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was in hopes the lure of these successes would induce Villars to hazard a general engagement, shut himself up in his tent, and appeared to be overwhelmed with mortification at the checks he had received.*

Villars was so much elated with these successes, and the accounts he received of Marlborough's chagrin, that he wrote to the King of France a vainglori

34. Preparations for executing it, and deceiving the enemy, 4th August.

ous letter, in which he boasted that he had at length brought his antagonist to a ne plus ultra. Meanwhile, Marlborough sent off his heavy baggage to Douay, dispatched his artillery under a proper guard to the rear, and, with all imaginable secrecy, obtained supplies of bread for the whole troops for six days. Thus disencumbered and prepared, he broke up at four in the morning on the 1st of August, and marched in eight columns toward the front. During the three following days the troops were kept collected, and menacing sometimes one part of the French lines and sometimes another, so as to leave the real point of attack in a state of uncertainty. Seriously alarmed, Villars concentrated his whole force opposite the allies, and drew in all his detachments, evacuating even Aubigny and Arleux, the object of so much eager contention some days before. On the evening of the 4th, Marlborough, affecting great chagrin at the check he had received, spoke openly to those around him of his intention of avenging them by a general action, and pointed to the direction the attacking columns were to take. He then returned to the camp, and gave orders to prepare for battle. Gloom hung on every countenance of those around him; it appeared nothing short of an act of madness to attack an enemy superior in number, and strongly posted in a camp surrounded with intrenchments and bristling with cannon. They ascribed it to desperation, produced by the mortifications received from the government, and feared that, by one rash act, he would lose the fruit of all his victories. Proportionally great was the joy in the French camp, when the men, never *KANE'S Memoirs, p. 89. CoxE, vi., 53-55. Disp., v., 421-428.

doubting they were on the eve of a glorious victory, spent the night in the exultation which, in that excitable people, has so often been the prelude to disaster.*

He

lines with entire success.

passes the

Having brought the feeling of both armies to this point, and produced a concentration of Villars's army di- 35. rectly in his front, Marlborough, at dusk on the 4th, ordered the drums to beat, and, before the roll had ceased, directions were given for the tents to be struck. Meanwhile Cadogan secretly left the camp, and met twentythree battalions and seventeen squadrons, drawn from the garrisons of Lille and Tournay, and other towns in the rear, which instantly marched; and, continuing to advance all night, they passed the lines rapidly to the left, at Arleux, and without opposition, at break of day. A little before nine, the allied main army began to defile rapidly to the left, through the woods of Villers and Neuville, Marlborough himself leading the van at the head of fifty squadrons. With such expedition did they march, still holding steadily on to the left, that before five in the morning of the 5th they reached Vitry on the Scarpe, where they found pontoons ready for their passage, and a considerable train of field artillery. At the same time, the English general received the welcome intelligence of Cadogan's success. He instantly dispatched orders to every man and horse to press forward without delay. Such was the ardor of the troops, who all saw the brilliant maneuver by which they had outwitted the enemy, and rendered all their labor abortive, that they marched sixteen hours without once halting; and by ten next morning, the whole had passed the enemy's lines without opposition, and without firing a shot.† Villars received intelligence of the night-march having begun at eleven at night; but so utterly was he in 36. the dark as to the plan his opponent was pursuing, Extraordinathat he came up to Verger, when Marlborough had thus gained.

ry success

* KANE'S Memoirs, p. 92. Marlborough to Mr. Secretary St. John, 6th of August, 1711. Disp., v., 428.

† COXE, vi., 60-63. KANE, 96-99. MARL., Disp., v., 428.

drawn up his army on the inner side of the lines in order of battle, attended only by a hundred dragoons, and narrowly escaped being made prisoner. Altogether, the allied troops marched thirty-six miles in sixteen hours, the most part of them in the dark, and crossed several rivers, without either falling into confusion or sustaining any loss. The annals of war scarcely afford an example of such a success being gained in so bloodless a manner. The famous French lines, which Villars boasted would form the ne plus ultra of Marlborough, had been passed without losing a man; the labor of nine months was at once rendered of no avail; and the French army, in deep dejection, had no alternative but to retire under the cannon of Cambray.*

37.

Commencement of the

siege of Bou

chain, 8th

August.

This great success at once restored the luster of Marlborough's reputation, and for a short season put to silence his detractors. Eugene, with the generosity which formed so striking a feature in his character, wrote to congratulate him on his achievement;† and even Bolingbroke admitted that this bloodless triumph rivaled his greatest achievements.‡ Marlborough immediately commenced the siege of Bouchain; but this was an enterprise of no small difficulty, as it was to be accomplished on very difficult ground, in presence of an army superior in force.

* Marlborough to Mr. Secretary St. John, 6th of August, 1711. Disp., v., 428. COXE, vi., 60-65. KANE'S Mil. Mem., 96-99.

"No person takes a greater interest in your concerns than myself; your highness has penetrated into the ne plus ultra. I hope the siege of Bouchain will not last long."-Eugene to Marlborough, 17th of August, 1771. COXE, vi., 66.

"My Lord Stair opened to us the general steps which your grace intended to take, in order to pass the lines in one part or another. It was, however, hard to imagine, and too much to hope, that a plan, which consisted of so many parts, wherein so many different corps were to co-operate personally together, should entirely succeed, and no one article fail of what your grace had projected. I most heartily congratulate your grace on this great event, of which I think no more needs be said, than that you have obtained, without losing a man, such an advantage as we should have been glad to have purchased with the loss of several thousand lives."-Mr. Secretary St. John to Marlborough, 31st of July, 1711. Disp., v., 429.

The investment was formed on the very day after the lines had been passed, and an important piece of ground occupied, which might have enabled Villars to communicate with the town, and regain the defensible position. On the morning of the 8th of August a bridge was thrown over the Scheldt at Neuville, and sixty squadrons passed over, which barred the road from Douay. Villars, upon this, threw thirty battalions across the Senzet, and made himself master of a hill above, on which he began to erect works, which would have kept open his communications with the town on its southern front. Marlborough at once saw this design, and at first determined to storm the works ere they were completed; and, with this view, General Fagel, with a strong body of troops, was secretly passed over the river. But Villars having heard of the design, attacked the allied posts at Ivry with such vigor, that Marlborough was obliged to countermarch in haste to be at hand to support them. Baffled in this attempt, Marlborough erected a chain of works on the right bank of the Scheldt, from Houdain, through Ivry, to the Sette, near Haspres, while Cadogan strengthened himself with similar works on the left. Villars, however, still retained the fortified position which has been mentioned, and which kept up his communication with the town; and the cutting him off from this was another, and the last, of Marlborough's brilliant field operations.*

38. Interesting op

erations on ing its prog

both sides dur

ress.

Notwithstanding all the diligence with which Villars labored to strengthen his men on this important position, he could not equal the activity with which the English general strove to supplant them. During the night of the 13th three redoubts were marked out, which would have completed the French marshal's communication with the town; but on the morning of the 14th they were all stormed by a large body of the allied troops before the works could be armed. That very day the allies carried their zigzag down to the very edge of a morass which adjoined Bouchain on the south, so as to command a * Marlborough to Secretary St. John, 10th of August, 1711. Disp., v., 437.

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causeway through the marshes from that town to Cambray, which the French still held, communicating with the besieged town. But, to complete the investment, it was necessary to win this causeway; and this last object was gained by Marlborough with equal daring and success. A battery, commanding the road, had been placed by Villars in a redoubt garrisoned by six hundred men, supported by three thousand more close in their rear. Marlborough, with incredible labor and diligence, constructed two roads, made of fascines, through part of the marsh, so as to render it passable to foot soldiers; and, on the night of the 16th, six hundred chosen grenadiers were sent across them to attack the intrenched battery. They rapidly advanced in the dark till the fascine path ended, and then boldly plunging into the marsh, struggled on, with the water often up to their arm-pits, till they reached the foot of the intrenchment, into which they rushed, without firing a shot, with fixed bayonets. So complete was the surprise, that the enemy were driven from their guns with the loss only of six men; the work was carried; and with such diligence were its defenses strengthened, that, before morning, it was in a condition to bid defiance to any attack.*

39.

Fall of Bouchain, Sept.

12.

Villars was now effectually cut off from Bouchain, and the operations of the siege were conducted with the utmost vigor. On the night of the 21st the trenches were opened; three separate attacks were pushed at the same time against the eastern, western, and southern faces of the town, and a huge train of heavy guns and mortars thundered upon the works without intermission. The progress of the operations, notwithstanding a vigorous defense by the besieged, was unusually rapid.. As fast as the outworks were breached they were stormed; and repeated attempts on the part of Villars to raise the siege were baffled by the skillful disposition and strong ground taken by Marl

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COXE, vi., 71-80. Marlborough to Mr. Secretary St. John, 14th, 17th, and 20th of August, 1711. Disp., v., 445-450-453.

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