurous lieutenant. He immediately extended his forces over the valley of the Trouille, fixed his headquarters at the abbey of Belian, and with his right occupied in strength the important plateau of Jemappes, which intercepted the communication between Mons and Valenciennes. It was on this height that the famous battle was fought with the French Republicans under Dumourier in 1792-another proof, among the many which history affords, how frequently the crisis of war, at long distances of time from each other, takes place in the same vicinity. By this decisive movement, Marlborough gained an immense advantage; -Mons was now passed, and invested on the side of France; and the formidable lines, thirty leagues in length, on which Marshal Villars had been labouring with such assiduity during the two preceding months, were turned, and made of no avail. Immense was the Secretary impression produced in France, and over Europe, by this decisive stroke. It shook the confidence of military men in the lines of defence, on which so much reliance had hitherto been placed, and spread a general belief that the Allied generals were invincible, since, with so much ease, and without bloodshed, they had rendered nugatory the boasted defences of the best French marshal.1 ▲ Marlbo rough to Mr Boyle, Sept. Marlb. iii. ii. 412. And the Russian foot-guards, in the course of the advance to Paris, after the combat at Fère-Champenoise in March 1814, marched forty-eight miles in twenty-six hours.-ALISON's Europe, c. 88, § 37. VII. 1709. 37. Villars' gets be While the Prince of Hesse-Cassel, with the advanced CHAP. guard of the army, gained this brilliant success, Marlborough was rapidly following with the main body in the same direction. The force besieging Tournay crossed He turns the Scheldt at the bridge of that town, and joined lines, and the covering force under Eugene. From thence they tween them advanced to Siran, where they were joined by Lord and France. Orkney with his detachment, which had failed in passing the Haine. On the 6th, having learned the success of the Prince of Hesse-Cassel, in turning the enemy's lines, and getting between Mons and France, the Allied generals pushed on with the utmost expedition, and, leaving their army to form the investment of Mons, joined the Prince in the abbey of Belian. Both commanders complimented his Royal Highness highly on the advantages he had gained; but he replied, "The French have deprived me of the glory due to such a compliment, since Sept. 6. they have not even waited. my arrival." In truth, such had been the celerity and skill of his dispositions that they had rendered resistance hopeless, and achieved success without the necessity of striking a blow. Meanwhile Marshal Boufflers, hearing a battle was imminent, 1 Marlb. arrived in the camp as a volunteer, to serve under Vil- Des. iv. lars, his junior in military service *-a noble example of Coxe, v. disinterested patriotism, which, not less than the justly Hist. de popular character of that distinguished general, raised 90-92. the enthusiasm of the French soldiers to the very highest 285, 286. pitch.1 Everything announced a more sanguinary and "Le plus ancien maréschal mandoit à l'autre- Je vous supplie de me faire savoir si vous approuvez que j'aie l'honneur de me rendre demain près de vous; vous satisferez mon impatience de vous embrasser et de recevoir moi-même vos ordres. Je puis vous assurer qu' aucun de vos aidesde-camp ne les exécutera avec plus d'empressement ni de plaisir que moi.'"Boufflers à Villars, 1st Sept. 1709; Hist. de Marlborough, iii. 93. + A similar incident occurred in the British service, when Sir Henry, now 588-595. 24, 25. Marlb. iii. Rousset, ii. VII. CHAP. important conflict between the renowned commanders. and gallant armies now arrayed on the opposite sides, than had yet taken place since the commencement of the war. 1709. During those rapid and vigorous movements, which entirely turned and broke through his much-vaunted lines of defence, Villars remained with the great body of his forces in a state of inactivity. Aware that he was to be attacked, but ignorant where the blow was likely to fall first, he judged, and perhaps rightly, that it would be hazardous to weaken his lines at any one point by accumulating forces at another. No sooner, however, did he receive intelligence of the march of the Prince of Hesse-Cassel than he broke up from the lines of Douai, now pierced and rendered useless, and, hastily collecting his forces, advanced towards that adventurous commander. His object was either to raise the siege of Mons, or at least prevent it from being entirely invested. For this purpose he made for the openings in the woods, or trouées, as they are called, of Louvière and Aulnoit, and drew near the enemy's posts on the Trouille. At two in the morning of the 4th his cavalry approached the front of the Prince's position; but conceiving the whole Allied army was before him, he did not venture to make an attack at a time when his great superiority of force would have enabled him to do it with every chance of success. The movement of Villars, however, and the general feu-de-joie which resounded through the French lines on the arrival of Lord Hardinge, and Governor-General of India, served as second in command to Sir Hugh Gough, his senior in military rank, but subordinate in station, at the glorious battles of Ferozepore and Sobraon, with the Sikhs. How identical is the noble and heroic spirit in all ages and countries! It forms a freemasonry throughout the world. CHAP. VII. 1709. Marshal Boufflers, warned the Allied leaders that a general battle was at hand. The Duke of Marlborough and Prince Eugene were dining together on the afternoon of the 7th, when intelligence of these events was brought them they instantly rose from table, and put themselves at the head of their respective divisions of the army; and orders were in consequence given to the whole army to advance at four o'clock on the afternoon of the 7th. A detachment of Eugene's troops was left to watch Mons, the garrison of which consisted only of eleven weak battalions and a regiment of horse, not mustering above five thousand combatants; and the whole remainder of the Allied army, ninety thousand strong, pressed forward in dense masses into the level and marshy plain in the middle of which Mons is situated. They advanced in different columns headed by Marlborough and Eugene; and never was a more magnificent spectacle presented than when the troops, consisting of cavalry, artillery, and infantry, defiled in the finest order from the woods into the plain, and ascended the undulating ground which lies to the south of that town. They arrived at night, and bivouacked in a line 1 Marlbostretching along the heights of Quaregnon, near Genly, Sec. Boyle, Sept. 7/11, to the village of Quevy, about three miles in length, and 1709. Des. only five distant from the enemy; so that it was evident Coxe, v. that a general battle would take place on the following Hist. de day, unless Villars was prepared to abandon Mons to 93, 94. its fate.1 rough to Mr iv. 591, 592. 25, 26. Marlb. iii. 39. tion and The French marshal, however, had no intention of declining the combat. His army was entirely fresh, and Composiin the finest order: it had engaged in no previous opera- strength of tions; whereas a bloody siege, and subsequent fatiguing army." marches in bad weather, had sensibly weakened the the French VII. 1709. CHAP. strength, though they had not depressed the spirits, of the Allied soldiers. The vast efforts of the French government, joined to the multitude of recruits which the public distress had impelled into the army, had in an extraordinary degree strengthened its ranks. After making provision for all the garrisons and detached posts with which he was charged, Villars could bring into the field no less than one hundred and thirty battalions, and two hundred and sixty squadrons, and all raised to their full complement, mustering sixty-five thousand infantry, and twenty-six thousand horse, with eighty guns-in all, with the artillery, ninety-five thousand combatants. This vast array had the advantages of being almost entirely of one nation, speaking one language, and being animated by one spirit; while the Allied force was a motley assemblage of many different races and nations of men, held together only by the strong tie of military success and confidence in their generals. Both armies were of nearly equal strength; they were under the command of the ablest and most intrepid commanders of their day; the soldiers of both had long Villars, ii. acted together, and acquired confidence in each other; and each contained that intermixture of the fire of young with the caution of veteran troops, which affords the happiest augury of military success. It was hard to predict, between such antagonists, to which side the scales of victory would incline.1* 1 Mém. de 167-184. Coxe, v. 26-29. Hist, de Marlb. iii. 97, 98. Rousset, ii. 285, 286, The face of the country occupied by the French army, |