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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Malplaquet, by Hilaire Belloc
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Malplaquet
+
+Author: Hilaire Belloc
+
+Release Date: May 5, 2010 [EBook #32257]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MALPLAQUET ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by The Online Distributed Proofreading Team at
+https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images
+generously made available by The Internet Archive/Canadian
+Libraries.)
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+MALPLAQUET
+
+
+
+[Illustration: _Malplaquet._
+
+_Frontispiece._]
+
+
+
+
+  MALPLAQUET
+
+
+  BY
+  HILAIRE BELLOC
+
+
+  LONDON
+  STEPHEN SWIFT & CO., LTD.
+  10 JOHN STREET, ADELPHI
+  1911
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+
+                                                     PAGE
+
+    I. THE POLITICAL MEANING OF MALPLAQUET              9
+
+   II. THE SIEGE OF TOURNAI                            27
+
+  III. THE MANOEUVRING FOR POSITION                    45
+
+   IV. THE PRELIMINARIES OF THE BATTLE                 52
+
+    V. THE ACTION                                      65
+
+
+
+
+LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
+
+
+                                                     PAGE
+
+  Sketch Map showing how the Lines of La Bassée
+    blocked the advance of the Allies on Paris,
+    and Marlborough's plan for turning them by
+    the successive capture of Tournai and Mons         19
+
+  Sketch Map showing how the Allies, holding
+    Lille, thrust the French back on to the
+    defensive line St Venant-Valenciennes, and
+    thus cut off the French garrisons of Ypres,
+    Tournai, and Mons                                  28
+
+  Sketch Map showing complete investment of
+    Tournai                                            34
+
+  Sketch Map showing the lines of woods behind
+    Mons, with the two gaps of Boussu and Aulnois      48
+
+  The Elements of the Action of Malplaquet,
+    September 11th, 1709                               66
+
+  Sketch Map showing the peril the French centre
+    ran towards noon of being turned on its left       79
+
+  Sketch Map showing Marlborough bringing up
+    troops to the centre for the final and
+    successful attack upon the entrenchments           84
+
+
+
+
+MALPLAQUET
+
+
+
+
+I
+
+THE POLITICAL MEANING OF MALPLAQUET
+
+
+That political significance which we must seek in all military history,
+and without which that history cannot be accurate even upon its technical
+side, may be stated for the battle of Malplaquet in the following terms.
+
+Louis XIV. succeeding to a cautious and constructive period in the
+national life of France, this in its turn succeeding to the long impotence
+of the religious wars, found at his orders when his long minority was
+ended a society not only eager and united, but beginning also to give
+forth the fruit due to three active generations of discussion and combat.
+
+Every department of the national life manifested an extreme vitality, and,
+while the orderly and therefore convincing scheme of French culture
+imposed itself upon Western Europe, there followed in its wake the triumph
+of French arms; the king in that triumph nearly perfected a realm which
+would have had for its limits those of ancient Gaul.
+
+It would be too long a matter to describe, even in general terms, the
+major issues depending upon Louis XIV.'s national ambitions and their
+success or failure.
+
+In one aspect he stands for the maintenance of Catholic civilisation
+against the Separatist and dissolving forces of the Protestant North; in
+another he is the permanent antagonist of the Holy Roman Empire, or rather
+of the House of Austria, which had attained to a permanent hegemony
+therein. An extravagant judgment conceives his great successes as a menace
+to the corporate independence of Europe, or--upon the other view--as the
+opportunity for the founding of a real European unity.
+
+But all these general considerations may, for the purposes of military
+history, be regarded in the single light of the final and decisive action
+which Louis XIV. took when he determined in the year 1701 to support the
+claims of his young grandson to the throne of Spain. This it was which
+excited against him a universal coalition, and acts following upon that
+main decision drew into the coalition the deciding factor of Great
+Britain.
+
+The supremacy of French arms had endured in Europe for forty years when
+the Spanish policy was decided on. Louis was growing old. That financial
+exhaustion which almost invariably follows a generation of high national
+activity, and which is almost invariably masked by pompous outward state,
+was a reality already present though as yet undiscovered in the condition
+of France.
+
+It was at the close of that year 1701 that the French king had determined
+upon a union of the two crowns of France and Spain in his own family. His
+forces occupied the Spanish Netherlands, which we now call the Kingdom of
+Belgium; others of his armies were spread along the Rhine, or were acting
+in Northern Italy--for the coalition at once began to make itself felt.
+Two men of genius combined in an exact agreement, the qualities of each
+complementing the defects of the other, to lead the main armies that were
+operating against the French. These men were Prince Eugene of Savoy
+(French by birth and training, a voluntary exile, and inspired throughout
+his life by a determination to avenge himself upon Louis XIV.), and the
+Englishman John Churchill, Duke of Marlborough.
+
+The combination of such a pair was irresistible. Its fruit appeared almost
+at the inception of the new situation in the great victory of Blenheim.
+
+This action, fought in August 1704, was the first great defeat French arms
+had registered in that generation. Henceforward the forces commanded from
+Versailles were compelled to stand upon the defensive.
+
+To Blenheim succeeded one blow after another. In 1706 the great battle of
+Ramillies, in 1708 the crushing action of Oudenarde, confirmed the
+supremacy of the allies and the abasement of France. By the opening of
+1709 the final defeat of Louis and his readiness to sue for peace were
+taken for granted.
+
+The financial exhaustion which I have said was already present, though
+hardly suspected, in 1701, was grown by 1709 acute. The ordinary methods
+of recruitment for the French army--which nominally, of course, was upon a
+voluntary basis--had long reached and passed their limit. The failure of
+the harvest in 1708, followed by a winter of terrible severity, had
+completed the catastrophe, and with the ensuing spring of 1709 Louis had
+no alternative but to approach the allies with terms of surrender.
+
+It seemed as though at last the way to Paris lay open. The forces of the
+allies in the Netherlands were not only numerically greatly superior to
+any which the exhausted French could now set against them, but in their
+equipment, in their supplies, the nourishment of the men, and every
+material detail, they were upon a footing wholly superior to the
+corresponding units of the enemy, man for man. They had further the
+incalculable advantage of prestige. Victory seemed normal to them, defeat
+to their opponents; and so overwhelming were the chances of the coalition
+against Louis that its leaders determined with judgment to demand from
+that monarch the very fullest and most humiliating terms.
+
+Though various sections of the allies differed severally as to their
+objects and requirements, their general purpose of completely destroying
+the power of France for offence, of recapturing all her conquests, and in
+particular of driving the Bourbons from the throne of Spain, was held in
+common, and vigorously pursued.
+
+Marlborough was as active as any in pushing the demands to the furthest
+possible point; Eugene, the ruling politicians of the English, the Dutch,
+and the German princes were agreed.
+
+Louis naturally made every effort to lessen the blow, though he regarded
+his acceptance of grave and permanent humiliation as inevitable. The
+negotiations were undertaken at the Hague, and were protracted. They
+occupied the late spring of 1709 and stretched into the beginning of
+summer. The French king was prepared (as his instructions to his
+negotiators show) to give up every point, though he strove to bargain for
+what remained after each concession. He would lose the frontier
+fortresses, which were the barrier of his kingdom in the north-east. He
+would even consent to the abandonment of Spain to Austria.
+
+Had that peace been declared for which the captains of Europe were
+confidently preparing, the future history of our civilisation would have
+proved materially different from what it has become. It is to be presumed
+that a complete breakdown of the strength of France would have followed;
+that the monarchy at Versailles would have sunk immediately into such
+disrepute that the eighteenth century would have seen France divided and
+possibly a prey to civil war, and one may even conclude that the great
+events of a century later, the Revolution and the campaigns of Napoleon,
+could not have sprung from so enfeebled a society.
+
+It so happened, however, that one of those slight miscalculations which
+are productive in history of its chief consequences, prevented the
+complete humiliation of Louis XIV. The demands of the allies were pushed
+in one last respect just beyond the line which it was worth the while of
+the defeated party to accept, for it was required of the old king not only
+that he should yield in every point, not only that he should abandon the
+claims of his own grandson to the throne of Spain (which throne Louis
+himself had now, after eight years of wise administration, singularly
+strengthened), but himself take arms against that grandson and co-operate
+in his proper shame by helping to oust him from it. It was stipulated that
+Louis should so act (if his grandson should show resistance and still
+clung to his throne) in company with those who had been for so many years
+his bitter and successful foes.
+
+This last small item in the programme of the victors changed all. It
+destroyed in the mind of Louis and of his subjects the advantages of the
+disgraceful peace which they had thought themselves compelled to accept;
+and, as Louis himself well put it, if he were still compelled to carry on
+the war, it was better to fail in pursuing it against his enemies than
+against his own household.
+
+The king issued to the authorities of his kingdom and to his people a
+circular letter, which remains a model of statesmanlike appeal. Grave,
+brief, and resolute, it exactly expressed the common mood of the moment.
+It met with an enthusiastic response. The depleted countrysides just
+managed to furnish the armies with a bare pittance of oats and rye (for
+wheat was unobtainable). Recruits appeared in unexpected numbers; and
+though none could believe that the issue could be other than disastrous,
+the campaign of 1709 was undertaken by a united nation.
+
+Of French offensive action against the overwhelming forces of their
+enemies there could be no question. Villars, who commanded the armies of
+Louis XIV. upon the north-eastern frontier, opposing Marlborough and
+Eugene, drew up a line of defence consisting of entrenchments, flooded
+land, and the use of existing watercourses, a line running from the
+neighbourhood of Douai away eastward to the Belgian frontier. Behind this
+line, with his headquarters at La Bassée,[1] he waited the fatal assault.
+
+It was at the close of June that the enemy's great forces moved. Their
+first action was not an attempt to penetrate the line but to take the
+fortresses upon its right, which taken, the defence might be turned. They
+therefore laid siege to Tournai, the first of the two fortresses guarding
+the right of the French line. (Mons was the second.)
+
+Here the first material point in the campaign showed the power of
+resistance that tradition and discipline yet maintained in the French
+army. The long resistance of Tournai and its small garrison largely
+determined what was to follow. Its siege had been undertaken in the hope
+of its rapid termination, which the exiguity of its garrison and the
+impossibility of its succour rendered probable. But though Marlborough had
+established his headquarters before the place by the evening of the 27th
+of June, and Eugene upon the next day, the 28th, though trenches were
+opened in the first week of July and the first of the heavy fighting
+began upon the 8th of that month, though the town itself was occupied
+after a fortnight's struggle, yet it was not until the 3rd of September
+that the citadel surrendered.
+
+This protracted resistance largely determined what was to follow. While it
+lasted no action could be undertaken against Villars. Meanwhile the French
+forces were growing stronger, and, most important of all, the first
+results of the harvest began to be felt.
+
+Tournai once taken, it was the business of the allies to pierce the French
+line of defence as soon as possible, and with that object to bring Villars
+to battle and to defeat him.
+
+The plan chosen for this object was as follows:--
+
+The allied army to march to the extreme right of the positions which the
+French could hope to defend. There the allies would contain the little
+garrison of Mons. Thither the mass of the French forces must march in
+order to bar the enemy's advance upon Paris, and upon some point near Mons
+the whole weight of the allies could fall upon them, destroy them, and
+leave the way to the capital open.
+
+
+[Illustration: Sketch Map showing how the Lines of La Bassée blocked the
+advance of the Allies on Paris, and Marlborough's plan for turning them by
+the successive capture of Tournai and Mons.]
+
+
+The plan was strategically wise. The lines of La Bassée proper could not
+be pierced, but this right extremity of the French positions was backed by
+easy country; the swamps, canals, and entrenchments of the main line to
+the north and west were absent. With the defeat of the inferior French
+forces at this point all obstacle to an advance into the heart of France
+would be removed.
+
+The plan was as rapidly executed as it was skilfully devised. Actually
+before the capitulation of the citadel of Tournai, but when it was
+perceived that that capitulation could only be a matter of hours, Lord
+Orkney had begun to advance upon the neighbourhood of Mons. Upon the day
+of the capitulation of Tournai, the Prince of Hesse-Cassel had started for
+Mons, Cadogan following him with the cavalry. Less than twenty-four hours
+after Tournai had yielded, the whole allied army was on the march
+throughout the night. Never was a military operation performed with
+organisation more exact, or with obedience more prompt. Three days later
+Mons was contained, and by Monday the 9th of September Villars awaited,
+some few miles to the west of that fortress, the assault of the allies.
+
+There followed two days of delay, which will be discussed in detail
+later. For the purposes of this introductory survey of the political
+meaning of the battle, it is enough to fix the date, Wednesday, 11th
+September 1709. A little before eight o'clock on the morning of that day
+the first cannon-shot of the battle of Malplaquet was fired. To the
+numerical superiority of the allies the French could oppose entrenchment
+and that character in the locality of the fight, or "terrain," which will
+be fully described on a later page. To the superior _moral_, equipment,
+and subsistence of the allies, however, it was doubtful whether any factor
+could be discovered on the French side.
+
+An unexpected enthusiasm lent something to the French resistance; the
+delay of two days lent something more to their defensive power. As will be
+seen in the sequel, certain errors (notably upon the left of Marlborough's
+line) also contributed to the result, and the whole day was passed in a
+series of attacks and counter-attacks which left the French forces intact,
+and permitted them in the early afternoon to rely upon the exhaustion of
+the enemy and to leave, in order and without loss, the field to the enemy.
+
+Marlborough's victory at Malplaquet was both honourable and great. The
+French were compelled to withdraw; the allies occupied upon the evening
+of the battle the ground upon which the struggle had taken place. It is
+with justice that Malplaquet is counted as the fourth of those great
+successful actions which distinguish the name of Marlborough, and it is
+reckoned with justice the conclusion of the series whose three other terms
+are Blenheim, Ramillies, and Oudenarde. So much might suffice did war
+consist in scoring points as one does in a game. But when we consider war
+as alone it should be considered for the serious purposes of history--that
+is, in its political aspect; and when we ask what Malplaquet was in the
+political sequence of European events, the withdrawal of the French from
+the field in the early afternoon of September 11, 1709, has no
+significance comparable to the fact that the allies could not pursue.
+
+Strategically the victory meant that an army which it was intended to
+destroy had maintained itself intact; morally, the battle left the
+defeated more elated than the victors; and for this reason, that the
+result was so much more in their favour than the expectation had been. In
+what is most important of all, the general fortunes of the campaign, the
+victory of the allies at Malplaquet was as sure a signal that the advance
+on Paris could not be made, and as sure a prevention of that advance as
+though Marlborough and Eugene had registered, not a success, but a defeat.
+
+Situations of this sort, which render victories barren or actually
+negative, paradoxical to the general reader, simple enough in their
+military aspect, abound in the history of war. It is perhaps more
+important to explain them if one is to make military history intelligible
+than to describe the preliminaries and movements of the great decisive
+action.
+
+The "block" of Malplaquet (to use the metaphor which is common in French
+history), the unexpected power of resistance which this last of the French
+armies displayed, and the moral effect of that resistance upon the allies,
+have an historical meaning almost as high as that of Blenheim upon the
+other side. It has been well said that one may win every battle and yet
+lose a campaign; there is a sense in which it may be said that one may win
+a campaign and suffer political loss as the result.
+
+Malplaquet was the turning-point after which it was evident that the
+decline of the French position in Europe would go no further. As Blenheim
+had marked the turn of the tide against Louis, so Malplaquet marked the
+slack water when the tide was ready to turn in his favour. After Blenheim
+it was certain that the ambition of Louis XIV. was checked, and probable
+that it would wholly fail. After Malplaquet it was equally certain that
+the total destruction of Louis' power was impossible, that the project of
+a march on Paris might be abandoned, and that the last phases of the great
+war would diminish the chances of the allies.
+
+The Dutch (whose troops in particular had been annihilated upon the left
+of the field) did indeed maintain their uncompromising attitude, but no
+longer with the old certitude of success; Austria also and her allies did
+continue the war, but a war doomed to puerility, to a sort of stale-mate
+bound to end in compromise. But it was in England that the effect of the
+battle was most remarkable.
+
+In England, where opinion had but tardily accepted the necessity for war
+nine years before, and where the fruits of that war were now regarded as
+quite sufficient for the satisfaction of English demands, this negative
+action, followed by no greater fruit than the capitulation of the little
+garrison at Mons, began the agitation for peace. Look closely at that
+agitation through its details, and personal motives will confuse you; the
+motives of the queen, of Harley, of Marlborough's enemies. Look at it in
+the general light of the national history and you will perceive that the
+winter following Malplaquet, a winter of disillusionment and discontent,
+bred in England an opinion that made peace certain at last. The accusation
+against Marlborough that he fought the battle with an eye to his failing
+political position is probably unjust. The accusation that he fought it
+from a lust of bloodshed is certainly a stupid calumny. But the
+unpopularity of so great a man succeeding upon so considerable a technical
+success sufficiently proves at what a price the barrenness of that success
+was estimated in England. It was the English Government that first opened
+secret negotiations with Louis for peace in the following year; and when
+the great instrument which closed the war was signed at Utrecht in 1713,
+it was after the English troops had been withdrawn from their allies,
+after Eugene, acting single-handed, had suffered serious check, and in
+general the Peace of Utrecht was concluded under conditions far more
+favourable to Louis than would have been any peace signed at the Hague in
+1709. The Spanish Netherlands were ceded to Austria, but France kept
+intact what is still her Belgian frontier. She preserved what she has
+since lost on the frontier of the Rhine, and (most remarkable of all!) the
+grandson of Louis was permitted to remain upon the Spanish throne.
+
+Such is the general political setting of this fierce action, one of the
+most determined known in the history of European arms, and therefore one
+of the most legitimately glorious; one in which men were most ready at the
+call of duty and under the influences of discipline to sacrifice their
+lives in the defence of a common cause; and one which, as all such
+sacrifices must, illumines the history of the several national traditions
+concerned, of the English as of the Dutch, of the German principalities as
+of the French.
+
+No action better proves the historical worth of valour.
+
+
+
+
+II
+
+THE SIEGE OF TOURNAI
+
+
+When the negotiations for peace had failed, that is, with the opening of
+June 1709, the King of France and his forces had particularly to dread an
+invasion of the country and the march on Paris.
+
+The accompanying sketch map will show under what preoccupations the French
+commander upon the north-eastern frontier lay.
+
+Lille was in the hands of the enemy. There was still a small French
+garrison in Ypres, another in Tournai, and a third in Mons. These of
+themselves (considering that Lille, the great town, was now occupied by
+the allies, and considering also the width of the gap between Ypres and
+Tournai) could not prevent the invasion and the advance on the capital.
+
+It was necessary to oppose some more formidable barrier to the line of
+advance which topography marked out for the allies into the heart of
+France.
+
+
+[Illustration: Sketch Map showing how the Allies holding Lille thrust the
+French back on to the defensive line St Venant-Valenciennes, and thus cut
+off the French garrisons of Ypres, Tournai, and Mons.]
+
+
+Some fear was indeed expressed lest a descent should be made on the coasts
+and an advance attempted along the valley of the Somme. The fear was
+groundless. To organise the transportation of troops thus by sea, to
+disembark them, to bring and continue the enormous supply of provisions
+and ammunition they would require, was far less practical than to use the
+great forces already drawn up under Marlborough and Eugene in the Low
+Countries. Of what size these forces were we shall see in a moment.
+
+The barrier, then, which Villars at the head of the French forces
+proceeded to erect, and which is known in history as "The Lines of La
+Bassée," are the first point upon which we must fix our attention in order
+to understand the campaign of Malplaquet, and why that battle took place
+where it did.
+
+It was upon the 3rd of June that Louis XIV. had written to Villars telling
+him that a renewal of the war would now be undertaken. On the 14th,
+Villars began to throw up earth for the formation of an entrenched camp
+between the marshy ground of Hulluch and that of Cuinchy. Here he proposed
+to concentrate the mass of his forces, with La Bassée just before him,
+the town of Lens behind. He used the waterways and the swamped ground in
+front and to the right for the formation of his defensive lines. These
+followed the upper valley of the Deule, the line of its canal, and finally
+reposed their right upon the river Scarpe. Though the regularly fortified
+line went no further than the camp near La Bassée, he also threw up a
+couple of entrenchments in front of Bethune and St Venant in order to
+cover any march he might have to make towards his left should the enemy
+attempt to turn him in that direction.
+
+It must further be noted that from the Scarpe eastward went the old "lines
+of La Trouille" thrown up in a former campaign, and now largely useless,
+but still covering, after a fashion, the neighbourhood of Mons.
+
+Toward the end of the month of June Villars awaited the advance of the
+allies. His forces were inferior by 40,000 to those of his enemy. He had
+but eight men to their twelve. The season of the year, immediately
+preceding the harvest, made the victualling of his troops exceedingly
+difficult, nor was it until the day before the final assault was expected
+that the moneys necessary to their pay, and to the other purposes of the
+army, reached him; but he had done what he could, and, acting upon a
+national tradition which is as old as Rome, he had very wisely depended
+upon fortification.
+
+The same conditions of the season which produced something like famine in
+the French camp, though they did not press equally severely upon that of
+the allies, rendered difficult the provisioning of their vast army also.
+
+It was the first intention of Marlborough and Eugene to attack the lines
+at once, to force them, and to destroy the command of Villars. But these
+lines had been carefully reconnoitred, notably by Cadogan, who, with a
+party of English officers, and under a disguise, had made himself
+acquainted with their strength. It was determined, therefore, at the last
+moment, partly also from the fears of the Dutch, to whom the possession of
+every fortress upon the frontier was of paramount importance, to make but
+a "feint" upon Villars' lines and to direct the army upon Tournai as its
+true object. The feint took the form of Eugene's marching towards the left
+or western extremity of the line, Marlborough towards the eastern or right
+extremity near Douai, and this general movement was effected on the night
+of the 26th and 27th of June. In the midst of its execution, the feint
+(which for the moment deceived Villars) was arrested.
+
+The 27th was passed without a movement, Villars refusing to leave his
+entrenchments, and the commanders of the allies giving no hint of their
+next intention. But during that same day Tilly with the Dutch had appeared
+before Tournai. On the evening of the day Marlborough himself was before
+the town. On the 28th Prince Eugene joined both the Dutch and Marlborough
+before the town, taking up his headquarters at Froyennes, Marlborough
+being at Willemeau, and the Dutch, under Tilly, already established on the
+east of Tournai from Antoing to Constantin, just opposite Eugene, where
+they threw a bridge across the Scheldt. By the evening of the 28th,
+therefore, Tournai was invested on every side, and the great allied armies
+of between 110,000 and 120,000 men had abandoned all hope of carrying
+Villars' lines, and had sat down to the capture of the frontier
+fortress.[2]
+
+A comprehension of this siege of Tournai, which so largely determined the
+fortunes of the campaign of Malplaquet, will be aided by the accompanying
+sketch map. Here it is apparent that Marlborough with his headquarters at
+Willemeau, Eugene with his at Froyennes, the Dutch under Tilly in a
+semicircle from Antoing to Constantin, completed the investment of the
+fortress, and that the existing bridge at Antoing which the Dutch
+commanded, the bridge at Constantin which they had constructed, giving
+access over the river to the north and to the south, made the circle
+complete.
+
+
+[Illustration: Sketch Map showing complete investment of Tournai.]
+
+
+The fortifications of Tournai were excellent. Vauban had superintended
+that piece of engineering in person, and the scheme of the fortifications
+was remarkable from the strength of the citadel which lay apart from the
+town (though within its ring of earthworks) to the south. The traveller
+can still recognise in its abandonment this enormous achievement of Louis
+XIV.'s sappers, and the opposition it was about to offer to the great
+hosts of Marlborough and Eugene does almost as much honour to the genius
+of the French engineer as to the tenacity of the little garrison then
+defending it.
+
+Two factors in the situation must first be appreciated by the reader.
+
+The first is that the inferiority of Villars' force made it impossible for
+him to do more than demonstrate against the army of observation. He was
+compelled to leave Tournai to its fate, and, indeed, the king in his first
+instructions, Villars in his reply, had taken it for granted that either
+that town or Ypres would be besieged and must fall. But the value of a
+fortress depends not upon its inviolability (for that can never be
+reckoned with), but upon the length of time during which it can hold out,
+and in this respect Tournai was to give full measure.
+
+Secondly, it must be set down for the allies that their unexpectedly long
+task was hampered by exceptional weather. Rain fell continually, and
+though their command of the Scheldt lessened in some degree the problem of
+transport, rain in those days upon such roads as the allies drew their
+supplies by was a heavy handicap. The garrison of Tournai numbered
+thirteen and a half battalions, five detached companies, the complement of
+gunners necessary for the artillery, and a couple of Irish brigades--in
+all, counting the depleted condition of the French units at the moment,
+some six to seven thousand men. Perhaps, counting every combatant and
+non-combatant attached to the garrison, a full seven thousand men.
+
+The command of this force was under Surville, in rank a
+lieutenant-general. Ravignon and Dolet were his subordinates. There was no
+lack of wheat for so small a force. Rationed, it was sufficient for four
+months. Meat made default, and, what was important with a large civil
+population encumbering the little garrison, money. Surville, the bishop,
+and others melted down their plate; even that of the altars in the town
+was sacrificed.
+
+The first trench was opened on the night of the 7th of July, and three
+first attacks were delivered: one by the gate called Marvis, which looks
+eastward, another by the gate of Valenciennes, the third at the gate known
+as that of the Seven Springs. A sortie of the second of these was fairly
+successful, and upon this model the operations continued for five days.
+
+By the end of that time a hundred heavy pieces had come up the Scheldt
+from Ghent, and sixty mortars as well. Four great batteries were formed.
+That to the south opened fire upon the 13th of July, and on the 14th the
+three others joined it.
+
+The discipline maintained in the great camps of the besiegers was severe,
+and the besieged experienced the unusual recruitment of five hundred to
+six hundred deserters who penetrated within their lines. A considerable
+body of deserters also betook themselves to Villars' lines, and the
+operations in these first days were sufficiently violent to account for
+some four thousand killed and wounded upon the side of the allies.
+Villars, meanwhile, could do no more than demonstrate without effect.
+Apart from the inferiority of his force, it was still impossible for him,
+until the harvest was gathered, to establish a sufficient accumulation of
+wheat to permit a forward movement. He never had four days' provision of
+bread at any one time, nor, considering the length of his line, could he
+concentrate it upon any one place. He was fed by driblets from day to day,
+and lived from hand to mouth while the siege of Tournai proceeded to the
+east of him.
+
+That siege was entering, with the close of the month, upon the end of its
+first phase.
+
+It had been a desperate combat of mine and counter-mine even where the
+general circumvallation of the town was concerned, though the worst, of
+course, was to come when the citadel should be attacked. The batteries
+against the place had been increased until they counted one hundred and
+twelve heavy pieces and seventy mortars. On the night of the 24th of July
+the covered way on the right of the Scheldt was taken at heavy loss;
+forty-eight hours later the covered way on the left between the river and
+the citadel. The horn work in front of the Gate of the Seven Springs was
+carried on the 27th, and the isolated work between this point and the Gate
+of Lille upon the following day. Surville in his report, in the true
+French spirit of self-criticism, ascribed to the culpable failure of
+their defenders the loss of these outworks. But the loss, whatever its
+cause, determined the loss of the town. A few hours later practicable
+breaches had been made in the walls, ways were filled in over the ditches,
+and on the imminence of a general assault Surville upon the 28th demanded
+terms. The capitulation was signed on the 29th, and with it the commander
+sent a letter to Versailles detailing his motives for demanding terms for
+the civilian population. Finally, upon the 30th,[3] Surville with 4000
+men, all that was left of his original force of 7000, retired into the
+citadel and there disposed himself for as a long a resistance as might be.
+As his good fortune decided, he was to be able to hold with this small
+force for five full weeks.
+
+To Marlborough is due the honour of the capitulation. The besieging troops
+were under his command, while Eugene directed the army of observation to
+the west. Marlborough put some eight thousand men into the town under
+Albemarle. A verbal understanding was given on both sides that the
+citadel would not fire upon the civilian part, nor the allies make an
+attack from it upon the citadel, and the siege of that stronghold began
+upon the following day, the 21st, towards evening. The operations against
+the citadel proved far more severe and a far greater trial to
+Marlborough's troops than those against the general circumvallation of the
+town. The subterranean struggle of mine and counter-mine particularly
+affected the moral of the allies, and after a week a proposal appeared[4]
+that the active fighting should cease, the siege be converted into a
+blockade, and only the small number of men sufficient for such a blockade
+be left before the citadel until the 5th of September, up to which date, a
+month ahead, at the utmost, it was believed the garrison could hold out.
+Louis was willing to accept the terms upon the condition that this month
+should be one of general truce. The allies refused this condition, and
+hostilities were resumed.[5]
+
+The force employed for containing the citadel and for prosecuting its
+siege had no necessity to be very large.
+
+It was warfare of a terrible kind. Men met underground in the mines, were
+burned alive when these were sprung, were exhausted, sometimes to death,
+in the subterranean and perilous labour. The mass of the army was free to
+menace Villars and his main body.
+
+But the admirable engineering which had instructed and completed the lines
+of La Bassée still checked the allies, in spite of superior numbers and
+provisionment still superior.
+
+The effect of the harvest was indeed just beginning to be felt, and the
+French general was beginning to have a little more elbow-room, so to
+speak, for the disposition of his men through the gradual replenishment of
+his stores. But even so, Marlborough and Eugene had very greatly the
+advantage of him in this respect.
+
+When the siege of the citadel of Tournai had been proceeding a little more
+than a week, upon the 8th of August the main body of the allies fell
+suddenly upon Marchiennes. Here the river Scarpe defended the main French
+positions. The town itself lay upon the further bank like a bastion. The
+attack was made under Tilly, and, consonantly to the strength of all
+Villars' defensive positions, that attack failed. On the night of the 9th
+Tilly retired from before Marchiennes, after having suffered the loss of
+but a few of his men.
+
+This action, though but a detail in the campaign, is well worth noting,
+because it exhibits in a sort of section, as it were, the causes of
+Malplaquet.
+
+Malplaquet, as we shall see in a moment, was fought simply because it had
+been impossible to pierce Villars' line, and Malplaquet, though a victory,
+was a sterile victory, more useful to the defeated than to the victors,
+because the defence had been kept up for such a length of time and was
+able to choose its own terrain.
+
+Now all this character in the campaign preceding the battle is exemplified
+in the attempt upon Marchiennes upon August 8th and 9th and its failure.
+Had it succeeded, had the line been pierced, there would have been no
+"block" at Malplaquet but an immediate invasion of France, just as there
+would have been had the line been pierced in the first attempt of five
+weeks before.
+
+In the next week and the next, Villars continually extended that line. He
+brought it up solidly as far as St Venant on his left, as far as
+Valenciennes on his right. He continually strengthened it, so that at no
+one place should it need any considerable body of men to hold it, and that
+the mass of the army should be free to move at will behind this strong
+entrenchment and dyke, fortified as it was with careful inundation and the
+use of two large rivers.
+
+Though the body of the allies again appeared in the neighbourhood of the
+lines, no general attack was delivered, but on the 30th of August Villars
+heard from deserters and spies that the citadel of Tournai was at the end
+of its provisions. Though but a certain minority of the allied army was
+necessary to contain that citadel, yet once it had fallen the whole of the
+allied forces would be much freer to act.
+
+It was upon the 31st of August that Surville, finding himself at the end
+of his provisionment of food, proposed capitulation. At first no
+capitulation could be arrived at. Marlborough insisted upon the garrison's
+complete surrender; Surville replied by threatening a destruction of the
+place. It was not until the morning of the 3rd September that a
+capitulation was signed in the form that the officers and soldiers of the
+garrison should not be free to serve the king until after they had been
+exchanged. The troops should march out with arms and colours, and should
+have safe escort through the French lines to Douai. They reached that town
+and camp upon the 4th, and an exchange of prisoners against their numbers
+was soon effected.
+
+Thus after two months ended the siege of Tournai, a piece of resistance
+which, as the reader will soon see, determined all that was to follow. Six
+thousand four hundred men had held the place when it was first invested.
+Of these, 1709 (nearly a third) had been killed; a number approximately
+equal had been wounded. The figures are sufficient to show the desperate
+character of the fighting, and how worthy this episode of war was on both
+sides of the legends that arose from it.
+
+
+
+
+III
+
+THE MANOEUVRING FOR POSITION
+
+
+With the end of the siege of Tournai both armies were free, the one for
+unfettered assault, the other to defend itself behind the lines as best it
+might.
+
+To make a frontal attack upon Villars' lines at any point was justly
+thought impossible after the past experience which Eugene and Marlborough
+had of their strength. A different plan was determined on. Mons, with its
+little garrison, should be invested, and the mass of the army should, on
+that extreme right of the French position, attempt to break through the
+old lines of the Trouille and invade France.
+
+Coincidently with the first negotiations for the capitulation of the
+citadel of Tournai, this new plan was entered upon. Lord Orkney, with the
+grenadiers of the army and between 2000 and 3000 mounted men, was sent
+off on the march to the south-east just as the first negotiations of
+Marlborough with Surville were opened. With this mobile force Orkney
+attempted to pass the Haine at St Ghislain. He all but surprised that
+point at one o'clock of the dark September night, but the French posts
+were just in time. He was beaten off, and had to cross the river higher up
+upon the eastern side of Mons, at Havre.
+
+The little check was not without its importance. It meant that the rapid
+forward march of his vanguard had failed to force that extreme extension
+of the French line, which was called "The Line of the Trouille" from the
+name of the small river that falls into the Haine near Mons. In point of
+time--which is everything in defensive warfare--the success of the defence
+at St Ghislain meant that all action by the allies was retarded for pretty
+well a week. Meanwhile, the weather had turned to persistent and harassing
+rain, the allied army, "toiling through a sea of mud,"[6] had not invested
+Mons even upon the eastern side until the evening of the 7th of September.
+On the same day Villars took advantage of a natural feature, stronger for
+purposes of defence than the line of the Trouille. This feature was the
+belt of forest-land which lies south and a little west of Mons, between
+that town and Bavai. He strengthened such forces as he had on the line of
+the Trouille (the little posts which had checked the first advance upon
+Mons, as I have said), concentrated the whole army just behind and west of
+the forest barrier, and watching the two gaps of that barrier, whose
+importance will be explained in a moment, he lay, upon the morning of
+Sunday, September the 8th, in a line which stretched from the river Haine
+at Montreuil to the bridge of Athis behind the woods; keeping watch upon
+his right in case he should have to move the line down south suddenly to
+meet an attack. As Villars so lay, he was in the position of a man who may
+be attacked through one of two doors in a wall. Such a man would stand
+between the two doors, watching both, and ready to spring upon that one
+which might be attacked, and attempt to defend it. The wall was the wall
+of wood, the two doors were the opening by Boussu and the other narrow
+opening which is distinguished by the name of Aulnois, the principal
+village at its mouth. It was this last which was to prove in the event the
+battlefield.
+
+All this I must make plainer and elaborate in what follows, and close
+this section by a mere statement of the manoeuvring for position.
+
+
+[Illustration: Sketch Map showing the Lines of Woods behind Mons, with the
+two gaps of Boussu and Aulnois.]
+
+
+Villars lying, as I have said, with his right at Athis, his left on the
+river Haine at Montreuil, Marlborough countered him by bringing the main
+of his forces over the Trouille[7] so that they lay from Quevy to
+Quaregnon.
+
+Eugene brought up his half, and drew it up as an extension of the Duke of
+Marlborough's line, and by the evening of the Sunday and on the morning of
+the Monday, all the troops who were at Tournai having been meanwhile
+called up, the allied army lay opposite the second or southern of the two
+openings in the forest wall. Villars during the Sunday shifted somewhat
+to the left or the south in the course of the day to face the new position
+of his enemy. It was evident upon that Monday morning the 9th of September
+that the action, when it was forced, would be in the second and
+southernmost of the two gaps. On that same Monday morning Villars brought
+the whole of his army still further south and was now right in front of
+the allies and barring the gap of Aulnois. By ten o'clock the centre of
+the French forces was drawn up in front of the hamlet of Malplaquet, by
+noon it had marched forward not quite a mile, stretched from wood to wood,
+and awaited the onslaught. A few ineffective cannon-shots were exchanged,
+but the expected attack was not delivered. Vastly to the advantage of the
+French and to the inexplicable prejudice of the allies Marlborough and
+Eugene wasted all that Monday and all the Tuesday following: the result we
+shall see when we come to the battle, for Villars used every moment of his
+respite to entrench and fortify without ceasing.
+
+With the drawing up of the French army across the gap, however, ends the
+manoeuvring for position, and under the title of "The Preliminaries of
+the Battle" I will next describe the arrival of Boufflers--a moral
+advantage not to be despised--the terrain, the French defences, and the
+full effect of the unexpected delay upon the part of the allies.
+
+
+
+
+IV
+
+THE PRELIMINARIES OF THE BATTLE
+
+
+The arrival of Louis Francis, Duke of Boufflers, peer and marshal of
+France, upon the frontier and before the army of defence, was one of those
+intangible advantages which the civilian historian will tend to exaggerate
+and the military to belittle, but which, though not susceptible of
+calculation or measurement, may always prove of vast consequence to a
+force, and have sometimes decided between victory and defeat. This
+advantage did not lie in Boufflers' singular capacity for command, nor, as
+will presently be seen, was he entrusted with the supreme direction of the
+action that was to follow. He was a great general. His service under arms
+had occupied the whole of his life and energies; he was to have a high and
+worthy reputation in the particular province of his career. But much more
+than this, the magic of his name and the just prestige which attached to
+the integrity and valour of the man went before him with a spiritual
+influence which every soldier felt, and which reanimated the whole body of
+the defence. His record was peculiarly suited for the confirmation of men
+who were fighting against odds, under disappointment, at the end of a long
+series of defeats, and on a last line to which the national arms had been
+thrust back after five years of almost uninterrupted failure.
+
+Boufflers at this moment was in his 66th year, and seemed older. His
+masterful, prominent face, large, direct, humorous in expression, full of
+command, was an index of a life well lived in the business of
+organisation, of obedience, and at last of supreme direction. Years ago at
+Namur his tenacity, under the pressure of a superior offensive, had earned
+him the particular character which he now bore. Only the year before, his
+conduct of the siege of Lille, when he had determinedly held out against
+the certitude of ultimate surrender, had refused to yield the place even
+after receiving orders from his sovereign, and had finally obtained, by
+his unshakable determination, a capitulation of the most honourable kind,
+was fresh in the minds of all. There is a story that on his arrival in the
+French camp the cheers with which he was greeted reached the opposing
+line, and that the allies were moved by the enormous rumour to expect an
+instant assault. He was one of those leaders who, partly through their
+legend, more through their real virtue, are a sort of flag and symbol to
+the soldiery who have the good fortune to receive their command.
+
+Nine years the senior in age of Villars, of a military experience far
+superior, in rank again possessed of the right to supreme command (for he
+had received the grade of marshal long before), he none the less
+determined to put himself wholly at Villars' orders, for he knew of what
+importance was continuity of direction in the face of the enemy. At the
+end of the last campaign, when he had expected peace, he had honourably
+retired. His life was nearing its close; in two years he was to die. He
+sacrificed both the pretension and the fact of superiority so dear to the
+commander, and told Villars that he came simply as a volunteer to aid as
+best he might, and to support the supreme command in the coming fight.
+
+He had arrived at Arras on the same day that Tournai had surrendered. Upon
+the morrow he had reached Villars' headquarters near Douai, Sin le Noble,
+in the centre of the defensive line. He had followed the easterly
+movement of the mass of the French army along that line to their present
+establishment between the two woods and to the terrain whereupon the
+action would be decided. In that action he was set at the head of the
+troops on the right, while Villars, attending in particular to the left,
+retained the general command and ordered all the disposition of the French
+force.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The landscape which lay before the French commanders when upon the Monday
+morning their line was drawn up and immediate battle expected, has changed
+hardly at all in the two hundred years between their day and ours. I will
+describe it.
+
+From the valley of the Sambre (which great river lies a day's march to the
+south of the French position) the land rises gradually upward in long
+rolls of bare fields. At the head of this slope is a typical watershed
+country, a country that is typical of watersheds in land neither hilly nor
+mountainous; small, sluggish streams, lessening to mere trickles of water
+as you rise, cut the clay; and the landscape, though at the watershed
+itself one is standing at a height of 500 feet above the sea, has the
+appearance of a plain. It is indeed difficult, without the aid of a map,
+to decide when one has passed from the one to the other side of the water
+parting, and the actual summit is, at this season of the year, a confused,
+flat stretch of open stubble fallow, and here and there coarse, heathy,
+untilled land. For two or three miles every way this level stretches,
+hummocked by slight rolls between stream and stream, and upon the actual
+watershed marked by one or two stagnant ponds. Seven miles behind you as
+you stand upon the battlefield lies the little French market town of
+Bavai, which was for centuries one of the great centres of Roman rule. It
+was the capital of the Nervii. Seven great Roman roads still strike out
+from it, to Rheims, to Cologne, to Utrecht, to Amiens, to the sea. Two in
+particular, that to Treves and that to Cologne, spreading gradually apart
+like the two neighbouring fingers of a hand, are the natural ways by which
+an army advancing to such a field or retreating from it would communicate
+with Bavai as a base.[8]
+
+The outstanding feature of this terrain is not that it is the summit of a
+watershed; indeed, as I have said, but for a map one would not guess that
+it bore this character, and to the eye it presents the appearance of a
+plain; it is rather the symmetrical arrangement of it as a broad belt of
+open land, flanked upon either side north and south by two great woods.
+That upon the right is known as the wood of Lanière, that upon the left
+bears several names in its various parts, and is easiest to remember under
+the general title of "The Forest of Sars." The gap between these two woods
+narrows to a line which is precisely 2000 yards in extent and runs from
+north-west to south-east, the two nearest points where either wood
+approaches the other being distant one from another by that distance and
+bearing one to the other upon those points of the compass. The French
+army, therefore, drawn up on the open land and stretching from wood to
+wood, faced somewhat north of east. The allies, drawn up a mile and a
+half away on the broad beginning of that gap, looked somewhat south of
+west. Behind the latter at a day's march was Mons; behind the former some
+seven miles was Bavai; and the modern frontier as well as the natural
+topographical frontier of the watershed runs just in front of what was
+then the emplacement of the French line.
+
+Upon the French side the bare fields are marked by no more than a few
+hamlets, the chief of which is the little village of Malplaquet, a few
+houses built along what is now the main road to Brussels. Certain of the
+French reserve were posted in this village, accompanied by a few sections
+of artillery, but the fields before it lay completely open to the action.
+
+Upon the Belgian side a string of considerable villages stretched; three
+of them from right to left marked the principal position of the allies.
+Their names from north to south, that is, from the left of the allies to
+the right, are Aulnois, Blaregnies, and Sars. The first of these lies
+right under the wood of Lanière; the second faces the gap between the
+woods; the third lies behind the left-hand wood, and takes its name from
+it, and is, as we have seen, called the forest of Sars.[9]
+
+The dispositions which the French army would take in such a defensive
+position were evident enough. It must defend the gap by entrenchment; it
+must put considerable forces into the woods upon the right and to the left
+of the gap to prevent the entrenchments being turned. The character of
+Villars and the French tradition of depending upon earth wherever that be
+possible, was bound, if time were accorded, to make the entrenchment of
+the open gap formidable. The large numbers engaged upon either side left a
+considerable number at the disposal of either commander, to be used by the
+one in holding the woods, by the other in attempting to force them; not
+much more than half of the French force need stand to the defence of the
+open gap. This gap was so suitable, with its bare fields after harvest,
+the absence of hedges, the insignificance of the rivulets, for the action
+of cavalry, that gates or gaps would be left in the French entrenchment
+for the use of that arm in order to allow the mounted men to pass through
+and charge as the necessity for such action might arise. In general,
+therefore, we must conceive of the French position as strong entrenchments
+thrown across the gap and lined with infantry, the cavalry drawn up behind
+to pass through the infantry when occasion might demand, through the line
+of entrenchment, and so to charge; the two woods upon either side thickly
+filled with men, and the position taken up by these defended by felled
+tree trunks and such earthwork as could be thrown up with difficulty in
+the dense undergrowth.
+
+It would be the business of the allies to try and force this line, either
+by carrying the central entrenchments across the gap or by turning the
+French left flank in the forest of Sars or the French right flank in the
+wood of Lanière, or by both of these attempts combined; for it must be
+remembered that the numerical superiority of the allies gave them a choice
+of action. Should either the stand on the left or that on the right be
+forced, the French line would be turned and the destruction of the army
+completed. Should the centre be pierced effectively and in time, the
+Northern half of the army so severed would certainly be destroyed, for
+there was no effective line of retreat; the Southern half might or might
+not escape towards the valley of the Sambre. In either case a decisive
+victory would destroy the last of the French bodies of defence and would
+open the way for an almost uninterrupted march upon Paris.
+
+It will be self-evident to the reader that what with Villars' known
+methods, his dependence upon his engineers, the tradition of the French
+service in this respect, the inferior numbers of the French forces, and
+the glaring necessities of the position, earthworks would be a deciding
+factor in the result.
+
+Now the value of entrenchment is a matter of time, and before proceeding
+to a description of the action we must, if we are to understand its
+result, appreciate how great an advantage was conferred upon the French by
+the delay in the attack of the allies.
+
+As I have said, it was upon the morning of Monday, September 9th, that the
+two armies were drawn up facing each other, and there is no apparent
+reason why the assault should not have been delivered upon that day. Had
+it been delivered we can hardly doubt that a decisive defeat of the French
+would have resulted, that the way to Paris would have been thrown open,
+and that the ruin of the French monarchy would have immediately followed.
+As it was, no attack was delivered upon that Monday. The whole of Tuesday
+was allowed to pass without a movement. It was not until the Wednesday
+morning that the allies moved.
+
+The problem of this delay is one which the historian must anxiously
+consider, for the answer to it explains the barrenness and political
+failure associated with the name of Malplaquet. But it is one which the
+historian will not succeed in answering unless indeed further documents
+should come to light. All that we now know is that in a council of war
+held upon the Monday on the side of the allies, it was thought well to
+wait until all the troops from Tournai should have come up (though these
+were few in number), and necessary to send 9000 men to hold the bridge
+across the Haine at St Ghislain in order to secure retreat in case of
+disaster.[10]
+
+The English historians blame the Dutch, the Dutch the English, and the
+Austrians and Prussians blame both.
+
+Perhaps there would have been an attack upon the Tuesday at least had not
+Villars spent all the Monday and all the Monday night in exacting from
+his men the most unexpected labours in constructing entrenchments of the
+most formidable character. Marlborough and Eugene, riding out before their
+lines to judge their chances on the Tuesday, were astonished at the work
+that had been done in those twenty-four hours. Nine redans, that is,
+openworks of peculiar strength, stretched across the gap to within about
+600 yards of the wood of Lanière, and the remainder of the space was one
+continuous line of entrenchment. What had been done in the woods could not
+be judged from such a survey, but it might be guessed, and the forcing of
+these became a very different problem from what it would have been had an
+attack been delivered on the Monday. Behind this main line Villars drew up
+another and yet another series of earthworks; even Malplaquet itself, with
+the reserve in the rear, was defended, and the work was continued without
+interruption even throughout the Tuesday night with relays of men.
+
+When at last, upon the Wednesday morning, the allies had arrived at their
+tardy agreement and determined to force an action, their superiority in
+numbers, such as it was (and this disputed point must be later
+discussed), was quite negatived by having to meet fortifications so
+formidable as to be called, in the exaggerated phrase of a witness, "a
+citadel."
+
+One last point must be mentioned before the action itself is described:
+the open gap across which the centre of the allies must advance to break
+the French centre and encapture the entrenchments was cut in two by a
+large copse or small wood, called "The Wood of Tiry." It was not defended,
+lying too far in front of the French line, and was of no great consequence
+save in this: that when the advance of the allies against the French
+defence should begin, it was bound to canalise and cut off from support
+for a moment the extreme left of that advance through the channel marked A
+upon the map over page. As will be seen, the Dutch advanced too early and
+in too great strength through this narrow gap, and the check they
+suffered, which was of such effect upon the battle, would not have been
+nearly so severe had not the little wood cut them off from the support of
+the centre.
+
+
+
+
+V
+
+THE ACTION
+
+
+On the morning of Wednesday, the 11th of September, the allied army was
+afoot long before dawn, and was ranged in order of battle earlier than
+four o'clock. But a dense mist covered the ground, and nothing was done
+until at about half-past seven this lifted and enabled the artillery of
+the opposing forces to estimate the range and to open fire. In order to
+understand what was to follow, the reader may, so to speak, utilise this
+empty period of the early morning before the action joined, to grasp the
+respective positions of the two hosts.
+
+
+[Illustration: The Elements of the Action of Malplaquet, September 11th,
+1709.]
+
+
+The nature of the terrain has already been described. The plan upon the
+part of the allies would naturally consist in an attempt to force both
+woods which covered the French flank, and, while the pressure upon these
+was at its strongest, the entrenched and fortified centre. Of course, if
+either of the woods was forced before the French centre should break,
+there would be no need to continue the central attack, for one or other of
+the French flanks would then be turned. But the woods were so well
+garnished by this time, and so strongly lined with fallen tree-trunks and
+such entrenchments as the undergrowth permitted, that it seemed to both
+Eugene and Marlborough more probable that the centre should be forced than
+that either of the two flanks should first be turned, and the general plan
+of the battle depended rather upon the holding and heavy engagement of the
+forces in the two woods to the north and south than in any hope to clear
+them out, and the final success was expected rather to take the form of
+piercing the central line while the flanks were thus held and engaged. The
+barren issue of the engagement led the commanders of the allies to excuse
+themselves, of course, and the peculiar ill-success of their left against
+the French right, which we shall detail in a moment, gave rise to the
+thesis that only a "feint" was intended in that quarter. The thesis may
+readily be dismissed. The left was intended to do serious work quite as
+much as the right. The theory that it was intended to "feint" was only
+produced after the action, and in order to explain its incomplete
+results.[11]
+
+Upon the French side the plan was purely defensive, as their inferior
+numbers and their reliance upon earthworks both necessitated and proved.
+It was Villars' plan to hold every part of his line with a force
+proportionate to its strength; to furnish the woods a little more heavily
+than the entrenchments of the open gap, but everywhere to rely upon the
+steadiness of his infantry and their artificial protections in the
+repelling of the assault. His cavalry he drew up behind this long line of
+infantry defence, prepared, as has already been said, to charge through
+gaps whenever such action on their part might seem effective.
+
+It will be perceived that the plan upon either side was of a very simple
+sort, and one easily grasped. On the side of the allies it was little more
+than a "hammer-and-tongs" assault upon a difficult and well-guarded
+position; on the side of the French, little more than a defence of the
+same.
+
+Next must be described the nature of the troops engaged in the various
+parts of the field.
+
+Upon the side of the allies we have:--
+
+On their left--that is, to the south of their lines and over against the
+wood of Lanière--one-third of the army under the Prince of Orange. The
+bulk of this body consisted in Dutch troops, of whom thirty-one battalions
+of infantry were present, and behind the infantry thus drawn up under the
+Dutch commander were his cavalry, instructed to keep out of range during
+the attack of the infantry upon the wood, and to charge and complete it
+when it should be successful. Embodied among these troops the British
+reader should note a corps of Highlanders, known as the Scottish
+Brigade.[12] These did not form part of the British army, but were
+specially enrolled in the Dutch service. The cavalry of this left wing was
+under the command of the Prince of Hesse-Cassel, who was mentioned a few
+pages back in the advance upon Mons. It numbered somewhat over 10,000
+sabres.
+
+The other end of the allied position consisted in two great forces of
+infantry acting separately, and in the following fashion:--
+
+First, a force under Schulemberg, which attacked the salient angle of the
+forest of Sars on its northern face, and another body attacking the other
+side of the same angle, to wit, its eastern face. In the first of these
+great masses, that under Schulemberg, there were no English troops. In
+strength it amounted alone to nearly 20,000 men. The second part, which
+was to attack the eastern face, was commanded by Lottum, and was only
+about half as strong, contained a certain small proportion of English.
+
+It may be asked when once these two great bodies of the left and the right
+(each of which was to concern itself with one of the two woods in front of
+the gap) are disposed of, what remained to furnish the centre of the
+allies? To this the curious answer must be afforded that in the
+arrangements of the allies at Malplaquet no true centre existed. The
+battle must be regarded from their side as a battle fought by two isolated
+wings, left and right, and ending in a central attack composed of men
+drawn from either wing. If upon the following sketch map the section from
+A to B be regarded as the special province of the Dutch or left wing, and
+the section from C to D be regarded as the special province of the
+Austro-Prussian or right wing, then the mid-section between B and C has no
+large body of troops corresponding to it. When the time came for acting in
+that mid-section, the troops necessary for the work were drawn from either
+end of the line. There were, however, two elements in connection with this
+mid-section which must be considered.
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+First, a great battery of forty guns ready to support an attack upon the
+entrenchments of the gap, whenever that time should come; and secondly,
+far in the rear, about 6000 British troops under Lord Orkney were spread
+out and linked the massed right of the army to its massed left. One
+further corps must be mentioned. Quite separate from the rest of the army,
+and right away on the left on the _French side_ of the forest of Sars, was
+the small isolated corps under Withers, which was to hold and embarrass
+the French rear near the group of farmsteads called La Folie, and when the
+forest of Sars was forced was to join hands with the successful assault
+of the Prussians and Austrians who should have forced it.
+
+The general command of the left, including Lord Orkney's battalions, also
+including (though tactically they formed part of the right wing) the force
+under Lottum, lay with the Duke of Marlborough. The command of the
+right--that is, Schulemberg and the cavalry behind him--lay with Prince
+Eugene.
+
+The French line of defence is, from its simplicity, quite easy to
+describe. In the wood of Lanière, and in the open space just outside it,
+as far as the fields in front of Malplaquet village, were the troops under
+command of the French general D'Artagnan. Among the regiments holding this
+part was that of the Bourbonnais, the famous brigade of Navarre (the best
+in the service), and certain of the Swiss mercenaries. The last of this
+body on the left was formed by the French Guards. The entrenchments in the
+centre were held by the Irish Brigades of Lee and O'Brien, and by the
+German mercenaries and allies of Bavaria and Cologne. These guarded the
+redans which defended the left or northern part of the open gap. The
+remainder of this gap, right up to the forest of Sars, was held by
+Alsatians and by the Brigade of Laon, and the chief command in this part
+lay with Steckenberg. The forest of Sars was full of French troops,
+Picardy, the Marines, the Regiment of Champagne, and many others, with a
+strong reserve of similar troops just behind the wood. The cavalry of the
+army formed a long line behind this body of entrenched infantry; the
+Household Cavalry being on the right near the wood of Lanière, the Gens
+d'armes being in the centre, and the Carabiniers upon the left. These last
+stretched so far northward and westward as to come at last opposite to
+Withers.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Such was the disposition of the two armies when at half-past seven the sun
+pierced the mist and the first cannon-shots were exchanged. Marlborough
+and Eugene had decided that they would begin by pressing, as hard as might
+be, the assault upon the forest of Sars. When this assault should have
+proceeded for half an hour, the opposite end of the line, the left, under
+the Prince of Orange,[13] should engage the French troops holding the wood
+of Lanière. It was expected that the forest of Sars would be forced early
+in the action; that the troops in the wood of Lanière would at least be
+held fast by the attack of the Prince of Orange, and that the weakened
+French centre could then be taken by assault with the use of the reserves,
+of Orkney's men, and of detachments drawn from the two great masses upon
+the wings.
+
+The reader may here pause to consider the excellence of this plan--very
+probably Marlborough's own, and one the comparative ill-success of which
+was due to the unexpected power of resistance displayed by the French
+infantry upon that day.
+
+It was wise to put the greater part of the force into a double attack upon
+the forest of Sars, for this forest, with its thick woods and heavy
+entrenchments, was at once the strongest part of the French position in
+its garnishing and artificial enforcement, yet weak in that the salient
+angle it presented was one that could not, from the thickness of the
+trees, be watched from any central point, as can the salient angle of a
+fortification. Lottum on the one side, Schulemberg on the other, were
+attacking forces numerically weaker than their own, and separate fronts
+which could not support each other under the pressure of the attack.
+
+It was wise to engage the forces upon the French side opposite the allied
+left in the wood of Lanière half an hour after the assault had begun upon
+the forest of Sars, for it was legitimate to expect that at the end of
+that half hour the pressure upon the forest of Sars would begin to be felt
+by the French, and that they would call for troops from the right unless
+the right were very busily occupied at that moment.
+
+Finally, it was wise not to burden the centre with any great body of
+troops until one of the two flanks should be pressed or broken, for the
+centre might, in this case, be compared to a funnel in which too great a
+body of troops would be caught at a disadvantage against the strong
+entrenchments which closed the mouth of the funnel. An historical
+discussion has arisen upon the true rôle of the left in this plan. The
+commander of the allies gave it out _after_ the action (as we have seen
+above) that the left had only been intended to "feint." The better
+conclusion is that they were intended to do their worst against the wood
+of Lanière, although of course this "worst" could not be expected to
+compare with the fundamental attack upon the forest of Sars, where all the
+chief forces of the battle were concentrated.
+
+If by a "feint" is meant a subsidiary part of the general plan, the
+expression might be allowed to pass, but it is not a legitimate use of
+that expression, and if, as occurred at Malplaquet with the Dutch troops,
+a subsidiary body in the general plan is badly commanded, the temptation
+to call the original movement a "feint," which developed from breach of
+orders into a true attack, though strong for the disappointed commanders,
+must not be admitted by the accurate historian. In general, we may be
+certain that the Dutch troops and their neighbours on the allied left were
+intended to do all they could against the wood of Lanière, did all they
+could, but suffered in the process a great deal more than Marlborough had
+allowed for.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+These dispositions once grasped, we may proceed to the nature and
+development of the general attack which followed that opening cannonade of
+half-past seven, which has already been described.
+
+The first movement of the allies was an advance of the left under the
+Prince of Orange and of the right under Lottum. The first was halted out
+of range; the second, after getting up as far as the eastern flank of the
+forest of Sars, wheeled round so as to face the hedge lining that forest,
+and formed into three lines. It was nine o'clock before the signal for
+the attack was given by a general discharge of the great battery in the
+centre opposite the French entrenchments in the gap. Coincidently with
+that signal Schulemberg attacked the forest of Sars from his side, the
+northern face, and he and Lottum pressed each upon that side of the
+salient angle which faced him. Schulemberg's large force got into the
+fringe of the wood, but no further. The resistance was furious; the
+thickness of the trees aided it. Eugene was present upon this side;
+meanwhile Marlborough himself was leading the troops of Lottum. He
+advanced with them against a hot fire, passed the swampy rivulet which
+here flanks the wood, and reached the entrenchments which had been drawn
+up just within the outer boundary of it.
+
+This attack failed. Villars was present in person with the French troops
+and directed the repulse. Almost at the same time the advance of
+Schulemberg upon the other side of the wood, which Eugene was
+superintending, suffered a check. Its reserves were called up. The
+intervals of the first line were filled up from the second. One French
+brigade lining the wood was beaten back, but the Picardy Regiment and the
+Marines stood out against a mixed force of Danes, Saxons, and Hessians
+opposing them. Schulemberg, therefore, in this second attack had failed
+again, but Marlborough, leading Lottum's men upon the other side of the
+wood to a second charge in his turn, had somewhat greater success. He had
+by this time been joined by a British brigade under the Duke of Argyle
+from the second line, and he did so far succeed with this extension of his
+men as to get round the edge of the French entrenchments in the wood.
+
+The French began to be pressed from this eastern side of their salient
+angle, right in among the trees. Schulemberg's command felt the advantage
+of the pressure being exercised on the other side. The French weakened
+before it, and in the neighbourhood of eleven o'clock a great part of the
+forest of Sars was already filled with the allies, who were beating back
+the French in individual combats from tree to tree. Close on noon the
+battle upon this side stood much as the sketch map upon the opposite page
+shows, and was as good as won, for it seemed to need only a continuation
+of this victorious effort to clear the whole wood at last and to turn the
+French line.
+
+This is undoubtedly the form which the battle would have taken--a complete
+victory for the allied forces by their right turning the French
+left--and the destruction of the French army would have followed, had not
+the allied left been getting into grave difficulty at the other end of the
+field of battle.
+
+
+[Illustration: Sketch Map showing the peril the French centre ran towards
+noon of being turned on its left.]
+
+
+The plan of the allied generals, it will be remembered, was that the left
+of their army under the Prince of Orange should attack the wood of Lanière
+about half an hour after the right had begun to effect an entrance into
+the opposing forest of Sars. When that half hour had elapsed, that is,
+about half-past nine, the Prince of Orange, without receiving special
+orders, it is true, but acting rightly enough upon his general orders,
+advanced against the French right. Tullibardine with his Scottish brigade
+took the worst of the fighting on the extreme left against the extreme of
+the French right, and was the first to get engaged among the trees. The
+great mass of the force advanced up the opening between the coppice called
+the wood of Tiry and the main wood, with the object of carrying the
+entrenchments which ran from the corner of the wood in front of Malplaquet
+and covered this edge of the open gap. The nine foremost battalions were
+led by the Prince of Orange in person; his courage and their tenacity,
+though fatal to the issue of the fight, form perhaps the finest part of
+our story. As they came near the French earthworks, a French battery right
+upon their flank at the edge of the wood opened upon them, enfilading
+whole ranks and doing, in the shortest time, terrible execution. The young
+leader managed to reach the earthworks. The breastwork was forced, but
+Boufflers brought up men from his left, that is, from the centre of the
+gap, drove the Dutch back, and checked, at the height of its success, this
+determined assault. Had not the wood of Tiry been there to separate the
+main part of the Prince of Orange's command from its right, reinforcements
+might have reached him and have saved the disaster. As it was, the wood of
+Tiry had cut the advance into two streams, and neither could help the
+other. The Dutch troops and the Highlanders rallied; the Prince of Orange
+charged again with a personal bravery that made him conspicuous before the
+whole field, and should make him famous in history, but the task was more
+than men could accomplish. The best brigade at the disposal of the French,
+that of Navarre, was brought up to meet this second onslaught, broke it,
+and the French leapt from the earthworks to pursue the flight of their
+assailants. Many of Orange's colours were taken in that rout, and the guns
+of his advanced battery fell into French hands. Beyond the wood of Tiry
+the extreme right of the Dutch charge had suffered no better fate. It had
+carried the central entrenchment of the French, only to be beaten back as
+the main body between the wood of Tiry and the wood of Lanière opened.
+
+At this moment, then, after eleven o'clock, which was coincident with the
+success of Lottum and Schulemberg in the forest of Sars, upon the right,
+the allied left had been hopelessly beaten back from the entrenchments in
+the gap, and from the edge of the wood of Lanière.
+
+Marlborough was hurriedly summoned away from his personal command of
+Lottum's victorious troops, and begged to do what he could for the broken
+regiments of Orange. He galloped back over the battlefield, a mile or so
+of open fields, and was appalled to see the havoc. Of the great force that
+had advanced an hour and a half before against Boufflers and the French
+right, fully a third was struck, and 2000 or more lay dead upon the
+stubble and the coarse heath of that upland. The scattered corpses strewn
+over half a mile of flight from the French entrenchments, almost back to
+their original position, largely showed the severity of the blow. It was
+impossible to attempt another attack upon the French right with any hope
+of success.
+
+Marlborough, trusting that the forest of Sars would soon be finally
+cleared, determined upon a change of plan. He ordered the advance upon the
+centre of the position of Lord Orkney's fifteen battalions, reinforced
+that advance by drafts of men from the shattered Dutch left, and prepared
+with some deliberation to charge the line of earthworks which ran across
+the open and the nine redans which we have seen were held by the French
+allies and mercenaries from Bavaria and Cologne, and await his moment.
+That moment came at about one o'clock; at this point in the action the
+opposing forces stood somewhat as they are sketched on the map over page.
+
+The pressure upon the French in the wood of Sars, perpetually increasing,
+had already caused Villars, who commanded there in person, to beg
+Boufflers for aid; but the demand came when Boufflers was fighting his
+hardest against the last Dutch attack, and no aid could be sent.
+
+Somewhat reluctantly, Villars had weakened his centre by withdrawing from
+it the two Irish regiments, and continued to dispute foot by foot the
+forest of Sars. But foot by foot and tree by tree, in a series of
+individual engagements, his men were pressed back, and a larger area of
+the woodland was held by the troops of Schulemberg and Lottum. Eugene was
+wounded, but refused to leave the field. The loss had been appalling upon
+either side, but especially severe (as might have been expected) among the
+assailants, when, just before one o'clock, the last of the French soldiers
+were driven from the wood.
+
+
+[Illustration: Sketch Map showing Marlborough bringing up troops to the
+centre for the final and successful attack upon the entrenchments about
+one o'clock.]
+
+
+All that main defence which the forest of Sars formed upon the French left
+flank was lost, but the fight had been so exhausting to the assailants in
+the confusion of the underwood, and the difficulty of forming them in the
+trees was so great, that the French forces once outside the wood could
+rally at leisure and draw up in line to receive any further movement on
+the part of their opponents. It was while the French left were thus drawn
+up in line behind the wood of Sars, with their redans at the centre
+weakened by the withdrawal of the Irish brigade, that Marlborough ordered
+the final central attack against those redans. The honour of carrying them
+fell to Lord Orkney and his British battalions. His men flooded over the
+earthworks at the first rush, breaking the depleted infantry behind them
+(for these, after the withdrawal of the Irish, were no more than the men
+of Bavaria and Cologne), and held the parapet.
+
+The French earthworks thus carried by the infantry in the centre, the
+modern reader might well premise that a complete rout of the French forces
+should have followed. But he would make this premise without counting for
+the preponderant rôle that cavalry played in the wars of Marlborough.
+
+Facing the victorious English battalions of Orkney, now in possession of
+the redans, stood the mile-long unbroken squadrons of the French horse.
+
+The allied cavalry, passing between gaps in its infantry line, began to
+deploy for the charge, but even as they deployed they were charged by the
+French mounted men, thrust back, and thrown into confusion. The short
+remainder of the battle is no more than a mêlée of sabres, but the nature
+of that mêlée must be clearly grasped, and the character of the French
+cavalry resistance understood, for this it was which determined the issue
+of the combat and saved the army of Louis XIV.
+
+A detailed account of the charges and counter-charges of the opposing
+horse would be confusing to the reader, and is, as a fact, impossible of
+narration, for no contemporary record of it remains in any form which can
+be lucidly set forth.
+
+A rough outline of what happened is this:--
+
+The first counter-charge of the French was successful, and the allied
+cavalry, caught in the act of deployment, was thrust back in confusion, as
+I have said, upon the British infantry who lined the captured earthworks.
+
+The great central battery of forty guns which Marlborough had kept all day
+in the centre of the gap, split to the right and left, and, once clear of
+its own troops, fired from either side upon the French horse. Shaken,
+confused, and almost broken by this fire, the French horse were charged by
+a new body of the allied horse led by Marlborough in person, composed of
+British and Prussian units. But, just as Marlborough's charge was
+succeeding, old Boufflers, bringing up the French Household Cavalry from
+in front of Malplaquet village, charged right home into the flank of
+Marlborough's mounted troops, bore back their first and second lines, and
+destroyed the order of their third.
+
+Thereupon Eugene, with yet another body of fresh horse (of the Imperial
+Service), charged in his turn, and the battle of Malplaquet ends in a
+furious mix-up of mounted men, which gradually separated into two
+undefeated lines, each retiring from the contest.
+
+It will be wondered why a conclusion so curiously impotent was permitted
+to close the fighting of so famous a field.
+
+The answer to this query is that the effort upon either side had passed
+the limits beyond which men are physically incapable of further action.
+Any attempt of the French to advance in force after two o'clock would have
+led to their certain disaster, for the allies were now in possession of
+their long line of earthworks.[14]
+
+On the other hand, the allies could not advance, because the men upon whom
+they could still count for action were reduced to insufficient numbers.
+Something like one-third of their vast host had fallen in this most
+murderous of battles; from an eighth to a sixth were dead. Of the
+remainder, the great proportion suffered at this hour from an exhaustion
+that forbade all effective effort.
+
+The horse upon either side might indeed have continued charge and
+counter-charge to no purpose and with no final effect, but the action of
+the cavalry in the repeated and abortive shocks, of which a list has just
+been detailed, could lead neither commander to hope for any final result.
+Boufflers ordered a retreat, screened by his yet unbroken lines of horse.
+The infantry were withdrawn from the wood of Lanière, which they still
+held, and from their positions behind the forest of Sars. They were
+directed in two columns towards Bavai in their rear, and as that orderly
+and unhurried retreat was accomplished, the cavalry filed in to follow the
+line, and the French host, leaving the field in the possession of the
+victors, marched back westward by the two Roman roads in as regular a
+formation as though they had been advancing to action rather than
+retreating from an abandoned position.
+
+It was not quite three o'clock in the afternoon.
+
+There was no pursuit, and there could be none. The allied army slept upon
+the ground it had gained; rested, evacuated its wounded, and restored its
+broken ranks through the whole of the morrow, Thursday. It was not until
+the Friday that it was able to march back again from the field in which
+it had triumphed at so terrible an expense of numbers, guns, and colours,
+and with so null a strategic result, and to take up once more the siege of
+Mons. Upon the 9th of October Mons capitulated, furnishing the sole fruit
+of this most arduous of all the great series of Marlborough's campaigns.
+
+No battle has been contested with more valour or tenacity than the battle
+of Malplaquet. The nature of the woodland fighting contributed to the
+enormous losses sustained upon either side. The delay during which the
+French had been permitted to entrench themselves so thoroughly naturally
+threw the great balance of the loss upon the assailants. In no battle,
+free, as Malplaquet was free, from all pursuit or a rout, or even the
+breaking of any considerable body of troops (save the Dutch troops and
+Highlanders on the left in the earlier part of the battle, and the
+Bavarians and Cologne men in the redans at the close of it), has the
+proportion of the killed and wounded been anything like so high. In none,
+perhaps, were casualties so heavy accompanied by so small a proportion of
+prisoners.
+
+The action will remain throughout history a standing example of the pitch
+of excellence to which those highly trained professional armies of the
+eighteenth century, with their savage discipline, their aristocratic
+command, their close formations, and their extraordinary reliance upon
+human daring, could arrive.
+
+
+FINIS
+
+
+PRINTED BY NEILL AND CO., LTD., EDINBURGH.
+
+
+
+
+BRITISH BATTLE BOOKS
+
+_Illustrated with Coloured Maps_
+
+BY HILAIRE BELLOC
+
+_F'cap 8vo, cloth, 1s. net; leather, 2s. 6d. net_
+
+_HISTORY IN WARFARE_
+
+The British Battle Series will consist of a number of monographs upon
+actions in which British troops have taken part. Each battle will be the
+subject of a separate booklet illustrated with coloured maps, illustrative
+of the movements described in the text, together with a large number of
+line maps showing the successive details of the action. In each case the
+political circumstances which led to the battle will be explained; next,
+the stages leading up to it; lastly, the action in detail.
+
+     1. BLENHEIM
+     2. MALPLAQUET
+     3. TOURCOING
+     4. WATERLOO
+
+Later volumes will deal with Crecy, Poitiers, Corunna, Talaveras, Flodden,
+The Siege of Valenciennes, Vittoria, Toulouse.
+
+London: STEPHEN SWIFT & CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi
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+
+
+
+THE PARTY SYSTEM
+
+BY HILAIRE BELLOC AND CECIL CHESTERTON
+
+_Crown 8vo. 3s. 6d. net_
+
+_THE THOUGHTS OF THINKING MEN_
+
+No book of the present season has been so much praised--and so much
+reviled: reviled by most of the Party organs, praised by independent
+papers. And yet mark the agreement of the following, as wide asunder as
+the poles often in their views.
+
+"Embodies the silent thoughts of almost all thinking men of to-day."--_The
+Evening Times._
+
+The _Star_ says:--"Says in plain English what everybody in touch with
+reality thinks."
+
+LORD ROBERT CECIL, in the _Morning Post_, says:--"So far the authors of
+'The Party System' only say in plain terms what everyone who has been in
+Parliament knows to be in substance true."
+
+"A complete proof of the necessity of restoring power to the
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+London: STEPHEN SWIFT & CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi
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+
+GORDON AT KHARTOUM
+
+BY WILFRED SCAWEN BLUNT
+
+_15s. net_
+
+_PRIVATE AND INTIMATE_
+
+This book follows the lines of the author's works on Egypt and India,
+consisting mainly of a private diary of a very intimate kind, and will
+bring down his narrative of events to the end of 1885.
+
+The present volume is designed especially as an answer to Lord Cromer's
+_Modern Egypt_, in so far as it concerned Gordon, and contains several
+important and hitherto unpublished documents throwing new light upon a
+case of perennial interest.
+
+It also includes an account of the author's relations with Lord Randolph
+Churchill, Sir Henry Drummond Wolff, Mr Gladstone, Mr Parnell, and other
+political personages of the day, as well as of the General Election of
+1885, in which the author stood as a Tory Home Ruler.
+
+London: STEPHEN SWIFT & CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi
+
+
+
+
+AN ENGLISHMAN IN NEW YORK
+
+BY JUVENAL
+
+_Crown 8vo. 5s. net_
+
+_VIVID ORIGINALITY_
+
+In these notes and studies on life in New York, Juvenal, by his vivid
+originality and his masterly deductions, has surpassed all other writers
+who have written on the same subject.
+
+Mr Eden Phillpotts writes of the Author: "The things seen are brilliantly
+set down. He writes with great force and skill."
+
+London: STEPHEN SWIFT & CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi
+
+
+
+
+PRINCE AZREEL
+
+A Poem with Prose Notes
+
+BY ARTHUR LYNCH
+
+_Crown 8vo. 5s. net_
+
+_DIRECT--INSPIRING--COMPELLING_
+
+The cry for something new in literature, the indefinable, the unexpected,
+has been answered. Prince Azreel comes to claim his place, not as one who
+has sounded the depths and shoals of the current modes of the day, but as
+one entirely careless of these things, discoursing freely of life, easily
+throughout its whole purport and scope.
+
+The Devil comes into the action, but he also is new--rather the Spirit of
+the World, "man's elder brother." His methods are those neither of _Faust_
+nor of _Paradise Regained_. His temptations are suasive, his lures less
+material.
+
+In the search for the Ideal of statesmanship Azreel and the Devil come to
+our own Parliament, Azreel filled with warm enthusiasm, high conceptions.
+They see, they learn; they discover "types," and discuss them. We find the
+Devil at length defending the Commons, supplying the corrective to
+Azreel's strange disillusions. This part will not be the least piquant.
+
+London: STEPHEN SWIFT & CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi
+
+
+
+
+POEMS
+
+BY CHARLES GRANVILLE
+
+_F'cap 4to. 5s. net._
+
+_REAL POETIC TALENT_
+
+The present volume is composed of a selection from the previous poetical
+works of the Author, who is also well known as a writer of prose. The
+distinctive feature of the poems in this collection--the feature, indeed,
+that marks off and differentiates the work of this poet from the mass of
+verse produced to-day--is their spiritual insight. Mr Granville is
+concerned with the soul of man, with the eternal rather than the
+transitory, and his perception, which is that of the seer, invests his
+language with that quality of ecstasy that constitutes the indisputable
+claim of poetry to rank in the forefront of literature.
+
+London: STEPHEN SWIFT & CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi
+
+
+
+
+THE HUMOUR OF THE UNDERMAN
+
+And Other Essays
+
+BY FRANCIS GRIERSON
+
+_F'cap 8vo. 3s. 6d. net_
+
+_CHARACTERISTICALLY INCISIVE_
+
+This volume contains the latest work of the greatest Essayist of our time.
+Maurice Maeterlinck has said of the Author, "He has, in his best moments,
+that most rare gift of casting certain shafts of light, at once simple and
+decisive, upon questions the most difficult, obscure, and unlooked for in
+Art, Morals, and Psychology ... essays among the most subtle and
+substantial that I know."
+
+This opinion has been endorsed by every critic of note in the British
+Isles and in the United States of America. Indeed, in the latter country a
+veritable Grierson cult has sprung into existence.
+
+London: STEPHEN SWIFT & CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi
+
+
+
+
+LA VIE ET LES HOMMES
+
+BY FRANCIS GRIERSON
+
+_F'cap. 8vo. 3s. 6d. net_
+
+_PENSÉES PIQUANTES, INDÉPENDANTES_
+
+SULLY PRUDHOMME (de l'Académie Française):--"J'ai trouvé ces méditations
+pleines d'aperçus profonds et sagaces. J'ai été frappé de l'originalité
+puissante de la pensée de l'auteur."
+
+JULES CLARETIE (de l'Académie Française):--"J'ai été charmé par les idées
+originales et justes."
+
+L'Abbé JOSEPH ROUX:--"Il y a là des vues originales, des appréciations
+neuves et frappantes."
+
+FRÉDÉRIC MISTRAL:--"Ces pensées m'ont paru neuves et piquantes, et
+indépendantes de cette ambiance de préjugés à laquelle il est si difficile
+d'échapper."
+
+Le Père P. V. DELAPORTE, S.J. (Rédacteur des Etudes Religieuses):--"J'ai
+admiré dans ces pages délicates l'artiste, le penseur et l'écrivain, et
+j'ai été singulièrement touché de la façon dont vous appréciez le génie
+français. Vous avez su le comprendre et vous avez dit votre pensée
+franchement, je pouvais ajouter _françaisement_."
+
+London: STEPHEN SWIFT & CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi
+
+
+
+
+THE ROLL OF THE SEASONS
+
+Nature Essays
+
+BY G. G. DESMOND
+
+_Crown 8vo. Cloth. 5s. net_
+
+_A NATURE BOOK FOR TOWN FOLK_
+
+This book for all Nature-lovers appeals perhaps most strongly to those in
+cities pent, for whom a word in season can call up visions of the open
+moor, the forest, the meadow stream, the flowered lane, or the wild
+sea-shore. The extreme penalty for reading one of these spring, summer,
+autumn, or winter chapters is to be driven from one's chair into the
+nearest field, there to forget town worries among the trees. The author
+does not spare us for fog, rain, frost, or snow. Sometimes he makes us get
+up by moonlight and watch the dawn come "cold as cold sea-shells" to the
+fluting of blackbirds, or he takes us through the woods by night and shows
+us invisible things by their sounds and scents. The spirit, even if the
+body cannot go with it, comes back refreshed by these excursions to the
+country.
+
+London: STEPHEN SWIFT & CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi
+
+
+
+
+THE MASTERY OF LIFE
+
+BY G. T. WRENCH, M.D. LOND.
+
+_Demy 8vo. 15s. net_
+
+_OLD VALUES RE-VALUED_
+
+This book is a review of the history of civilisation with the object of
+discovering where and under what conditions man has shown the most
+positive attitude towards life. The review has been based not so much upon
+scholarship as upon the direct evidence of the products and monuments of
+the different peoples of history, and the author has consequently
+travelled widely in order to collect his material. The author shows how
+the patriarchal system and values have always been the foundation of
+peoples, who have been distinguished for their joy in and power over life,
+and have expressed their mastery in works of art, which have been their
+peculiar glory and the object of admiration and wonder of other peoples.
+In contrast to them has been the briefer history of civilisation in
+Europe, in which the paternal and filial values of interdependence have
+always been rivalled by the ideal of independence from one's fellow-man.
+The consequences of this ideal of personal liberty in the destruction of
+the art of life are forcibly delineated in the last chapters.
+
+London: STEPHEN SWIFT & CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi
+
+
+
+
+TORY DEMOCRACY
+
+BY J. M. KENNEDY
+
+_Crown 8vo. Cloth. 3s. 6d. net_
+
+_LORDS, GOVERNMENT, LIBERALISM_
+
+There are unmistakable indications that the system of politics at present
+pursued by the two chief political parties is not meeting with the
+approval of the electorate as a whole, though this electorate, as a result
+of the Caucus methods, finds it increasingly difficult to give expression
+to its views. In his book on Tory Democracy, Mr J. M. Kennedy, who is
+already favourably known through his books on modern philosophical and
+sociological subjects, sets forth the principles underlying a system of
+politics which was seriously studied by men so widely different as
+Disraeli, Bismarck, and Lord Randolph Churchill. Mr Kennedy not only shows
+the close connection still existing between the aristocracy and the
+working classes, but he also has the distinction of being the first writer
+to lay down a constructive Conservative policy which is independent of
+Tariff Reform. Apart from this, the chapters of his work which deal with
+Representative Government, the House of Lords, and "Liberalism at Work"
+throw entirely new light on many vexed questions of modern politics. The
+book, it may be added, is written in a style that spares neither parties
+nor persons.
+
+London: STEPHEN SWIFT & CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi
+
+
+
+
+PRINCIPLES OF A NEW SYSTEM OF PSYCHOLOGY
+
+BY ARTHUR LYNCH,
+
+  M.A., C.E., L.R.C.P., M.R.C.S.E., M.P.
+  AUTHOR OF "HUMAN DOCUMENTS," ETC., ETC.
+
+_Two Vols. Demy 8vo. 10s. 6d. net each_
+
+_A BASIC WORK OF ANALYSIS_
+
+This book is dynamic. It is new in the sense in which Schwann's Cell
+Theory was new to Physiology, or Dalton's Atomic Theory to Chemistry. The
+author has faced the problem in its widest extension: Can the entire realm
+of knowledge, and the whole possible scope of mental acts, be so resolved
+that we may formulate the unanalysable elements, the Fundamental Processes
+of the mind? This problem is solved, and thence the manner of all
+synthesis indicated. The argument is closely consecutive, but the severity
+is relieved by abundant illustrations drawn from many sciences. The
+principles established will afford criteria in regard to every position in
+Psychology. New light will be thrown, for instance, on Kant's Categories,
+Spencer's Hedonism, Fechner's Law, the foundation of Mathematics, Memory,
+Association, Externality, Will, the Feeling of Effort, Brain
+Localisations, and finally on the veritable nature of Reason. A philosophy
+of Research is foreshadowed. The work offers a base on which all valid
+studies may be co-ordinated, and developments are indicated. It
+presupposes no technical knowledge, and the exposition is couched in
+simple language. It will give a new impetus to Psychology.
+
+London: STEPHEN SWIFT & CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi
+
+
+
+
+EIGHT CENTURIES OF PORTUGUESE MONARCHY
+
+BY V. de BRAGANÇA CUNHA
+
+_Demy 8vo. 14 Pencil Portraits. 15s. net_
+
+_THE TRUTH ABOUT PORTUGAL_
+
+This book reveals the series of causes, both political and social, which
+have brought Portugal to its present condition and affected the character
+of its people.
+
+The entire history of Monarchical Portugal is reviewed in masterly
+fashion, and the work is based on a thorough knowledge and critical
+appreciation of all available sources. The author writes, not as an
+outsider, but as one who knows his country from within, and the book
+therefore constitutes a serious attempt to tell the English-speaking world
+the truth about Portugal.
+
+The author knows that he treads "forbidden ground," but even where he
+apportions the severest blame he does so in the conviction that adverse
+criticism of any country, "however unpleasant it may be to all Chadbands
+and Stigginses," cannot be considered abusive if it be made with the
+intention of stirring up the forces of reform and of remedying the defects
+which it discloses.
+
+London: STEPHEN SWIFT & CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi
+
+
+
+
+SIR EDWARD
+
+A BRIEF MEMORIAL OF A NOBLE LIFE
+
+BY A FELLOW OF THE LITERARY SOCIETY
+
+_Crown 8vo. Cloth. 1s. net_
+
+_AN IRRESISTIBLE SATIRE_
+
+The humour of this remarkable satire is irresistible. The truth concerning
+Sir Edward is gradually revealed by fantastic touches and sly suggestions,
+and with a manner so correct as almost to put the reader off his guard.
+
+Although the subject of this Æsopian biography is drawn in such a way as
+to suggest now one and now another familiar figure in modern life, yet
+these fleeting and shadowy resemblances are in reality an indication of
+the archetypal nature of Sir Edward; he is not a caricature but a symbol;
+not any particular individual but a composite type--a materialisation into
+one grotesque shape of the drifting ideas and false ideals of a muddled
+civilisation.
+
+The narrative gathers into its net both big and little fishes--a heavy
+haul. But people who regard Western civilisation as the final word in
+social wisdom should not read this book: or perhaps they should. Anyway,
+everyone else should.
+
+London: STEPHEN SWIFT & CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi
+
+
+
+
+PARISIAN PORTRAITS
+
+BY FRANCIS GRIERSON
+
+_F'cap 8vo. 2s. 6d. net_
+
+_AN APPRECIATION OF FRENCH GENIUS_
+
+These profoundly sagacious studies and finely drawn portraits are of the
+greatest interest, not only in virtue of the author's intimate knowledge
+of Paris and Parisian life (dating from 1869), but also because Mr
+Grierson is one of the few living Englishmen who thoroughly understand and
+appreciate the French Genius. The book will be an enduring delight to all
+lovers of fine literature.
+
+Mr RICHARD LE GALLIENNE says:--"Mr Francis Grierson, cosmopolite and
+subtile critic of the arts, is one of those sudden new acquaintances that
+assume immediate importance in one's world of thought.... Everywhere with
+remarkable rectitude of perception, Mr Grierson puts his finger on the
+real power, and it is always spiritual."
+
+_The Spectator_ says:--"Mr Grierson has a right to speak, for he uses with
+success one of the most difficult of literary forms, the essay."
+
+London: STEPHEN SWIFT & CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi
+
+
+
+
+THE VALLEY OF SHADOWS
+
+BY FRANCIS GRIERSON
+
+_Second Edition. Demy 8vo. 6s. net_
+
+_MEMORIES OF LINCOLN'S COUNTRY_
+
+In this book Mr Grierson recalls in vivid memories the wonderful romance
+of his life in Lincoln's country before the war. "_The Valley of the
+Shadows_ is not a novel," says Mr W. L. Courtney in the _Daily Telegraph_,
+"yet in the graphic portraiture of spiritual and intellectual movements it
+possesses an attraction denied to all but the most significant kind of
+fiction.... With a wonderful touch Mr Grierson depicts scene after scene,
+drawing the simple, native characters with bold, impressive strokes."
+
+"Told with wonderful charm ... enthralling as any romance ... truth,
+though often stranger than fiction, is almost always duller; Mr Grierson
+has accomplished the rare feat of making it more interesting. There are
+chapters in the book ... that haunt one afterwards like remembered music,
+or like passages in the prose of Walter Pater."--_Punch._
+
+London: STEPHEN SWIFT & CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi
+
+
+
+
+MODERN MYSTICISM
+
+And Other Essays
+
+BY FRANCIS GRIERSON
+
+_F'cap. 8vo. 2s. 6d. net_
+
+_ORIGINAL, INCISIVE, SUBTLE, ACUTE_
+
+This book embodies profound thinking expressed in an original and happy
+style.
+
+Mr MAURICE MAETERLINCK says:--"This volume is full of thoughts and
+meditations of the very highest order.... Mr Grierson has concentrated his
+thought on the profound and simple questions of life and conscience....
+What unique and decisive things in 'Parsifalitis,' for example, what
+strange clairvoyance in 'Beauty and Morals in Nature,' in the essay on
+'Tolstoy,' in 'Authority and Individualism,' in 'The New Criticism'!"
+
+Mr JAMES DOUGLAS says:--"This little book is tremulous with originality
+and palpitating with style."
+
+Mr A. B. WALKLEY says:--"A delectable book.... I shall keep it on the same
+shelf as 'Wisdom and Destiny' and 'The Treasure of the Humble.'"
+
+London: STEPHEN SWIFT & CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi
+
+
+
+
+THE CELTIC TEMPERAMENT
+
+BY FRANCIS GRIERSON
+
+_F'cap 8vo. 2s. 6d. net_
+
+_CHARMING AND FULL OF WISDOM_
+
+The late Professor WILLIAM JAMES said:--"I find 'The Celtic Temperament'
+charming and full of wisdom."
+
+The _Glasgow Herald_ says:--"A remarkable book, and by a remarkable
+man.... This book will be read and re-read by all who recognise acuteness
+of intellectual faculty, culture which has gained much from books, but
+more from human intercourse, deep thinking, and a gift of literary
+expression which at times it quite Gallic."
+
+Mr MAURICE MAETERLINCK says:--"In this volume I am privileged once more to
+breathe the atmosphere of supreme spiritual aristocracy which emanates
+from all Mr Grierson's work. He has, in his best moments, that most rare
+gift of casting certain shafts of light, at once simple and decisive, upon
+questions the most difficult, obscure, and unlooked-for in art, morals,
+and psychology.... I place these essays among the most subtle and
+substantial that I know."
+
+London: STEPHEN SWIFT & CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi
+
+
+
+
+SOME NEIGHBOURS
+
+STORIES, SKETCHES, AND STUDIES
+
+BY CHARLES GRANVILLE
+
+_Second edition. Crown 8vo. 6s._
+
+_FULL OF CLEVER CHARACTERISATION_
+
+A fine vein of poetic feeling runs through all these stories, sketches,
+and studies, which are, without exception, highly entertaining and full of
+clever characterisation. Mr Granville's style is by turns naïve,
+deliberate and restrained, but always attractive.
+
+_The Times._--"A pleasant book ... prettily conceived and told...."
+
+_The Scotsman._--"The stories are always interesting, both as studies of
+odd aspects of humanity and for the curious modern reticence of their
+art."
+
+CLEMENT K. SHORTER in _The Sphere_.--"'Some Neighbours' deserves the
+highest commendation."
+
+_The Morning Leader._--"The treatment is invariably fresh and individual
+... thoroughly readable."
+
+_Eastern Morning News._--"There can be nothing but praise--and that of a
+high quality--for a man who writes with Mr Granville's sympathy and charm
+... his art is so sure that he puts a world of life and reality into a few
+pages."
+
+_Liverpool Daily Post._--"Mr Granville is a writer possessing literary
+gifts very much above the average, and the versatility of his gifts is
+very fully indicated in the book under notice."
+
+_Yorkshire Observer._--"The author certainly shows that love of humanity
+which marks the creative mind."
+
+_Aberdeen Free Press._--"All of them are readable, and there are one or
+two of _quite surprising excellence_.... These are characterised by real
+literary power, and suffused with true poetic feeling."
+
+_Westminster Review._--"Mr Granville's humour is of that quality which
+perceives the sense of tears in human things. To those capable of
+appreciating fine literature we recommend 'Some Neighbours.'"
+
+_The Commentator._--"This clever writer's characteristic originality and
+freshness both of thought and expression."
+
+London: STEPHEN SWIFT & CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi
+
+
+
+
+CIVIL WAR
+
+A Play in Four Acts
+
+BY ASHLEY DUKES
+
+_Crown 8vo. 2s. net_
+
+_A DRAMA WITHOUT ARTIFICIALITY_
+
+This play is that rarity, an English drama of ideas which is not in any
+sense imitative of Mr Bernard Shaw. It presents an intellectual conflict
+which is also a passionate conflict of individualities, and the theme is
+treated with sympathy and humanity. The portrait of life in a colony of
+revolutionists alone would make "Civil War" something of a dramatic
+curiosity, but it is more than that. It is at once effective and original.
+The play was given for the first time by the Incorporated Stage Society in
+June 1910, with remarkable success, and it will shortly be revived by
+several of our newer repertory theatres. It should be read as well as
+seen, however, for it is dramatic without artificiality, and literary
+without affectation.
+
+_The following is what some of the Press think of the play:_
+
+_Pall Mall Gazette_:--"A very interesting, sincere, and artistic piece of
+work."
+
+_Westminster Gazette_:--"In producing 'Civil War,' by Mr Ashley Dukes, the
+Stage Society has rendered a real service to drama.... The play shows that
+the dramatist possesses in a high degree the capacity for writing
+dialogue--for finding phrases characteristic of the persons of the comedy,
+useful for the situations, and exhibiting a certain style that is rare and
+indefinable. There were scenes, notably one of great beauty between the
+old Socialist and his daughter, where, apart from the dramatic effect, one
+had real pleasure from the phrases, and this without there being any
+obvious attempt to write in a literary style."
+
+_Times_:--"A piece of sound and promising work."
+
+_Daily News_:--"His 'Civil War' has a strong motive, and, best of all,
+there is humanity and understanding in his treatment of it.... It is
+rarely indeed that we are given a play in which the drama is made
+inevitable by a clash of temperament and ideas."
+
+London: STEPHEN SWIFT & CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi
+
+
+
+
+THE MAID'S COMEDY
+
+A Chivalric Romance in Thirteen Chapters
+
+_Crown 8vo. 3s. 6d. net_
+
+_UNIQUE_
+
+I. In which, by favour and fortune, three gentle persons may interest at
+least three others.
+
+II. Wherein is founded a new Order of Chivalry, and matters for simple and
+wise alike may be discovered.
+
+III. Exhibiting a partner in an old-established business pursuing her
+occupation.
+
+IV. Wherein one character is left in a delicate situation, another loses
+her way, and a third is brought to a pretty pass.
+
+V. Containing the din of arms, thrust and parry and threat of slaughter,
+but gently concluding with the first canon of feminine craft.
+
+VI. Displaying a standing example of feminine folly and a rally of heroes.
+
+VII. Concerning, mainly, the passions as toys for the great god, Chance,
+to fool with.
+
+VIII. Wherein an oft-defeated, yet indestructible, ideal is realised.
+
+IX. Of matters for old and young, facts and fancies, aspirations and
+exhortations, and chronicling a feat worthy the grand tradition of
+chivalry.
+
+X. A magical chapter, of whose content those who doubt may likely believe
+what should be doubted, and those who believe may doubt what is perfectly
+true.
+
+XI. Confirming the adage that happy beginnings tend to happy endings, and
+showing how Heaven will still preserve Virtue, even at the cost of working
+a miracle.
+
+XII. Which relates the Happy Ending.
+
+XIII. Wherein the Romancer takes courteous leave of the Three Gentle
+Readers.
+
+London: STEPHEN SWIFT & CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi
+
+
+
+
+Footnotes:
+
+[1] From which little place the lines as a whole take the name in history
+of "Lines of La Bassée."
+
+[2] As is common in the history of military affairs, the advocates of
+either party present these confused movements before the lines of La
+Bassée upon the eve of the siege of Tournai in very different and indeed
+contradictory lights.
+
+The classical work of Mr Fortescue, to which I must, here as elsewhere,
+render homage, will have the whole movement, from its inception, to be
+deliberately designed; no battle intended, the siege of Tournai to be the
+only real object of the allies.
+
+The French apologists talk of quarrels between Eugene and Marlborough,
+take for granted a plan of assault against Villars, and represent the
+turning off of the army to the siege of Tournai as an afterthought. The
+truth, of course, is contained in both versions, and lies between the two.
+Eugene and Marlborough did intend a destructive assault upon Villars and
+his line, but they were early persuaded--especially by the reconnoitring
+of Cadogan--that the defensive skill of the French commander had proved
+formidable, and we may take it that the determination to besiege Tournai
+and to abandon an assault upon the main of the French forces had been
+reached at least as early as the 26th. There is no positive evidence,
+however, one way or the other, to decide these questions of motive. I rely
+upon no more than the probable intention of the men, to be deduced from
+their actions, and I do not believe that the Dutch would have had orders
+to move as early as they did unless Marlborough had decided--not later
+than the moment I have mentioned--to make Tournai the first objective of
+the campaign.
+
+[3] Mr Fortescue in his work makes it the 23rd. I cannot conceive the
+basis for such an error. The whole story of the 24th, 25th, 26th, 27th,
+28th, and 29th is in the French archives, together with full details of
+the capitulation on the 29th and 30th.
+
+[4] As usual, there is a contradiction in the records. The French record
+definitely ascribes the proposal to Marlborough. Marlborough, in a letter
+to his wife of 5th August, as definitely ascribes it to Surville; and
+there is no positive evidence one way or the other, though Louis'
+rejection of the terms and the ability of calculation and the character of
+the two men certainly make it more probable that Marlborough and not
+Surville was the author of the proposition.
+
+[5] The dispute as to who was the author of the suggestion for an
+armistice is further illumined by this refusal on the part of the allies.
+The proposal to contain Tournai and yet to have free their vast forces in
+operation elsewhere, if a trifle crude, was certainly to their advantage,
+and as certainly to the disadvantage of the French.
+
+[6] This excellent phrase is Mr Fortescue's.
+
+[7] Technically the line of defence was forced, for the line of Trouille
+was but a continuation of the lines of La Bassée--Douai--Valenciennes. So
+far as strategical results were concerned, the withdrawal of Villars
+behind the forest barrier was equivalent to the reconstruction of new
+lines, and in the event the action of Malplaquet proved that new defensive
+position to be strong enough to prevent the invasion of France. On the
+other hand, there is little doubt that if Villars had been in a little
+more strength he would have elected to fight on the old lines and not
+behind the woods.
+
+It must further be remarked that if the operations had not been prolonged
+as they were by the existence of the posts on the lines, notably at St
+Ghislain, the defensive position of the French would probably have been
+forced and their whole line broken as early as September 4th.
+
+[8] It is remarkable that these two roads, which are the chief feature
+both of the landscape and the local military topography, and which are of
+course as straight as taut strings, are represented upon Mr Fortescue's
+map (vol. i. p. 424) as winding lanes, or, to speak more accurately, are
+not represented at all. In this perhaps the learned historian of the
+British army was misled by Coxe's atlas to Marlborough's campaign, a
+picturesque but grossly inaccurate compilation. The student who desires to
+study this action in detail will do well to consult the Belgian Ordnance
+Map on the scale of 1/40,000 contours at 5 metres, section Roisin, and the
+French General Staff Map, 1/80,000, section Maubeuge, south-western
+quarter; the action being fought exactly on the frontier between Belgium
+and France, both maps are necessary. For the general strategic position
+the French 1/200,000 in colours, sheet Maubeuge, and the adjoining sheet,
+Lille, are sufficient.
+
+[9] The reader who may compare this account of Malplaquet with others will
+be the less confused if he remembers that the forest of Sars is called on
+that extremity nearest to the gap the wood of Blaregnies, and that this
+name is often extended, especially in English accounts, to the whole
+forest.
+
+[10] These 9000 found at St Ghislain a belated post of 200 French, who
+surrendered. Someone had forgotten them.
+
+[11] For the discussion of this see later on p. 75.
+
+[12] They were commanded by Hamilton and Tullibardine. It is to be
+remarked that the command of the whole of the left of the Prince of
+Orange's force, though it was not half Scotch, was under the command of
+Hamilton and Douglas. The two regiments of Tullibardine and Hepburn were
+under the personal command of the Marquis of Tullibardine, the heir of
+Atholl.
+
+[13] Nominally under Tilly, but practically under the young Royal
+commander.
+
+[14] Villars, wounded and fainting with pain, had been taken from the
+field an hour or two before, and the whole command was now in the hands of
+Boufflers.
+
+
+
+
+Transcriber's Notes:
+
+Passages in italics are indicated by _underscore_.
+
+The misprint "Schulenberg" has been corrected to "Schulemberg" (page 70).
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Malplaquet, by Hilaire Belloc
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+
+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Malplaquet, by Hilaire Belloc
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Malplaquet
+
+Author: Hilaire Belloc
+
+Release Date: May 5, 2010 [EBook #32257]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MALPLAQUET ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by The Online Distributed Proofreading Team at
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+generously made available by The Internet Archive/Canadian
+Libraries.)
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+
+
+
+
+
+<h1>MALPLAQUET</h1>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p><a name="front" id="front"></a>&nbsp;</p>
+<p><i>Malplaquet.</i></p>
+<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/i004tmb.jpg" alt="" /><br />
+<a href="images/i004.jpg"><small>Larger Image</small></a></div>
+<p class="right"><i>Frontispiece.</i></p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+
+
+<h1>MALPLAQUET</h1>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<h3>BY</h3>
+<h2>HILAIRE BELLOC</h2>
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/i005.jpg" alt="" /></div>
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<h4>LONDON<br />
+STEPHEN SWIFT &amp; CO., LTD.<br />
+10 JOHN STREET, ADELPHI<br />
+1911</h4>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2>CONTENTS</h2>
+
+<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="5" summary="contents">
+<tr><td colspan="3">&nbsp;</td><td align="right"><span class="smcaplc">PAGE</span></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="right"><a href="#I">I.</a></td><td>THE POLITICAL MEANING OF MALPLAQUET</td><td><span class="spacer">&nbsp;</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_9">9</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="right"><a href="#II">II.</a></td><td>THE SIEGE OF TOURNAI</td><td>&nbsp;</td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_27">27</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="right"><a href="#III">III.</a></td><td>THE MAN&OElig;UVRING FOR POSITION</td><td>&nbsp;</td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_45">45</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="right"><a href="#IV">IV.</a></td><td>THE PRELIMINARIES OF THE BATTLE</td><td>&nbsp;</td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_52">52</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="right"><a href="#V">V.</a></td><td>THE ACTION</td><td>&nbsp;</td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_65">65</a></td></tr></table>
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2>LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS</h2>
+
+<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="5" summary="illustrations">
+<tr><td>&nbsp;</td><td><span class="spacer">&nbsp;</span></td><td align="right"><span class="smcaplc">PAGE</span></td></tr>
+<tr><td>Sketch Map showing how the Lines of La Bass&eacute;e blocked the advance of the Allies<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 2em;">on Paris, and Marlborough&#8217;s plan for turning them by the successive capture of</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Tournai and Mons</span></td><td>&nbsp;</td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_19">19</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td>Sketch Map showing how the Allies, holding Lille, thrust the French back on to the<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 2em;">defensive line St Venant-Valenciennes, and thus cut off the French garrisons of</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Ypres, Tournai, and Mons</span></td><td>&nbsp;</td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_28">28</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td>Sketch Map showing complete investment of Tournai</td><td>&nbsp;</td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_34">34</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td>Sketch Map showing the lines of woods behind Mons, with the two gaps of Boussu<br /><span style="margin-left: 2em;">and Aulnois</span></td><td>&nbsp;</td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_48">48</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td>The Elements of the Action of Malplaquet, September 11th, 1709</td><td>&nbsp;</td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_66">66</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td>Sketch Map showing the peril the French centre ran towards noon of being turned<br /><span style="margin-left: 2em;">on its left</span></td><td>&nbsp;</td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_79">79</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td>Sketch Map showing Marlborough bringing up troops to the centre for the final and<br /><span style="margin-left: 2em;">successful attack upon the entrenchments</span></td><td>&nbsp;</td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_84">84</a></td></tr></table>
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[Pg 9]</a></span></p>
+<h1><a name="I" id="I"></a>MALPLAQUET</h1>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<h2>I</h2>
+<h3>THE POLITICAL MEANING OF MALPLAQUET</h3>
+
+<p>That political significance which we must seek in all military history,
+and without which that history cannot be accurate even upon its technical
+side, may be stated for the battle of Malplaquet in the following terms.</p>
+
+<p>Louis XIV. succeeding to a cautious and constructive period in the
+national life of France, this in its turn succeeding to the long impotence
+of the religious wars, found at his orders when his long minority was
+ended a society not only eager and united, but beginning also to give
+forth the fruit due to three active generations of discussion and combat.</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[Pg 10]</a></span>Every department of the national life manifested an extreme vitality, and,
+while the orderly and therefore convincing scheme of French culture
+imposed itself upon Western Europe, there followed in its wake the triumph
+of French arms; the king in that triumph nearly perfected a realm which
+would have had for its limits those of ancient Gaul.</p>
+
+<p>It would be too long a matter to describe, even in general terms, the
+major issues depending upon Louis XIV.&#8217;s national ambitions and their
+success or failure.</p>
+
+<p>In one aspect he stands for the maintenance of Catholic civilisation
+against the Separatist and dissolving forces of the Protestant North; in
+another he is the permanent antagonist of the Holy Roman Empire, or rather
+of the House of Austria, which had attained to a permanent hegemony
+therein. An extravagant judgment conceives his great successes as a menace
+to the corporate independence of Europe, or&mdash;upon the other view&mdash;as the
+opportunity for the founding of a real European unity.</p>
+
+<p>But all these general considerations may, for the purposes of military
+history, be regarded in the single light of the final and decisive action
+which Louis XIV. took when<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[Pg 11]</a></span> he determined in the year 1701 to support the
+claims of his young grandson to the throne of Spain. This it was which
+excited against him a universal coalition, and acts following upon that
+main decision drew into the coalition the deciding factor of Great
+Britain.</p>
+
+<p>The supremacy of French arms had endured in Europe for forty years when
+the Spanish policy was decided on. Louis was growing old. That financial
+exhaustion which almost invariably follows a generation of high national
+activity, and which is almost invariably masked by pompous outward state,
+was a reality already present though as yet undiscovered in the condition
+of France.</p>
+
+<p>It was at the close of that year 1701 that the French king had determined
+upon a union of the two crowns of France and Spain in his own family. His
+forces occupied the Spanish Netherlands, which we now call the Kingdom of
+Belgium; others of his armies were spread along the Rhine, or were acting
+in Northern Italy&mdash;for the coalition at once began to make itself felt.
+Two men of genius combined in an exact agreement, the qualities of each
+complementing the defects of the other, to lead the main armies that were
+operating against the French. These<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[Pg 12]</a></span> men were Prince Eugene of Savoy
+(French by birth and training, a voluntary exile, and inspired throughout
+his life by a determination to avenge himself upon Louis XIV.), and the
+Englishman John Churchill, Duke of Marlborough.</p>
+
+<p>The combination of such a pair was irresistible. Its fruit appeared almost
+at the inception of the new situation in the great victory of Blenheim.</p>
+
+<p>This action, fought in August 1704, was the first great defeat French arms
+had registered in that generation. Henceforward the forces commanded from
+Versailles were compelled to stand upon the defensive.</p>
+
+<p>To Blenheim succeeded one blow after another. In 1706 the great battle of
+Ramillies, in 1708 the crushing action of Oudenarde, confirmed the
+supremacy of the allies and the abasement of France. By the opening of
+1709 the final defeat of Louis and his readiness to sue for peace were
+taken for granted.</p>
+
+<p>The financial exhaustion which I have said was already present, though
+hardly suspected, in 1701, was grown by 1709 acute. The ordinary methods
+of recruitment for the French army&mdash;which nominally, of course, was upon a
+voluntary basis&mdash;<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[Pg 13]</a></span>had long reached and passed their limit. The failure of
+the harvest in 1708, followed by a winter of terrible severity, had
+completed the catastrophe, and with the ensuing spring of 1709 Louis had
+no alternative but to approach the allies with terms of surrender.</p>
+
+<p>It seemed as though at last the way to Paris lay open. The forces of the
+allies in the Netherlands were not only numerically greatly superior to
+any which the exhausted French could now set against them, but in their
+equipment, in their supplies, the nourishment of the men, and every
+material detail, they were upon a footing wholly superior to the
+corresponding units of the enemy, man for man. They had further the
+incalculable advantage of prestige. Victory seemed normal to them, defeat
+to their opponents; and so overwhelming were the chances of the coalition
+against Louis that its leaders determined with judgment to demand from
+that monarch the very fullest and most humiliating terms.</p>
+
+<p>Though various sections of the allies differed severally as to their
+objects and requirements, their general purpose of completely destroying
+the power of France for offence, of recapturing all her conquests, and in
+particular of driving the Bourbons from<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[Pg 14]</a></span> the throne of Spain, was held in
+common, and vigorously pursued.</p>
+
+<p>Marlborough was as active as any in pushing the demands to the furthest
+possible point; Eugene, the ruling politicians of the English, the Dutch,
+and the German princes were agreed.</p>
+
+<p>Louis naturally made every effort to lessen the blow, though he regarded
+his acceptance of grave and permanent humiliation as inevitable. The
+negotiations were undertaken at the Hague, and were protracted. They
+occupied the late spring of 1709 and stretched into the beginning of
+summer. The French king was prepared (as his instructions to his
+negotiators show) to give up every point, though he strove to bargain for
+what remained after each concession. He would lose the frontier
+fortresses, which were the barrier of his kingdom in the north-east. He
+would even consent to the abandonment of Spain to Austria.</p>
+
+<p>Had that peace been declared for which the captains of Europe were
+confidently preparing, the future history of our civilisation would have
+proved materially different from what it has become. It is to be presumed
+that a complete breakdown of the strength of France would have followed;
+that the monarchy at Versailles would have<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[Pg 15]</a></span> sunk immediately into such
+disrepute that the eighteenth century would have seen France divided and
+possibly a prey to civil war, and one may even conclude that the great
+events of a century later, the Revolution and the campaigns of Napoleon,
+could not have sprung from so enfeebled a society.</p>
+
+<p>It so happened, however, that one of those slight miscalculations which
+are productive in history of its chief consequences, prevented the
+complete humiliation of Louis XIV. The demands of the allies were pushed
+in one last respect just beyond the line which it was worth the while of
+the defeated party to accept, for it was required of the old king not only
+that he should yield in every point, not only that he should abandon the
+claims of his own grandson to the throne of Spain (which throne Louis
+himself had now, after eight years of wise administration, singularly
+strengthened), but himself take arms against that grandson and co-operate
+in his proper shame by helping to oust him from it. It was stipulated that
+Louis should so act (if his grandson should show resistance and still
+clung to his throne) in company with those who had been for so many years
+his bitter and successful foes.</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[Pg 16]</a></span>This last small item in the programme of the victors changed all. It
+destroyed in the mind of Louis and of his subjects the advantages of the
+disgraceful peace which they had thought themselves compelled to accept;
+and, as Louis himself well put it, if he were still compelled to carry on
+the war, it was better to fail in pursuing it against his enemies than
+against his own household.</p>
+
+<p>The king issued to the authorities of his kingdom and to his people a
+circular letter, which remains a model of statesmanlike appeal. Grave,
+brief, and resolute, it exactly expressed the common mood of the moment.
+It met with an enthusiastic response. The depleted countrysides just
+managed to furnish the armies with a bare pittance of oats and rye (for
+wheat was unobtainable). Recruits appeared in unexpected numbers; and
+though none could believe that the issue could be other than disastrous,
+the campaign of 1709 was undertaken by a united nation.</p>
+
+<p>Of French offensive action against the overwhelming forces of their
+enemies there could be no question. Villars, who commanded the armies of
+Louis XIV. upon the north-eastern frontier, opposing Marlborough and
+Eugene, drew up a line of defence consisting of entrenchments, flooded
+land, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[Pg 17]</a></span> the use of existing watercourses, a line running from the
+neighbourhood of Douai away eastward to the Belgian frontier. Behind this
+line, with his headquarters at La Bass&eacute;e,<small><a name="f1.1" id="f1.1" href="#f1">[1]</a></small> he waited the fatal assault.</p>
+
+<p>It was at the close of June that the enemy&#8217;s great forces moved. Their
+first action was not an attempt to penetrate the line but to take the
+fortresses upon its right, which taken, the defence might be turned. They
+therefore laid siege to Tournai, the first of the two fortresses guarding
+the right of the French line. (Mons was the second.)</p>
+
+<p>Here the first material point in the campaign showed the power of
+resistance that tradition and discipline yet maintained in the French
+army. The long resistance of Tournai and its small garrison largely
+determined what was to follow. Its siege had been undertaken in the hope
+of its rapid termination, which the exiguity of its garrison and the
+impossibility of its succour rendered probable. But though Marlborough had
+established his headquarters before the place by the evening of the 27th
+of June, and Eugene upon the next day, the 28th, though trenches were
+opened in the <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[Pg 18]</a></span>first week of July and the first of the heavy fighting
+began upon the 8th of that month, though the town itself was occupied
+after a fortnight&#8217;s struggle, yet it was not until the 3rd of September
+that the citadel surrendered.</p>
+
+<p>This protracted resistance largely determined what was to follow. While it
+lasted no action could be undertaken against Villars. Meanwhile the French
+forces were growing stronger, and, most important of all, the first
+results of the harvest began to be felt.</p>
+
+<p>Tournai once taken, it was the business of the allies to pierce the French
+line of defence as soon as possible, and with that object to bring Villars
+to battle and to defeat him.</p>
+
+<p>The plan chosen for this object was as follows:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>The allied army to march to the extreme right of the positions which the
+French could hope to defend. There the allies would contain the little
+garrison of Mons. Thither the mass of the French forces must march in
+order to bar the enemy&#8217;s advance upon Paris, and upon some point near Mons
+the whole weight of the allies could fall upon them, destroy them, and
+leave the way to the capital open.</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[Pg 19]</a></span></p>
+<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/i021tmb.jpg" alt="" /><br />
+<a href="images/i021.jpg"><small>Larger Image</small></a></div>
+<p class="center">Sketch Map showing how the Lines of La Bass&eacute;e blocked the advance of the Allies on Paris,<br />
+and Marlborough&#8217;s plan for turning them by the successive capture of Tournai and Mons.</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[Pg 20]</a></span>The plan was strategically wise. The lines of La Bass&eacute;e proper could not
+be pierced, but this right extremity of the French positions was backed by
+easy country; the swamps, canals, and entrenchments of the main line to
+the north and west were absent. With the defeat of the inferior French
+forces at this point all obstacle to an advance into the heart of France
+would be removed.</p>
+
+<p>The plan was as rapidly executed as it was skilfully devised. Actually
+before the capitulation of the citadel of Tournai, but when it was
+perceived that that capitulation could only be a matter of hours, Lord
+Orkney had begun to advance upon the neighbourhood of Mons. Upon the day
+of the capitulation of Tournai, the Prince of Hesse-Cassel had started for
+Mons, Cadogan following him with the cavalry. Less than twenty-four hours
+after Tournai had yielded, the whole allied army was on the march
+throughout the night. Never was a military operation performed with
+organisation more exact, or with obedience more prompt. Three days later
+Mons was contained, and by Monday the 9th of September Villars awaited,
+some few miles to the west of that fortress, the assault of the allies.</p>
+
+<p>There followed two days of delay, which<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[Pg 21]</a></span> will be discussed in detail
+later. For the purposes of this introductory survey of the political
+meaning of the battle, it is enough to fix the date, Wednesday, 11th
+September 1709. A little before eight o&#8217;clock on the morning of that day
+the first cannon-shot of the battle of Malplaquet was fired. To the
+numerical superiority of the allies the French could oppose entrenchment
+and that character in the locality of the fight, or &#8220;terrain,&#8221; which will
+be fully described on a later page. To the superior <i>moral</i>, equipment,
+and subsistence of the allies, however, it was doubtful whether any factor
+could be discovered on the French side.</p>
+
+<p>An unexpected enthusiasm lent something to the French resistance; the
+delay of two days lent something more to their defensive power. As will be
+seen in the sequel, certain errors (notably upon the left of Marlborough&#8217;s
+line) also contributed to the result, and the whole day was passed in a
+series of attacks and counter-attacks which left the French forces intact,
+and permitted them in the early afternoon to rely upon the exhaustion of
+the enemy and to leave, in order and without loss, the field to the enemy.</p>
+
+<p>Marlborough&#8217;s victory at Malplaquet was both honourable and great. The
+French<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[Pg 22]</a></span> were compelled to withdraw; the allies occupied upon the evening
+of the battle the ground upon which the struggle had taken place. It is
+with justice that Malplaquet is counted as the fourth of those great
+successful actions which distinguish the name of Marlborough, and it is
+reckoned with justice the conclusion of the series whose three other terms
+are Blenheim, Ramillies, and Oudenarde. So much might suffice did war
+consist in scoring points as one does in a game. But when we consider war
+as alone it should be considered for the serious purposes of history&mdash;that
+is, in its political aspect; and when we ask what Malplaquet was in the
+political sequence of European events, the withdrawal of the French from
+the field in the early afternoon of September 11, 1709, has no
+significance comparable to the fact that the allies could not pursue.</p>
+
+<p>Strategically the victory meant that an army which it was intended to
+destroy had maintained itself intact; morally, the battle left the
+defeated more elated than the victors; and for this reason, that the
+result was so much more in their favour than the expectation had been. In
+what is most important of all, the general fortunes of the campaign, the
+victory of the allies at<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[Pg 23]</a></span> Malplaquet was as sure a signal that the advance
+on Paris could not be made, and as sure a prevention of that advance as
+though Marlborough and Eugene had registered, not a success, but a defeat.</p>
+
+<p>Situations of this sort, which render victories barren or actually
+negative, paradoxical to the general reader, simple enough in their
+military aspect, abound in the history of war. It is perhaps more
+important to explain them if one is to make military history intelligible
+than to describe the preliminaries and movements of the great decisive
+action.</p>
+
+<p>The &#8220;block&#8221; of Malplaquet (to use the metaphor which is common in French
+history), the unexpected power of resistance which this last of the French
+armies displayed, and the moral effect of that resistance upon the allies,
+have an historical meaning almost as high as that of Blenheim upon the
+other side. It has been well said that one may win every battle and yet
+lose a campaign; there is a sense in which it may be said that one may win
+a campaign and suffer political loss as the result.</p>
+
+<p>Malplaquet was the turning-point after which it was evident that the
+decline of the French position in Europe would go no further. As Blenheim
+had marked the turn<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[Pg 24]</a></span> of the tide against Louis, so Malplaquet marked the
+slack water when the tide was ready to turn in his favour. After Blenheim
+it was certain that the ambition of Louis XIV. was checked, and probable
+that it would wholly fail. After Malplaquet it was equally certain that
+the total destruction of Louis&#8217; power was impossible, that the project of
+a march on Paris might be abandoned, and that the last phases of the great
+war would diminish the chances of the allies.</p>
+
+<p>The Dutch (whose troops in particular had been annihilated upon the left
+of the field) did indeed maintain their uncompromising attitude, but no
+longer with the old certitude of success; Austria also and her allies did
+continue the war, but a war doomed to puerility, to a sort of stale-mate
+bound to end in compromise. But it was in England that the effect of the
+battle was most remarkable.</p>
+
+<p>In England, where opinion had but tardily accepted the necessity for war
+nine years before, and where the fruits of that war were now regarded as
+quite sufficient for the satisfaction of English demands, this negative
+action, followed by no greater fruit than the capitulation of the little
+garrison at Mons, began the agitation for peace. Look closely at that
+agitation through its<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[Pg 25]</a></span> details, and personal motives will confuse you; the
+motives of the queen, of Harley, of Marlborough&#8217;s enemies. Look at it in
+the general light of the national history and you will perceive that the
+winter following Malplaquet, a winter of disillusionment and discontent,
+bred in England an opinion that made peace certain at last. The accusation
+against Marlborough that he fought the battle with an eye to his failing
+political position is probably unjust. The accusation that he fought it
+from a lust of bloodshed is certainly a stupid calumny. But the
+unpopularity of so great a man succeeding upon so considerable a technical
+success sufficiently proves at what a price the barrenness of that success
+was estimated in England. It was the English Government that first opened
+secret negotiations with Louis for peace in the following year; and when
+the great instrument which closed the war was signed at Utrecht in 1713,
+it was after the English troops had been withdrawn from their allies,
+after Eugene, acting single-handed, had suffered serious check, and in
+general the Peace of Utrecht was concluded under conditions far more
+favourable to Louis than would have been any peace signed at the Hague in
+1709. The Spanish Netherlands were ceded to Austria,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[Pg 26]</a></span> but France kept
+intact what is still her Belgian frontier. She preserved what she has
+since lost on the frontier of the Rhine, and (most remarkable of all!) the
+grandson of Louis was permitted to remain upon the Spanish throne.</p>
+
+<p>Such is the general political setting of this fierce action, one of the
+most determined known in the history of European arms, and therefore one
+of the most legitimately glorious; one in which men were most ready at the
+call of duty and under the influences of discipline to sacrifice their
+lives in the defence of a common cause; and one which, as all such
+sacrifices must, illumines the history of the several national traditions
+concerned, of the English as of the Dutch, of the German principalities as
+of the French.</p>
+
+<p>No action better proves the historical worth of valour.</p>
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[Pg 27]</a></span></p>
+<h2><a name="II" id="II"></a>II</h2>
+<h3>THE SIEGE OF TOURNAI</h3>
+
+<p>When the negotiations for peace had failed, that is, with the opening of
+June 1709, the King of France and his forces had particularly to dread an
+invasion of the country and the march on Paris.</p>
+
+<p>The accompanying sketch map will show under what preoccupations the French
+commander upon the north-eastern frontier lay.</p>
+
+<p>Lille was in the hands of the enemy. There was still a small French
+garrison in Ypres, another in Tournai, and a third in Mons. These of
+themselves (considering that Lille, the great town, was now occupied by
+the allies, and considering also the width of the gap between Ypres and
+Tournai) could not prevent the invasion and the advance on the capital.</p>
+
+<p>It was necessary to oppose some more formidable barrier to the line of
+advance which topography marked out for the allies into the heart of
+France.</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[Pg 28]</a></span></p>
+<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/i030tmb.jpg" alt="" /><br />
+<a href="images/i030.jpg"><small>Larger Image</small></a></div>
+<p class="center">Sketch Map showing how the Allies holding Lille thrust the French back<br />
+on to the defensive line St Venant-Valenciennes, and thus cut off the<br />French garrisons of Ypres, Tournai, and Mons.</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[Pg 29]</a></span>Some fear was indeed expressed lest a descent should be made on the coasts
+and an advance attempted along the valley of the Somme. The fear was
+groundless. To organise the transportation of troops thus by sea, to
+disembark them, to bring and continue the enormous supply of provisions
+and ammunition they would require, was far less practical than to use the
+great forces already drawn up under Marlborough and Eugene in the Low
+Countries. Of what size these forces were we shall see in a moment.</p>
+
+<p>The barrier, then, which Villars at the head of the French forces
+proceeded to erect, and which is known in history as &#8220;The Lines of La
+Bass&eacute;e,&#8221; are the first point upon which we must fix our attention in order
+to understand the campaign of Malplaquet, and why that battle took place
+where it did.</p>
+
+<p>It was upon the 3rd of June that Louis XIV. had written to Villars telling
+him that a renewal of the war would now be undertaken. On the 14th,
+Villars began to throw up earth for the formation of an entrenched camp
+between the marshy ground of Hulluch and that of Cuinchy. Here he proposed
+to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[Pg 30]</a></span> concentrate the mass of his forces, with La Bass&eacute;e just before him,
+the town of Lens behind. He used the waterways and the swamped ground in
+front and to the right for the formation of his defensive lines. These
+followed the upper valley of the Deule, the line of its canal, and finally
+reposed their right upon the river Scarpe. Though the regularly fortified
+line went no further than the camp near La Bass&eacute;e, he also threw up a
+couple of entrenchments in front of Bethune and St Venant in order to
+cover any march he might have to make towards his left should the enemy
+attempt to turn him in that direction.</p>
+
+<p>It must further be noted that from the Scarpe eastward went the old &#8220;lines
+of La Trouille&#8221; thrown up in a former campaign, and now largely useless,
+but still covering, after a fashion, the neighbourhood of Mons.</p>
+
+<p>Toward the end of the month of June Villars awaited the advance of the
+allies. His forces were inferior by 40,000 to those of his enemy. He had
+but eight men to their twelve. The season of the year, immediately
+preceding the harvest, made the victualling of his troops exceedingly
+difficult, nor was it until the day before the final assault was expected
+that the moneys necessary to their pay, and to the other<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[Pg 31]</a></span> purposes of the
+army, reached him; but he had done what he could, and, acting upon a
+national tradition which is as old as Rome, he had very wisely depended
+upon fortification.</p>
+
+<p>The same conditions of the season which produced something like famine in
+the French camp, though they did not press equally severely upon that of
+the allies, rendered difficult the provisioning of their vast army also.</p>
+
+<p>It was the first intention of Marlborough and Eugene to attack the lines
+at once, to force them, and to destroy the command of Villars. But these
+lines had been carefully reconnoitred, notably by Cadogan, who, with a
+party of English officers, and under a disguise, had made himself
+acquainted with their strength. It was determined, therefore, at the last
+moment, partly also from the fears of the Dutch, to whom the possession of
+every fortress upon the frontier was of paramount importance, to make but
+a &#8220;feint&#8221; upon Villars&#8217; lines and to direct the army upon Tournai as its
+true object. The feint took the form of Eugene&#8217;s marching towards the left
+or western extremity of the line, Marlborough towards the eastern or right
+extremity near Douai, and this general movement was effected on<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[Pg 32]</a></span> the night
+of the 26th and 27th of June. In the midst of its execution, the feint
+(which for the moment deceived Villars) was arrested.</p>
+
+<p>The 27th was passed without a movement, Villars refusing to leave his
+entrenchments, and the commanders of the allies giving no hint of their
+next intention. But during that same day Tilly with the Dutch had appeared
+before Tournai. On the evening of the day Marlborough himself was before
+the town. On the 28th Prince Eugene joined both the Dutch and Marlborough
+before the town, taking up his headquarters at Froyennes, Marlborough
+being at Willemeau, and the Dutch, under Tilly, already established on the
+east of Tournai from Antoing to Constantin, just opposite Eugene, where
+they threw a bridge across the Scheldt. By the evening of the 28th,
+therefore, Tournai was invested on every side, and the great allied armies
+of between 110,000 and 120,000 men had abandoned all hope of carrying
+Villars&#8217; lines, and had sat down to the capture of the frontier
+fortress.<small><a name="f2.1" id="f2.1" href="#f2">[2]</a></small></p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[Pg 33]</a></span>A comprehension of this siege of Tournai, which so largely determined the
+fortunes of the campaign of Malplaquet, will be aided by the accompanying
+sketch map. Here it is apparent that Marlborough with his headquarters at
+Willemeau, Eugene with his at Froyennes, the Dutch under Tilly in a
+semicircle from Antoing to Constantin, completed the investment of the
+fortress, and that the existing bridge at Antoing which the Dutch
+commanded, the bridge at Constantin which they had constructed, giving
+access over the river to the north and to the south, made the circle
+complete.</p>
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[Pg 34]</a></span></p>
+<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/i036tmb.jpg" alt="" /><br />
+<a href="images/i036.jpg"><small>Larger Image</small></a></div>
+<p class="center">Sketch Map showing complete investment of Tournai.</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[Pg 35]</a></span>The fortifications of Tournai were excellent. Vauban had superintended
+that piece of engineering in person, and the scheme of the fortifications
+was remarkable from the strength of the citadel which lay apart from the
+town (though within its ring of earthworks) to the south. The traveller
+can still recognise in its abandonment this enormous achievement of Louis
+XIV.&#8217;s sappers, and the opposition it was about to offer to the great
+hosts of Marlborough and Eugene does almost as much honour to the genius
+of the French engineer as to the tenacity of the little garrison then
+defending it.</p>
+
+<p>Two factors in the situation must first be appreciated by the reader.</p>
+
+<p>The first is that the inferiority of Villars&#8217; force made it impossible for
+him to do more than demonstrate against the army of observation. He was
+compelled to leave Tournai to its fate, and, indeed, the king in his first
+instructions, Villars in his reply, had taken it for granted that either
+that town or Ypres would be besieged and must fall. But the value of a
+fortress depends not upon its inviolability (for that can never be
+reckoned with), but upon the length of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[Pg 36]</a></span> time during which it can hold out,
+and in this respect Tournai was to give full measure.</p>
+
+<p>Secondly, it must be set down for the allies that their unexpectedly long
+task was hampered by exceptional weather. Rain fell continually, and
+though their command of the Scheldt lessened in some degree the problem of
+transport, rain in those days upon such roads as the allies drew their
+supplies by was a heavy handicap. The garrison of Tournai numbered
+thirteen and a half battalions, five detached companies, the complement of
+gunners necessary for the artillery, and a couple of Irish brigades&mdash;in
+all, counting the depleted condition of the French units at the moment,
+some six to seven thousand men. Perhaps, counting every combatant and
+non-combatant attached to the garrison, a full seven thousand men.</p>
+
+<p>The command of this force was under Surville, in rank a
+lieutenant-general. Ravignon and Dolet were his subordinates. There was no
+lack of wheat for so small a force. Rationed, it was sufficient for four
+months. Meat made default, and, what was important with a large civil
+population encumbering the little garrison, money. Surville, the bishop,
+and others melted<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[Pg 37]</a></span> down their plate; even that of the altars in the town
+was sacrificed.</p>
+
+<p>The first trench was opened on the night of the 7th of July, and three
+first attacks were delivered: one by the gate called Marvis, which looks
+eastward, another by the gate of Valenciennes, the third at the gate known
+as that of the Seven Springs. A sortie of the second of these was fairly
+successful, and upon this model the operations continued for five days.</p>
+
+<p>By the end of that time a hundred heavy pieces had come up the Scheldt
+from Ghent, and sixty mortars as well. Four great batteries were formed.
+That to the south opened fire upon the 13th of July, and on the 14th the
+three others joined it.</p>
+
+<p>The discipline maintained in the great camps of the besiegers was severe,
+and the besieged experienced the unusual recruitment of five hundred to
+six hundred deserters who penetrated within their lines. A considerable
+body of deserters also betook themselves to Villars&#8217; lines, and the
+operations in these first days were sufficiently violent to account for
+some four thousand killed and wounded upon the side of the allies.
+Villars, meanwhile, could do no more than demonstrate without effect.
+Apart from the inferiority of his force, it was<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[Pg 38]</a></span> still impossible for him,
+until the harvest was gathered, to establish a sufficient accumulation of
+wheat to permit a forward movement. He never had four days&#8217; provision of
+bread at any one time, nor, considering the length of his line, could he
+concentrate it upon any one place. He was fed by driblets from day to day,
+and lived from hand to mouth while the siege of Tournai proceeded to the
+east of him.</p>
+
+<p>That siege was entering, with the close of the month, upon the end of its
+first phase.</p>
+
+<p>It had been a desperate combat of mine and counter-mine even where the
+general circumvallation of the town was concerned, though the worst, of
+course, was to come when the citadel should be attacked. The batteries
+against the place had been increased until they counted one hundred and
+twelve heavy pieces and seventy mortars. On the night of the 24th of July
+the covered way on the right of the Scheldt was taken at heavy loss;
+forty-eight hours later the covered way on the left between the river and
+the citadel. The horn work in front of the Gate of the Seven Springs was
+carried on the 27th, and the isolated work between this point and the Gate
+of Lille upon the following day. Surville in his report, in the true
+French spirit of self-criticism,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[Pg 39]</a></span> ascribed to the culpable failure of
+their defenders the loss of these outworks. But the loss, whatever its
+cause, determined the loss of the town. A few hours later practicable
+breaches had been made in the walls, ways were filled in over the ditches,
+and on the imminence of a general assault Surville upon the 28th demanded
+terms. The capitulation was signed on the 29th, and with it the commander
+sent a letter to Versailles detailing his motives for demanding terms for
+the civilian population. Finally, upon the 30th,<small><a name="f3.1" id="f3.1" href="#f3">[3]</a></small> Surville with 4000
+men, all that was left of his original force of 7000, retired into the
+citadel and there disposed himself for as a long a resistance as might be.
+As his good fortune decided, he was to be able to hold with this small
+force for five full weeks.</p>
+
+<p>To Marlborough is due the honour of the capitulation. The besieging troops
+were under his command, while Eugene directed the army of observation to
+the west. Marlborough put some eight thousand men into the town under
+Albemarle. A verbal understanding was given on both sides that the
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[Pg 40]</a></span>citadel would not fire upon the civilian part, nor the allies make an
+attack from it upon the citadel, and the siege of that stronghold began
+upon the following day, the 21st, towards evening. The operations against
+the citadel proved far more severe and a far greater trial to
+Marlborough&#8217;s troops than those against the general circumvallation of the
+town. The subterranean struggle of mine and counter-mine particularly
+affected the moral of the allies, and after a week a proposal appeared<small><a name="f4.1" id="f4.1" href="#f4">[4]</a></small>
+that the active fighting should cease, the siege be converted into a
+blockade, and only the small number of men sufficient for such a blockade
+be left before the citadel until the 5th of September, up to which date, a
+month ahead, at the utmost, it was believed the garrison could hold out.
+Louis was willing to accept the terms upon the condition that this month
+should be one of general truce. The allies refused this condition, and
+hostilities were resumed.<small><a name="f5.1" id="f5.1" href="#f5">[5]</a></small></p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[Pg 41]</a></span>The force employed for containing the citadel and for prosecuting its
+siege had no necessity to be very large.</p>
+
+<p>It was warfare of a terrible kind. Men met underground in the mines, were
+burned alive when these were sprung, were exhausted, sometimes to death,
+in the subterranean and perilous labour. The mass of the army was free to
+menace Villars and his main body.</p>
+
+<p>But the admirable engineering which had instructed and completed the lines
+of La Bass&eacute;e still checked the allies, in spite of superior numbers and
+provisionment still superior.</p>
+
+<p>The effect of the harvest was indeed just beginning to be felt, and the
+French general was beginning to have a little more elbow-room, so to
+speak, for the disposition of his men through the gradual replenishment of
+his stores. But even so, Marlborough and Eugene had very greatly the
+advantage of him in this respect.</p>
+
+<p>When the siege of the citadel of Tournai had been proceeding a little more
+than a week, upon the 8th of August the main body of the allies fell
+suddenly upon Marchiennes.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[Pg 42]</a></span> Here the river Scarpe defended the main French
+positions. The town itself lay upon the further bank like a bastion. The
+attack was made under Tilly, and, consonantly to the strength of all
+Villars&#8217; defensive positions, that attack failed. On the night of the 9th
+Tilly retired from before Marchiennes, after having suffered the loss of
+but a few of his men.</p>
+
+<p>This action, though but a detail in the campaign, is well worth noting,
+because it exhibits in a sort of section, as it were, the causes of
+Malplaquet.</p>
+
+<p>Malplaquet, as we shall see in a moment, was fought simply because it had
+been impossible to pierce Villars&#8217; line, and Malplaquet, though a victory,
+was a sterile victory, more useful to the defeated than to the victors,
+because the defence had been kept up for such a length of time and was
+able to choose its own terrain.</p>
+
+<p>Now all this character in the campaign preceding the battle is exemplified
+in the attempt upon Marchiennes upon August 8th and 9th and its failure.
+Had it succeeded, had the line been pierced, there would have been no
+&#8220;block&#8221; at Malplaquet but an immediate invasion of France, just as there
+would have been had the line been pierced in the first attempt of five
+weeks before.</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[Pg 43]</a></span>In the next week and the next, Villars continually extended that line. He
+brought it up solidly as far as St Venant on his left, as far as
+Valenciennes on his right. He continually strengthened it, so that at no
+one place should it need any considerable body of men to hold it, and that
+the mass of the army should be free to move at will behind this strong
+entrenchment and dyke, fortified as it was with careful inundation and the
+use of two large rivers.</p>
+
+<p>Though the body of the allies again appeared in the neighbourhood of the
+lines, no general attack was delivered, but on the 30th of August Villars
+heard from deserters and spies that the citadel of Tournai was at the end
+of its provisions. Though but a certain minority of the allied army was
+necessary to contain that citadel, yet once it had fallen the whole of the
+allied forces would be much freer to act.</p>
+
+<p>It was upon the 31st of August that Surville, finding himself at the end
+of his provisionment of food, proposed capitulation. At first no
+capitulation could be arrived at. Marlborough insisted upon the garrison&#8217;s
+complete surrender; Surville replied by threatening a destruction of the
+place. It was not until the morning of the 3rd September that a
+capitulation was signed in the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[Pg 44]</a></span> form that the officers and soldiers of the
+garrison should not be free to serve the king until after they had been
+exchanged. The troops should march out with arms and colours, and should
+have safe escort through the French lines to Douai. They reached that town
+and camp upon the 4th, and an exchange of prisoners against their numbers
+was soon effected.</p>
+
+<p>Thus after two months ended the siege of Tournai, a piece of resistance
+which, as the reader will soon see, determined all that was to follow. Six
+thousand four hundred men had held the place when it was first invested.
+Of these, 1709 (nearly a third) had been killed; a number approximately
+equal had been wounded. The figures are sufficient to show the desperate
+character of the fighting, and how worthy this episode of war was on both
+sides of the legends that arose from it.</p>
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[Pg 45]</a></span></p>
+<h2><a name="III" id="III"></a>III</h2>
+<h3>THE MAN&OElig;UVRING FOR POSITION</h3>
+
+<p>With the end of the siege of Tournai both armies were free, the one for
+unfettered assault, the other to defend itself behind the lines as best it
+might.</p>
+
+<p>To make a frontal attack upon Villars&#8217; lines at any point was justly
+thought impossible after the past experience which Eugene and Marlborough
+had of their strength. A different plan was determined on. Mons, with its
+little garrison, should be invested, and the mass of the army should, on
+that extreme right of the French position, attempt to break through the
+old lines of the Trouille and invade France.</p>
+
+<p>Coincidently with the first negotiations for the capitulation of the
+citadel of Tournai, this new plan was entered upon. Lord Orkney, with the
+grenadiers of the army and between 2000 and 3000 mounted<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[Pg 46]</a></span> men, was sent
+off on the march to the south-east just as the first negotiations of
+Marlborough with Surville were opened. With this mobile force Orkney
+attempted to pass the Haine at St Ghislain. He all but surprised that
+point at one o&#8217;clock of the dark September night, but the French posts
+were just in time. He was beaten off, and had to cross the river higher up
+upon the eastern side of Mons, at Havre.</p>
+
+<p>The little check was not without its importance. It meant that the rapid
+forward march of his vanguard had failed to force that extreme extension
+of the French line, which was called &#8220;The Line of the Trouille&#8221; from the
+name of the small river that falls into the Haine near Mons. In point of
+time&mdash;which is everything in defensive warfare&mdash;the success of the defence
+at St Ghislain meant that all action by the allies was retarded for pretty
+well a week. Meanwhile, the weather had turned to persistent and harassing
+rain, the allied army, &#8220;toiling through a sea of mud,&#8221;<small><a name="f6.1" id="f6.1" href="#f6">[6]</a></small> had not invested
+Mons even upon the eastern side until the evening of the 7th of September.
+On the same day Villars took advantage of a natural feature, stronger for
+purposes of defence than the line of the Trouille. This <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[Pg 47]</a></span>feature was the
+belt of forest-land which lies south and a little west of Mons, between
+that town and Bavai. He strengthened such forces as he had on the line of
+the Trouille (the little posts which had checked the first advance upon
+Mons, as I have said), concentrated the whole army just behind and west of
+the forest barrier, and watching the two gaps of that barrier, whose
+importance will be explained in a moment, he lay, upon the morning of
+Sunday, September the 8th, in a line which stretched from the river Haine
+at Montreuil to the bridge of Athis behind the woods; keeping watch upon
+his right in case he should have to move the line down south suddenly to
+meet an attack. As Villars so lay, he was in the position of a man who may
+be attacked through one of two doors in a wall. Such a man would stand
+between the two doors, watching both, and ready to spring upon that one
+which might be attacked, and attempt to defend it. The wall was the wall
+of wood, the two doors were the opening by Boussu and the other narrow
+opening which is distinguished by the name of Aulnois, the principal
+village at its mouth. It was this last which was to prove in the event the
+battlefield.</p>
+
+<p>All this I must make plainer and elaborate in what follows, and close
+this section by a mere statement of the man&oelig;uvring for position.</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[Pg 48]</a></span></p>
+<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/i050tmb.jpg" alt="" /><br />
+<a href="images/i050.jpg"><small>Larger Image</small></a></div>
+<p class="center">Sketch Map showing the Lines of Woods behind Mons,<br />with the two gaps of Boussu and Aulnois.</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[Pg 49]</a></span>Villars lying, as I have said, with his right at Athis, his left on the
+river Haine at Montreuil, Marlborough countered him by bringing the main
+of his forces over the Trouille<small><a name="f7.1" id="f7.1" href="#f7">[7]</a></small> so that they lay from Quevy to
+Quaregnon.</p>
+
+<p>Eugene brought up his half, and drew it up as an extension of the Duke of
+Marlborough&#8217;s line, and by the evening of the Sunday and on the morning of
+the Monday, all the troops who were at Tournai having been meanwhile
+called up, the allied army lay opposite the second or southern of the two
+openings in the forest wall. Villars <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[Pg 50]</a></span>during the Sunday shifted somewhat
+to the left or the south in the course of the day to face the new position
+of his enemy. It was evident upon that Monday morning the 9th of September
+that the action, when it was forced, would be in the second and
+southernmost of the two gaps. On that same Monday morning Villars brought
+the whole of his army still further south and was now right in front of
+the allies and barring the gap of Aulnois. By ten o&#8217;clock the centre of
+the French forces was drawn up in front of the hamlet of Malplaquet, by
+noon it had marched forward not quite a mile, stretched from wood to wood,
+and awaited the onslaught. A few ineffective cannon-shots were exchanged,
+but the expected attack was not delivered. Vastly to the advantage of the
+French and to the inexplicable prejudice of the allies Marlborough and
+Eugene wasted all that Monday and all the Tuesday following: the result we
+shall see when we come to the battle, for Villars used every moment of his
+respite to entrench and fortify without ceasing.</p>
+
+<p>With the drawing up of the French army across the gap, however, ends the
+man&oelig;uvring for position, and under the title of &#8220;The Preliminaries of
+the Battle&#8221; I will next<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[Pg 51]</a></span> describe the arrival of Boufflers&mdash;a moral
+advantage not to be despised&mdash;the terrain, the French defences, and the
+full effect of the unexpected delay upon the part of the allies.</p>
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[Pg 52]</a></span></p>
+<h2><a name="IV" id="IV"></a>IV</h2>
+<h3>THE PRELIMINARIES OF THE BATTLE</h3>
+
+<p>The arrival of Louis Francis, Duke of Boufflers, peer and marshal of
+France, upon the frontier and before the army of defence, was one of those
+intangible advantages which the civilian historian will tend to exaggerate
+and the military to belittle, but which, though not susceptible of
+calculation or measurement, may always prove of vast consequence to a
+force, and have sometimes decided between victory and defeat. This
+advantage did not lie in Boufflers&#8217; singular capacity for command, nor, as
+will presently be seen, was he entrusted with the supreme direction of the
+action that was to follow. He was a great general. His service under arms
+had occupied the whole of his life and energies; he was to have a high and
+worthy reputation in the particular province of his career. But much more
+than this, the magic of his name and the just prestige<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[Pg 53]</a></span> which attached to
+the integrity and valour of the man went before him with a spiritual
+influence which every soldier felt, and which reanimated the whole body of
+the defence. His record was peculiarly suited for the confirmation of men
+who were fighting against odds, under disappointment, at the end of a long
+series of defeats, and on a last line to which the national arms had been
+thrust back after five years of almost uninterrupted failure.</p>
+
+<p>Boufflers at this moment was in his 66th year, and seemed older. His
+masterful, prominent face, large, direct, humorous in expression, full of
+command, was an index of a life well lived in the business of
+organisation, of obedience, and at last of supreme direction. Years ago at
+Namur his tenacity, under the pressure of a superior offensive, had earned
+him the particular character which he now bore. Only the year before, his
+conduct of the siege of Lille, when he had determinedly held out against
+the certitude of ultimate surrender, had refused to yield the place even
+after receiving orders from his sovereign, and had finally obtained, by
+his unshakable determination, a capitulation of the most honourable kind,
+was fresh in the minds of all. There is a story that on his arrival in the
+French camp the cheers<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[Pg 54]</a></span> with which he was greeted reached the opposing
+line, and that the allies were moved by the enormous rumour to expect an
+instant assault. He was one of those leaders who, partly through their
+legend, more through their real virtue, are a sort of flag and symbol to
+the soldiery who have the good fortune to receive their command.</p>
+
+<p>Nine years the senior in age of Villars, of a military experience far
+superior, in rank again possessed of the right to supreme command (for he
+had received the grade of marshal long before), he none the less
+determined to put himself wholly at Villars&#8217; orders, for he knew of what
+importance was continuity of direction in the face of the enemy. At the
+end of the last campaign, when he had expected peace, he had honourably
+retired. His life was nearing its close; in two years he was to die. He
+sacrificed both the pretension and the fact of superiority so dear to the
+commander, and told Villars that he came simply as a volunteer to aid as
+best he might, and to support the supreme command in the coming fight.</p>
+
+<p>He had arrived at Arras on the same day that Tournai had surrendered. Upon
+the morrow he had reached Villars&#8217; headquarters near Douai, Sin le Noble,
+in the centre of the defensive line. He had followed the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[Pg 55]</a></span> easterly
+movement of the mass of the French army along that line to their present
+establishment between the two woods and to the terrain whereupon the
+action would be decided. In that action he was set at the head of the
+troops on the right, while Villars, attending in particular to the left,
+retained the general command and ordered all the disposition of the French
+force.</p>
+
+<hr style="width: 15%;" />
+
+<p>The landscape which lay before the French commanders when upon the Monday
+morning their line was drawn up and immediate battle expected, has changed
+hardly at all in the two hundred years between their day and ours. I will
+describe it.</p>
+
+<p>From the valley of the Sambre (which great river lies a day&#8217;s march to the
+south of the French position) the land rises gradually upward in long
+rolls of bare fields. At the head of this slope is a typical watershed
+country, a country that is typical of watersheds in land neither hilly nor
+mountainous; small, sluggish streams, lessening to mere trickles of water
+as you rise, cut the clay; and the landscape, though at the watershed
+itself one is standing at a height of 500 feet above the sea, has the
+appearance of a plain. It is indeed difficult, without the aid of a map,
+to decide when one<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[Pg 56]</a></span> has passed from the one to the other side of the water
+parting, and the actual summit is, at this season of the year, a confused,
+flat stretch of open stubble fallow, and here and there coarse, heathy,
+untilled land. For two or three miles every way this level stretches,
+hummocked by slight rolls between stream and stream, and upon the actual
+watershed marked by one or two stagnant ponds. Seven miles behind you as
+you stand upon the battlefield lies the little French market town of
+Bavai, which was for centuries one of the great centres of Roman rule. It
+was the capital of the Nervii. Seven great Roman roads still strike out
+from it, to Rheims, to Cologne, to Utrecht, to Amiens, to the sea. Two in
+particular, that to Treves and that to Cologne, spreading gradually apart
+like the two neighbouring fingers of a hand, are the natural ways by which
+an army advancing to such a field or retreating from it would communicate
+with Bavai as a base.<small><a name="f8.1" id="f8.1" href="#f8">[8]</a></small></p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[Pg 57]</a></span>The outstanding feature of this terrain is not that it is the summit of a
+watershed; indeed, as I have said, but for a map one would not guess that
+it bore this character, and to the eye it presents the appearance of a
+plain; it is rather the symmetrical arrangement of it as a broad belt of
+open land, flanked upon either side north and south by two great woods.
+That upon the right is known as the wood of Lani&egrave;re, that upon the left
+bears several names in its various parts, and is easiest to remember under
+the general title of &#8220;The Forest of Sars.&#8221; The gap between these two woods
+narrows to a line which is precisely 2000 yards in extent and runs from
+north-west to south-east, the two nearest points where either wood
+approaches the other being distant one from another by that distance and
+bearing one to the other upon those points of the compass. The French
+army, therefore, drawn up on the open land and stretching from wood to
+wood, faced somewhat north of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[Pg 58]</a></span> east. The allies, drawn up a mile and a
+half away on the broad beginning of that gap, looked somewhat south of
+west. Behind the latter at a day&#8217;s march was Mons; behind the former some
+seven miles was Bavai; and the modern frontier as well as the natural
+topographical frontier of the watershed runs just in front of what was
+then the emplacement of the French line.</p>
+
+<p>Upon the French side the bare fields are marked by no more than a few
+hamlets, the chief of which is the little village of Malplaquet, a few
+houses built along what is now the main road to Brussels. Certain of the
+French reserve were posted in this village, accompanied by a few sections
+of artillery, but the fields before it lay completely open to the action.</p>
+
+<p>Upon the Belgian side a string of considerable villages stretched; three
+of them from right to left marked the principal position of the allies.
+Their names from north to south, that is, from the left of the allies to
+the right, are Aulnois, Blaregnies, and Sars. The first of these lies
+right under the wood of Lani&egrave;re; the second faces the gap between the
+woods; the third lies behind the left-hand wood, and takes its name from<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[Pg 59]</a></span>
+it, and is, as we have seen, called the forest of Sars.<small><a name="f9.1" id="f9.1" href="#f9">[9]</a></small></p>
+
+<p>The dispositions which the French army would take in such a defensive
+position were evident enough. It must defend the gap by entrenchment; it
+must put considerable forces into the woods upon the right and to the left
+of the gap to prevent the entrenchments being turned. The character of
+Villars and the French tradition of depending upon earth wherever that be
+possible, was bound, if time were accorded, to make the entrenchment of
+the open gap formidable. The large numbers engaged upon either side left a
+considerable number at the disposal of either commander, to be used by the
+one in holding the woods, by the other in attempting to force them; not
+much more than half of the French force need stand to the defence of the
+open gap. This gap was so suitable, with its bare fields after harvest,
+the absence of hedges, the insignificance of the rivulets, for the action
+of cavalry, that gates or gaps would be left in the French entrenchment
+for the use of that arm in order to allow the <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[Pg 60]</a></span>mounted men to pass through
+and charge as the necessity for such action might arise. In general,
+therefore, we must conceive of the French position as strong entrenchments
+thrown across the gap and lined with infantry, the cavalry drawn up behind
+to pass through the infantry when occasion might demand, through the line
+of entrenchment, and so to charge; the two woods upon either side thickly
+filled with men, and the position taken up by these defended by felled
+tree trunks and such earthwork as could be thrown up with difficulty in
+the dense undergrowth.</p>
+
+<p>It would be the business of the allies to try and force this line, either
+by carrying the central entrenchments across the gap or by turning the
+French left flank in the forest of Sars or the French right flank in the
+wood of Lani&egrave;re, or by both of these attempts combined; for it must be
+remembered that the numerical superiority of the allies gave them a choice
+of action. Should either the stand on the left or that on the right be
+forced, the French line would be turned and the destruction of the army
+completed. Should the centre be pierced effectively and in time, the
+Northern half of the army so severed would certainly be destroyed, for
+there was no effective line of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[Pg 61]</a></span> retreat; the Southern half might or might
+not escape towards the valley of the Sambre. In either case a decisive
+victory would destroy the last of the French bodies of defence and would
+open the way for an almost uninterrupted march upon Paris.</p>
+
+<p>It will be self-evident to the reader that what with Villars&#8217; known
+methods, his dependence upon his engineers, the tradition of the French
+service in this respect, the inferior numbers of the French forces, and
+the glaring necessities of the position, earthworks would be a deciding
+factor in the result.</p>
+
+<p>Now the value of entrenchment is a matter of time, and before proceeding
+to a description of the action we must, if we are to understand its
+result, appreciate how great an advantage was conferred upon the French by
+the delay in the attack of the allies.</p>
+
+<p>As I have said, it was upon the morning of Monday, September 9th, that the
+two armies were drawn up facing each other, and there is no apparent
+reason why the assault should not have been delivered upon that day. Had
+it been delivered we can hardly doubt that a decisive defeat of the French
+would have resulted, that the way to Paris would have been thrown open,
+and that the ruin of the French<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[Pg 62]</a></span> monarchy would have immediately followed.
+As it was, no attack was delivered upon that Monday. The whole of Tuesday
+was allowed to pass without a movement. It was not until the Wednesday
+morning that the allies moved.</p>
+
+<p>The problem of this delay is one which the historian must anxiously
+consider, for the answer to it explains the barrenness and political
+failure associated with the name of Malplaquet. But it is one which the
+historian will not succeed in answering unless indeed further documents
+should come to light. All that we now know is that in a council of war
+held upon the Monday on the side of the allies, it was thought well to
+wait until all the troops from Tournai should have come up (though these
+were few in number), and necessary to send 9000 men to hold the bridge
+across the Haine at St Ghislain in order to secure retreat in case of
+disaster.<small><a name="f10.1" id="f10.1" href="#f10">[10]</a></small></p>
+
+<p>The English historians blame the Dutch, the Dutch the English, and the
+Austrians and Prussians blame both.</p>
+
+<p>Perhaps there would have been an attack upon the Tuesday at least had not
+Villars <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[Pg 63]</a></span>spent all the Monday and all the Monday night in exacting from
+his men the most unexpected labours in constructing entrenchments of the
+most formidable character. Marlborough and Eugene, riding out before their
+lines to judge their chances on the Tuesday, were astonished at the work
+that had been done in those twenty-four hours. Nine redans, that is,
+openworks of peculiar strength, stretched across the gap to within about
+600 yards of the wood of Lani&egrave;re, and the remainder of the space was one
+continuous line of entrenchment. What had been done in the woods could not
+be judged from such a survey, but it might be guessed, and the forcing of
+these became a very different problem from what it would have been had an
+attack been delivered on the Monday. Behind this main line Villars drew up
+another and yet another series of earthworks; even Malplaquet itself, with
+the reserve in the rear, was defended, and the work was continued without
+interruption even throughout the Tuesday night with relays of men.</p>
+
+<p>When at last, upon the Wednesday morning, the allies had arrived at their
+tardy agreement and determined to force an action, their superiority in
+numbers, such as it was (and this disputed point must be<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[Pg 64]</a></span> later
+discussed), was quite negatived by having to meet fortifications so
+formidable as to be called, in the exaggerated phrase of a witness, &#8220;a
+citadel.&#8221;</p>
+
+<p>One last point must be mentioned before the action itself is described:
+the open gap across which the centre of the allies must advance to break
+the French centre and encapture the entrenchments was cut in two by a
+large copse or small wood, called &#8220;The Wood of Tiry.&#8221; It was not defended,
+lying too far in front of the French line, and was of no great consequence
+save in this: that when the advance of the allies against the French
+defence should begin, it was bound to canalise and cut off from support
+for a moment the extreme left of that advance through the channel marked A
+upon the map over page. As will be seen, the Dutch advanced too early and
+in too great strength through this narrow gap, and the check they
+suffered, which was of such effect upon the battle, would not have been
+nearly so severe had not the little wood cut them off from the support of
+the centre.</p>
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[Pg 65]</a></span></p>
+<h2><a name="V" id="V"></a>V</h2>
+<h3>THE ACTION</h3>
+
+<p>On the morning of Wednesday, the 11th of September, the allied army was
+afoot long before dawn, and was ranged in order of battle earlier than
+four o&#8217;clock. But a dense mist covered the ground, and nothing was done
+until at about half-past seven this lifted and enabled the artillery of
+the opposing forces to estimate the range and to open fire. In order to
+understand what was to follow, the reader may, so to speak, utilise this
+empty period of the early morning before the action joined, to grasp the
+respective positions of the two hosts.</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[Pg 66]</a></span></p>
+<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/i068tmb.jpg" alt="" /><br />
+<a href="images/i068.jpg"><small>Larger Image</small></a></div>
+<p class="center">The Elements of the Action of Malplaquet, September 11th, 1709.</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[Pg 67]</a></span>The nature of the terrain has already been described. The plan upon the
+part of the allies would naturally consist in an attempt to force both
+woods which covered the French flank, and, while the pressure upon these
+was at its strongest, the entrenched and fortified centre. Of course, if
+either of the woods was forced before the French centre should break,
+there would be no need to continue the central attack, for one or other of
+the French flanks would then be turned. But the woods were so well
+garnished by this time, and so strongly lined with fallen tree-trunks and
+such entrenchments as the undergrowth permitted, that it seemed to both
+Eugene and Marlborough more probable that the centre should be forced than
+that either of the two flanks should first be turned, and the general plan
+of the battle depended rather upon the holding and heavy engagement of the
+forces in the two woods to the north and south than in any hope to clear
+them out, and the final success was expected rather to take the form of
+piercing the central line while the flanks were thus held and engaged. The
+barren issue of the engagement led the commanders of the allies to excuse
+themselves, of course, and the peculiar ill-success of their left against
+the French right, which we shall detail in a moment, gave rise to the
+thesis that only a &#8220;feint&#8221; was intended in that quarter. The thesis may
+readily be dismissed. The left was intended to do serious work quite as
+much as the right. The theory that it was intended to &#8220;feint&#8221; was only
+produced<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[Pg 68]</a></span> after the action, and in order to explain its incomplete
+results.<small><a name="f11.1" id="f11.1" href="#f11">[11]</a></small></p>
+
+<p>Upon the French side the plan was purely defensive, as their inferior
+numbers and their reliance upon earthworks both necessitated and proved.
+It was Villars&#8217; plan to hold every part of his line with a force
+proportionate to its strength; to furnish the woods a little more heavily
+than the entrenchments of the open gap, but everywhere to rely upon the
+steadiness of his infantry and their artificial protections in the
+repelling of the assault. His cavalry he drew up behind this long line of
+infantry defence, prepared, as has already been said, to charge through
+gaps whenever such action on their part might seem effective.</p>
+
+<p>It will be perceived that the plan upon either side was of a very simple
+sort, and one easily grasped. On the side of the allies it was little more
+than a &#8220;hammer-and-tongs&#8221; assault upon a difficult and well-guarded
+position; on the side of the French, little more than a defence of the
+same.</p>
+
+<p>Next must be described the nature of the troops engaged in the various
+parts of the field.</p>
+
+<p>Upon the side of the allies we have:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[Pg 69]</a></span>On their left&mdash;that is, to the south of their lines and over against the
+wood of Lani&egrave;re&mdash;one-third of the army under the Prince of Orange. The
+bulk of this body consisted in Dutch troops, of whom thirty-one battalions
+of infantry were present, and behind the infantry thus drawn up under the
+Dutch commander were his cavalry, instructed to keep out of range during
+the attack of the infantry upon the wood, and to charge and complete it
+when it should be successful. Embodied among these troops the British
+reader should note a corps of Highlanders, known as the Scottish
+Brigade.<small><a name="f12.1" id="f12.1" href="#f12">[12]</a></small> These did not form part of the British army, but were
+specially enrolled in the Dutch service. The cavalry of this left wing was
+under the command of the Prince of Hesse-Cassel, who was mentioned a few
+pages back in the advance upon Mons. It numbered somewhat over 10,000
+sabres.</p>
+
+<p>The other end of the allied position consisted in two great forces of
+infantry acting separately, and in the following fashion:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[Pg 70]</a></span>First, a force under Schulemberg, which attacked the salient angle of the
+forest of Sars on its northern face, and another body attacking the other
+side of the same angle, to wit, its eastern face. In the first of these
+great masses, that under <ins class="correction" title="original reads 'Schulenberg'">Schulemberg</ins>, there were no English troops. In
+strength it amounted alone to nearly 20,000 men. The second part, which
+was to attack the eastern face, was commanded by Lottum, and was only
+about half as strong, contained a certain small proportion of English.</p>
+
+<p>It may be asked when once these two great bodies of the left and the right
+(each of which was to concern itself with one of the two woods in front of
+the gap) are disposed of, what remained to furnish the centre of the
+allies? To this the curious answer must be afforded that in the
+arrangements of the allies at Malplaquet no true centre existed. The
+battle must be regarded from their side as a battle fought by two isolated
+wings, left and right, and ending in a central attack composed of men
+drawn from either wing. If upon the following sketch map the section from
+A to B be regarded as the special province of the Dutch or left wing, and
+the section from C to D be regarded as the special pro<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[Pg 71]</a></span>vince of the
+Austro-Prussian or right wing, then the mid-section between B and C has no
+large body of troops corresponding to it. When the time came for acting in
+that mid-section, the troops necessary for the work were drawn from either
+end of the line. There were, however, two elements in connection with this
+mid-section which must be considered.</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/i073.jpg" alt="" /></div>
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+
+<p>First, a great battery of forty guns ready to support an attack upon the
+entrenchments of the gap, whenever that time should come; and secondly,
+far in the rear, about 6000 British troops under Lord Orkney were spread
+out and linked the massed right of the army to its massed left. One
+further corps must be mentioned. Quite separate from the rest of the army,
+and right away on the left on the <i>French side</i> of the forest of Sars, was
+the small isolated corps under Withers, which was to hold and embarrass
+the French rear near the group of farmsteads called La Folie, and when the
+forest of Sars was forced was to join hands with the successful<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[Pg 72]</a></span> assault
+of the Prussians and Austrians who should have forced it.</p>
+
+<p>The general command of the left, including Lord Orkney&#8217;s battalions, also
+including (though tactically they formed part of the right wing) the force
+under Lottum, lay with the Duke of Marlborough. The command of the
+right&mdash;that is, Schulemberg and the cavalry behind him&mdash;lay with Prince
+Eugene.</p>
+
+<p>The French line of defence is, from its simplicity, quite easy to
+describe. In the wood of Lani&egrave;re, and in the open space just outside it,
+as far as the fields in front of Malplaquet village, were the troops under
+command of the French general D&#8217;Artagnan. Among the regiments holding this
+part was that of the Bourbonnais, the famous brigade of Navarre (the best
+in the service), and certain of the Swiss mercenaries. The last of this
+body on the left was formed by the French Guards. The entrenchments in the
+centre were held by the Irish Brigades of Lee and O&#8217;Brien, and by the
+German mercenaries and allies of Bavaria and Cologne. These guarded the
+redans which defended the left or northern part of the open gap. The
+remainder of this gap, right up to the forest of Sars, was held by
+Alsatians and by the Brigade of Laon, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[Pg 73]</a></span> the chief command in this part
+lay with Steckenberg. The forest of Sars was full of French troops,
+Picardy, the Marines, the Regiment of Champagne, and many others, with a
+strong reserve of similar troops just behind the wood. The cavalry of the
+army formed a long line behind this body of entrenched infantry; the
+Household Cavalry being on the right near the wood of Lani&egrave;re, the Gens
+d&#8217;armes being in the centre, and the Carabiniers upon the left. These last
+stretched so far northward and westward as to come at last opposite to
+Withers.</p>
+
+<hr style="width: 15%;" />
+
+<p>Such was the disposition of the two armies when at half-past seven the sun
+pierced the mist and the first cannon-shots were exchanged. Marlborough
+and Eugene had decided that they would begin by pressing, as hard as might
+be, the assault upon the forest of Sars. When this assault should have
+proceeded for half an hour, the opposite end of the line, the left, under
+the Prince of Orange,<small><a name="f13.1" id="f13.1" href="#f13">[13]</a></small> should engage the French troops holding the wood
+of Lani&egrave;re. It was expected that the forest of Sars would be forced early
+in the action; that the troops in the wood of Lani&egrave;re would at <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[Pg 74]</a></span>least be
+held fast by the attack of the Prince of Orange, and that the weakened
+French centre could then be taken by assault with the use of the reserves,
+of Orkney&#8217;s men, and of detachments drawn from the two great masses upon
+the wings.</p>
+
+<p>The reader may here pause to consider the excellence of this plan&mdash;very
+probably Marlborough&#8217;s own, and one the comparative ill-success of which
+was due to the unexpected power of resistance displayed by the French
+infantry upon that day.</p>
+
+<p>It was wise to put the greater part of the force into a double attack upon
+the forest of Sars, for this forest, with its thick woods and heavy
+entrenchments, was at once the strongest part of the French position in
+its garnishing and artificial enforcement, yet weak in that the salient
+angle it presented was one that could not, from the thickness of the
+trees, be watched from any central point, as can the salient angle of a
+fortification. Lottum on the one side, Schulemberg on the other, were
+attacking forces numerically weaker than their own, and separate fronts
+which could not support each other under the pressure of the attack.</p>
+
+<p>It was wise to engage the forces upon the French side opposite the allied
+left in the wood of Lani&egrave;re half an hour after the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[Pg 75]</a></span> assault had begun upon
+the forest of Sars, for it was legitimate to expect that at the end of
+that half hour the pressure upon the forest of Sars would begin to be felt
+by the French, and that they would call for troops from the right unless
+the right were very busily occupied at that moment.</p>
+
+<p>Finally, it was wise not to burden the centre with any great body of
+troops until one of the two flanks should be pressed or broken, for the
+centre might, in this case, be compared to a funnel in which too great a
+body of troops would be caught at a disadvantage against the strong
+entrenchments which closed the mouth of the funnel. An historical
+discussion has arisen upon the true r&ocirc;le of the left in this plan. The
+commander of the allies gave it out <i>after</i> the action (as we have seen
+above) that the left had only been intended to &#8220;feint.&#8221; The better
+conclusion is that they were intended to do their worst against the wood
+of Lani&egrave;re, although of course this &#8220;worst&#8221; could not be expected to
+compare with the fundamental attack upon the forest of Sars, where all the
+chief forces of the battle were concentrated.</p>
+
+<p>If by a &#8220;feint&#8221; is meant a subsidiary part of the general plan, the
+expression might be allowed to pass, but it is not a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[Pg 76]</a></span> legitimate use of
+that expression, and if, as occurred at Malplaquet with the Dutch troops,
+a subsidiary body in the general plan is badly commanded, the temptation
+to call the original movement a &#8220;feint,&#8221; which developed from breach of
+orders into a true attack, though strong for the disappointed commanders,
+must not be admitted by the accurate historian. In general, we may be
+certain that the Dutch troops and their neighbours on the allied left were
+intended to do all they could against the wood of Lani&egrave;re, did all they
+could, but suffered in the process a great deal more than Marlborough had
+allowed for.</p>
+
+<hr style="width: 15%;" />
+
+<p>These dispositions once grasped, we may proceed to the nature and
+development of the general attack which followed that opening cannonade of
+half-past seven, which has already been described.</p>
+
+<p>The first movement of the allies was an advance of the left under the
+Prince of Orange and of the right under Lottum. The first was halted out
+of range; the second, after getting up as far as the eastern flank of the
+forest of Sars, wheeled round so as to face the hedge lining that forest,
+and formed into three lines. It was<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[Pg 77]</a></span> nine o&#8217;clock before the signal for
+the attack was given by a general discharge of the great battery in the
+centre opposite the French entrenchments in the gap. Coincidently with
+that signal Schulemberg attacked the forest of Sars from his side, the
+northern face, and he and Lottum pressed each upon that side of the
+salient angle which faced him. Schulemberg&#8217;s large force got into the
+fringe of the wood, but no further. The resistance was furious; the
+thickness of the trees aided it. Eugene was present upon this side;
+meanwhile Marlborough himself was leading the troops of Lottum. He
+advanced with them against a hot fire, passed the swampy rivulet which
+here flanks the wood, and reached the entrenchments which had been drawn
+up just within the outer boundary of it.</p>
+
+<p>This attack failed. Villars was present in person with the French troops
+and directed the repulse. Almost at the same time the advance of
+Schulemberg upon the other side of the wood, which Eugene was
+superintending, suffered a check. Its reserves were called up. The
+intervals of the first line were filled up from the second. One French
+brigade lining the wood was beaten back, but the Picardy Regiment and the
+Marines stood out against a mixed<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[Pg 78]</a></span> force of Danes, Saxons, and Hessians
+opposing them. Schulemberg, therefore, in this second attack had failed
+again, but Marlborough, leading Lottum&#8217;s men upon the other side of the
+wood to a second charge in his turn, had somewhat greater success. He had
+by this time been joined by a British brigade under the Duke of Argyle
+from the second line, and he did so far succeed with this extension of his
+men as to get round the edge of the French entrenchments in the wood.</p>
+
+<p>The French began to be pressed from this eastern side of their salient
+angle, right in among the trees. Schulemberg&#8217;s command felt the advantage
+of the pressure being exercised on the other side. The French weakened
+before it, and in the neighbourhood of eleven o&#8217;clock a great part of the
+forest of Sars was already filled with the allies, who were beating back
+the French in individual combats from tree to tree. Close on noon the
+battle upon this side stood much as the sketch map upon the opposite page
+shows, and was as good as won, for it seemed to need only a continuation
+of this victorious effort to clear the whole wood at last and to turn the
+French line.</p>
+
+<p>This is undoubtedly the form which the battle would have taken&mdash;a complete
+victory for the allied forces by their right turning the French
+left&mdash;and the destruction of the French army would have followed, had not
+the allied left been getting into grave difficulty at the other end of the
+field of battle.</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[Pg 79]</a></span></p>
+<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/i081tmb.jpg" alt="" /><br />
+<a href="images/i081.jpg"><small>Larger Image</small></a></div>
+<p class="center">Sketch Map showing the peril the French centre ran towards<br />noon of being turned on its left.</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[Pg 80]</a></span>The plan of the allied generals, it will be remembered, was that the left
+of their army under the Prince of Orange should attack the wood of Lani&egrave;re
+about half an hour after the right had begun to effect an entrance into
+the opposing forest of Sars. When that half hour had elapsed, that is,
+about half-past nine, the Prince of Orange, without receiving special
+orders, it is true, but acting rightly enough upon his general orders,
+advanced against the French right. Tullibardine with his Scottish brigade
+took the worst of the fighting on the extreme left against the extreme of
+the French right, and was the first to get engaged among the trees. The
+great mass of the force advanced up the opening between the coppice called
+the wood of Tiry and the main wood, with the object of carrying the
+entrenchments which ran from the corner of the wood in front of Malplaquet
+and covered this edge of the open gap. The nine foremost battalions were
+led by the Prince of Orange in person; his courage<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[Pg 81]</a></span> and their tenacity,
+though fatal to the issue of the fight, form perhaps the finest part of
+our story. As they came near the French earthworks, a French battery right
+upon their flank at the edge of the wood opened upon them, enfilading
+whole ranks and doing, in the shortest time, terrible execution. The young
+leader managed to reach the earthworks. The breastwork was forced, but
+Boufflers brought up men from his left, that is, from the centre of the
+gap, drove the Dutch back, and checked, at the height of its success, this
+determined assault. Had not the wood of Tiry been there to separate the
+main part of the Prince of Orange&#8217;s command from its right, reinforcements
+might have reached him and have saved the disaster. As it was, the wood of
+Tiry had cut the advance into two streams, and neither could help the
+other. The Dutch troops and the Highlanders rallied; the Prince of Orange
+charged again with a personal bravery that made him conspicuous before the
+whole field, and should make him famous in history, but the task was more
+than men could accomplish. The best brigade at the disposal of the French,
+that of Navarre, was brought up to meet this second onslaught, broke it,
+and the French leapt from the earthworks to pursue<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[Pg 82]</a></span> the flight of their
+assailants. Many of Orange&#8217;s colours were taken in that rout, and the guns
+of his advanced battery fell into French hands. Beyond the wood of Tiry
+the extreme right of the Dutch charge had suffered no better fate. It had
+carried the central entrenchment of the French, only to be beaten back as
+the main body between the wood of Tiry and the wood of Lani&egrave;re opened.</p>
+
+<p>At this moment, then, after eleven o&#8217;clock, which was coincident with the
+success of Lottum and Schulemberg in the forest of Sars, upon the right,
+the allied left had been hopelessly beaten back from the entrenchments in
+the gap, and from the edge of the wood of Lani&egrave;re.</p>
+
+<p>Marlborough was hurriedly summoned away from his personal command of
+Lottum&#8217;s victorious troops, and begged to do what he could for the broken
+regiments of Orange. He galloped back over the battlefield, a mile or so
+of open fields, and was appalled to see the havoc. Of the great force that
+had advanced an hour and a half before against Boufflers and the French
+right, fully a third was struck, and 2000 or more lay dead upon the
+stubble and the coarse heath of that upland. The scattered corpses strewn
+over half a mile of flight from the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[Pg 83]</a></span> French entrenchments, almost back to
+their original position, largely showed the severity of the blow. It was
+impossible to attempt another attack upon the French right with any hope
+of success.</p>
+
+<p>Marlborough, trusting that the forest of Sars would soon be finally
+cleared, determined upon a change of plan. He ordered the advance upon the
+centre of the position of Lord Orkney&#8217;s fifteen battalions, reinforced
+that advance by drafts of men from the shattered Dutch left, and prepared
+with some deliberation to charge the line of earthworks which ran across
+the open and the nine redans which we have seen were held by the French
+allies and mercenaries from Bavaria and Cologne, and await his moment.
+That moment came at about one o&#8217;clock; at this point in the action the
+opposing forces stood somewhat as they are sketched on the map over page.</p>
+
+<p>The pressure upon the French in the wood of Sars, perpetually increasing,
+had already caused Villars, who commanded there in person, to beg
+Boufflers for aid; but the demand came when Boufflers was fighting his
+hardest against the last Dutch attack, and no aid could be sent.</p>
+
+<p>Somewhat reluctantly, Villars had weakened his centre by withdrawing from
+it the two Irish regiments, and continued to dispute foot by foot the
+forest of Sars. But foot by foot and tree by tree, in a series of
+individual engagements, his men were pressed back, and a larger area of
+the woodland was held by the troops of Schulemberg and Lottum. Eugene was
+wounded, but refused to leave the field. The loss had been appalling upon
+either side, but especially severe (as might have been expected) among the
+assailants, when, just before one o&#8217;clock, the last of the French soldiers
+were driven from the wood.</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[Pg 84]</a></span></p>
+<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/i086tmb.jpg" alt="" /><br />
+<a href="images/i086.jpg"><small>Larger Image</small></a></div>
+<p class="center">Sketch Map showing Marlborough bringing up troops to the
+centre for the<br />final and successful attack upon the entrenchments about one o&#8217;clock.</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[Pg 85]</a></span>All that main defence which the forest of Sars formed upon the French left
+flank was lost, but the fight had been so exhausting to the assailants in
+the confusion of the underwood, and the difficulty of forming them in the
+trees was so great, that the French forces once outside the wood could
+rally at leisure and draw up in line to receive any further movement on
+the part of their opponents. It was while the French left were thus drawn
+up in line behind the wood of Sars, with their redans at the centre
+weakened by the withdrawal of the Irish brigade, that Marlborough ordered
+the final central attack against those redans. The honour of carrying them
+fell to Lord Orkney and his British battalions. His men flooded<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[Pg 86]</a></span> over the
+earthworks at the first rush, breaking the depleted infantry behind them
+(for these, after the withdrawal of the Irish, were no more than the men
+of Bavaria and Cologne), and held the parapet.</p>
+
+<p>The French earthworks thus carried by the infantry in the centre, the
+modern reader might well premise that a complete rout of the French forces
+should have followed. But he would make this premise without counting for
+the preponderant r&ocirc;le that cavalry played in the wars of Marlborough.</p>
+
+<p>Facing the victorious English battalions of Orkney, now in possession of
+the redans, stood the mile-long unbroken squadrons of the French horse.</p>
+
+<p>The allied cavalry, passing between gaps in its infantry line, began to
+deploy for the charge, but even as they deployed they were charged by the
+French mounted men, thrust back, and thrown into confusion. The short
+remainder of the battle is no more than a m&ecirc;l&eacute;e of sabres, but the nature
+of that m&ecirc;l&eacute;e must be clearly grasped, and the character of the French
+cavalry resistance understood, for this it was which determined the issue
+of the combat and saved the army of Louis XIV.</p>
+
+<p>A detailed account of the charges and counter-charges of the opposing
+horse would<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[Pg 87]</a></span> be confusing to the reader, and is, as a fact, impossible of
+narration, for no contemporary record of it remains in any form which can
+be lucidly set forth.</p>
+
+<p>A rough outline of what happened is this:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>The first counter-charge of the French was successful, and the allied
+cavalry, caught in the act of deployment, was thrust back in confusion, as
+I have said, upon the British infantry who lined the captured earthworks.</p>
+
+<p>The great central battery of forty guns which Marlborough had kept all day
+in the centre of the gap, split to the right and left, and, once clear of
+its own troops, fired from either side upon the French horse. Shaken,
+confused, and almost broken by this fire, the French horse were charged by
+a new body of the allied horse led by Marlborough in person, composed of
+British and Prussian units. But, just as Marlborough&#8217;s charge was
+succeeding, old Boufflers, bringing up the French Household Cavalry from
+in front of Malplaquet village, charged right home into the flank of
+Marlborough&#8217;s mounted troops, bore back their first and second lines, and
+destroyed the order of their third.</p>
+
+<p>Thereupon Eugene, with yet another body<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[Pg 88]</a></span> of fresh horse (of the Imperial
+Service), charged in his turn, and the battle of Malplaquet ends in a
+furious mix-up of mounted men, which gradually separated into two
+undefeated lines, each retiring from the contest.</p>
+
+<p>It will be wondered why a conclusion so curiously impotent was permitted
+to close the fighting of so famous a field.</p>
+
+<p>The answer to this query is that the effort upon either side had passed
+the limits beyond which men are physically incapable of further action.
+Any attempt of the French to advance in force after two o&#8217;clock would have
+led to their certain disaster, for the allies were now in possession of
+their long line of earthworks.<small><a name="f14.1" id="f14.1" href="#f14">[14]</a></small></p>
+
+<p>On the other hand, the allies could not advance, because the men upon whom
+they could still count for action were reduced to insufficient numbers.
+Something like one-third of their vast host had fallen in this most
+murderous of battles; from an eighth to a sixth were dead. Of the
+remainder, the great proportion suffered at this hour from an exhaustion
+that forbade all effective effort.</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[Pg 89]</a></span>The horse upon either side might indeed have continued charge and
+counter-charge to no purpose and with no final effect, but the action of
+the cavalry in the repeated and abortive shocks, of which a list has just
+been detailed, could lead neither commander to hope for any final result.
+Boufflers ordered a retreat, screened by his yet unbroken lines of horse.
+The infantry were withdrawn from the wood of Lani&egrave;re, which they still
+held, and from their positions behind the forest of Sars. They were
+directed in two columns towards Bavai in their rear, and as that orderly
+and unhurried retreat was accomplished, the cavalry filed in to follow the
+line, and the French host, leaving the field in the possession of the
+victors, marched back westward by the two Roman roads in as regular a
+formation as though they had been advancing to action rather than
+retreating from an abandoned position.</p>
+
+<p>It was not quite three o&#8217;clock in the afternoon.</p>
+
+<p>There was no pursuit, and there could be none. The allied army slept upon
+the ground it had gained; rested, evacuated its wounded, and restored its
+broken ranks through the whole of the morrow, Thursday. It was not until
+the Friday that it was able to march back again from the field in which<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[Pg 90]</a></span>
+it had triumphed at so terrible an expense of numbers, guns, and colours,
+and with so null a strategic result, and to take up once more the siege of
+Mons. Upon the 9th of October Mons capitulated, furnishing the sole fruit
+of this most arduous of all the great series of Marlborough&#8217;s campaigns.</p>
+
+<p>No battle has been contested with more valour or tenacity than the battle
+of Malplaquet. The nature of the woodland fighting contributed to the
+enormous losses sustained upon either side. The delay during which the
+French had been permitted to entrench themselves so thoroughly naturally
+threw the great balance of the loss upon the assailants. In no battle,
+free, as Malplaquet was free, from all pursuit or a rout, or even the
+breaking of any considerable body of troops (save the Dutch troops and
+Highlanders on the left in the earlier part of the battle, and the
+Bavarians and Cologne men in the redans at the close of it), has the
+proportion of the killed and wounded been anything like so high. In none,
+perhaps, were casualties so heavy accompanied by so small a proportion of
+prisoners.</p>
+
+<p>The action will remain throughout history a standing example of the pitch
+of excellence to which those highly trained<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[Pg 91]</a></span> professional armies of the
+eighteenth century, with their savage discipline, their aristocratic
+command, their close formations, and their extraordinary reliance upon
+human daring, could arrive.</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p class="center"><b>FINIS</b></p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<h5>PRINTED BY NEILL AND CO., LTD., EDINBURGH.</h5>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[Pg 92]</a></span></p>
+
+<div class="adverts"><div class="adbox">
+<h2>BRITISH BATTLE BOOKS</h2>
+<p class="center"><i>Illustrated with Coloured Maps</i></p>
+<p class="center">BY HILAIRE BELLOC</p>
+<p class="center"><i>F&#8217;cap</i> 8<i>vo, cloth,</i> 1<i>s. net; leather,</i> 2<i>s.</i> 6<i>d. net</i></p>
+<p class="center"><i>HISTORY IN WARFARE</i></p>
+<p>The British Battle Series will consist of a number of monographs upon
+actions in which British troops have taken part. Each battle will be the
+subject of a separate booklet illustrated with coloured maps, illustrative
+of the movements described in the text, together with a large number of
+line maps showing the successive details of the action. In each case the
+political circumstances which led to the battle will be explained; next,
+the stages leading up to it; lastly, the action in detail.</p>
+
+<p><span style="margin-left: 4em;">1. BLENHEIM</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4em;">2. MALPLAQUET</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4em;">3. TOURCOING</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4em;">4. WATERLOO</span></p>
+
+<p>Later volumes will deal with Crecy, Poitiers, Corunna, Talaveras, Flodden,
+The Siege of Valenciennes, Vittoria, Toulouse.</p>
+
+<p class="center"><br />London: STEPHEN SWIFT &amp; CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi</p></div></div>
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[Pg 93]</a></span></p>
+<div class="adverts"><div class="adbox">
+<h2>THE PARTY SYSTEM</h2>
+<p class="center">BY HILAIRE BELLOC AND CECIL CHESTERTON</p>
+<p class="center"><i>Crown</i> 8<i>vo.</i> 3<i>s.</i> 6d<i>. net</i></p>
+<p class="center"><i>THE THOUGHTS OF THINKING MEN</i></p>
+
+<p>No book of the present season has been so much praised&mdash;and so much
+reviled: reviled by most of the Party organs, praised by independent
+papers. And yet mark the agreement of the following, as wide asunder as
+the poles often in their views.</p>
+
+<p>&#8220;Embodies the silent thoughts of almost all thinking men of to-day.&#8221;&mdash;<i>The
+Evening Times.</i></p>
+
+<p>The <i>Star</i> says:&mdash;&#8220;Says in plain English what everybody in touch with
+reality thinks.&#8221;</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Lord Robert Cecil</span>, in the <i>Morning Post</i>, says:&mdash;&#8220;So far the authors of
+&#8216;The Party System&#8217; only say in plain terms what everyone who has been in
+Parliament knows to be in substance true.&#8221;</p>
+
+<p>&#8220;A complete proof of the necessity of restoring power to the
+people.&#8221;&mdash;<i>The Daily Express.</i></p>
+
+<p class="center"><br />London: STEPHEN SWIFT &amp; CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi</p></div></div>
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[Pg 94]</a></span></p>
+<div class="adverts"><div class="adbox">
+<h2>GORDON AT KHARTOUM</h2>
+<p class="center">BY WILFRED SCAWEN BLUNT</p>
+<p class="center">15<i>s. net</i></p>
+<p class="center"><i>PRIVATE AND INTIMATE</i></p>
+
+<p>This book follows the lines of the author&#8217;s works on Egypt and India,
+consisting mainly of a private diary of a very intimate kind, and will
+bring down his narrative of events to the end of 1885.</p>
+
+<p>The present volume is designed especially as an answer to Lord Cromer&#8217;s
+<i>Modern Egypt</i>, in so far as it concerned Gordon, and contains several
+important and hitherto unpublished documents throwing new light upon a
+case of perennial interest.</p>
+
+<p>It also includes an account of the author&#8217;s relations with Lord Randolph
+Churchill, Sir Henry Drummond Wolff, Mr Gladstone, Mr Parnell, and other
+political personages of the day, as well as of the General Election of
+1885, in which the author stood as a Tory Home Ruler.</p>
+
+<p class="center"><br />London: STEPHEN SWIFT &amp; CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi</p></div></div>
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[Pg 95]</a></span></p>
+<div class="adverts"><div class="adbox">
+<h2>AN ENGLISHMAN IN NEW YORK</h2>
+<p class="center">BY JUVENAL</p>
+<p class="center"><i>Crown</i> 8<i>vo.</i> 5<i>s. net</i></p>
+<p class="center"><i>VIVID ORIGINALITY</i></p>
+
+<p>In these notes and studies on life in New York, Juvenal, by his vivid
+originality and his masterly deductions, has surpassed all other writers
+who have written on the same subject.</p>
+
+<p>Mr Eden Phillpotts writes of the Author: &#8220;The things seen are brilliantly
+set down. He writes with great force and skill.&#8221;</p>
+
+<p class="center"><br />London: STEPHEN SWIFT &amp; CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi</p></div></div>
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[Pg 96]</a></span></p>
+<div class="adverts"><div class="adbox">
+<h2>PRINCE AZREEL</h2>
+<p class="center">A Poem with Prose Notes</p>
+<p class="center">BY ARTHUR LYNCH</p>
+<p class="center"><i>Crown</i> 8<i>vo.</i> 5<i>s. net</i></p>
+<p class="center"><i>DIRECT&mdash;INSPIRING&mdash;COMPELLING</i></p>
+
+<p>The cry for something new in literature, the indefinable, the unexpected,
+has been answered. Prince Azreel comes to claim his place, not as one who
+has sounded the depths and shoals of the current modes of the day, but as
+one entirely careless of these things, discoursing freely of life, easily
+throughout its whole purport and scope.</p>
+
+<p>The Devil comes into the action, but he also is new&mdash;rather the Spirit of
+the World, &#8220;man&#8217;s elder brother.&#8221; His methods are those neither of <i>Faust</i>
+nor of <i>Paradise Regained</i>. His temptations are suasive, his lures less
+material.</p>
+
+<p>In the search for the Ideal of statesmanship Azreel and the Devil come to
+our own Parliament, Azreel filled with warm enthusiasm, high conceptions.
+They see, they learn; they discover &#8220;types,&#8221; and discuss them. We find the
+Devil at length defending the Commons, supplying the corrective to
+Azreel&#8217;s strange disillusions. This part will not be the least piquant.</p>
+
+<p class="center"><br />London: STEPHEN SWIFT &amp; CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi</p></div></div>
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[Pg 97]</a></span></p>
+<div class="adverts"><div class="adbox">
+<h2>POEMS</h2>
+<p class="center">BY CHARLES GRANVILLE</p>
+<p class="center"><i>F&#8217;cap</i> 4<i>to.</i> 5<i>s. net.</i></p>
+<p class="center"><i>REAL POETIC TALENT</i></p>
+
+<p>The present volume is composed of a selection from the previous poetical
+works of the Author, who is also well known as a writer of prose. The
+distinctive feature of the poems in this collection&mdash;the feature, indeed,
+that marks off and differentiates the work of this poet from the mass of
+verse produced to-day&mdash;is their spiritual insight. Mr Granville is
+concerned with the soul of man, with the eternal rather than the
+transitory, and his perception, which is that of the seer, invests his
+language with that quality of ecstasy that constitutes the indisputable
+claim of poetry to rank in the forefront of literature.</p>
+
+<p class="center"><br />London: STEPHEN SWIFT &amp; CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi</p></div></div>
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[Pg 98]</a></span></p>
+<div class="adverts"><div class="adbox">
+<h2>THE HUMOUR OF THE UNDERMAN</h2>
+<p class="center">And Other Essays</p>
+<p class="center">BY FRANCIS GRIERSON</p>
+<p class="center"><i>F&#8217;cap</i> 8<i>vo.</i> 3<i>s.</i> 6<i>d. net</i></p>
+<p class="center"><i>CHARACTERISTICALLY INCISIVE</i></p>
+
+<p>This volume contains the latest work of the greatest Essayist of our time.
+Maurice Maeterlinck has said of the Author, &#8220;He has, in his best moments,
+that most rare gift of casting certain shafts of light, at once simple and
+decisive, upon questions the most difficult, obscure, and unlooked for in
+Art, Morals, and Psychology ... essays among the most subtle and
+substantial that I know.&#8221;</p>
+
+<p>This opinion has been endorsed by every critic of note in the British
+Isles and in the United States of America. Indeed, in the latter country a
+veritable Grierson cult has sprung into existence.</p>
+
+<p class="center"><br />London: STEPHEN SWIFT &amp; CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi</p></div></div>
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[Pg 99]</a></span></p>
+<div class="adverts"><div class="adbox">
+<h2>LA VIE ET LES HOMMES</h2>
+<p class="center">BY FRANCIS GRIERSON</p>
+<p class="center"><i>F&#8217;cap.</i> 8<i>vo.</i> 3<i>s.</i> 6<i>d. net</i></p>
+<p class="center"><i>PENS&Eacute;ES PIQUANTES, IND&Eacute;PENDANTES</i></p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Sully Prudhomme</span> (de l&#8217;Acad&eacute;mie Fran&ccedil;aise):&mdash;&#8220;J&#8217;ai trouv&eacute; ces m&eacute;ditations
+pleines d&#8217;aper&ccedil;us profonds et sagaces. J&#8217;ai &eacute;t&eacute; frapp&eacute; de l&#8217;originalit&eacute;
+puissante de la pens&eacute;e de l&#8217;auteur.&#8221;</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Jules Claretie</span> (de l&#8217;Acad&eacute;mie Fran&ccedil;aise):&mdash;&#8220;J&#8217;ai &eacute;t&eacute; charm&eacute; par les id&eacute;es
+originales et justes.&#8221;</p>
+
+<p>L&#8217;Abb&eacute; <span class="smcap">Joseph Roux</span>:&mdash;&#8220;Il y a l&agrave; des vues originales, des appr&eacute;ciations
+neuves et frappantes.&#8221;</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Fr&eacute;d&eacute;ric Mistral</span>:&mdash;&#8220;Ces pens&eacute;es m&#8217;ont paru neuves et piquantes, et
+ind&eacute;pendantes de cette ambiance de pr&eacute;jug&eacute;s &agrave; laquelle il est si difficile
+d&#8217;&eacute;chapper.&#8221;</p>
+
+<p>Le P&egrave;re <span class="smcap">P. V. Delaporte, S.J.</span> (R&eacute;dacteur des Etudes Religieuses):&mdash;&#8220;J&#8217;ai
+admir&eacute; dans ces pages d&eacute;licates l&#8217;artiste, le penseur et l&#8217;&eacute;crivain, et
+j&#8217;ai &eacute;t&eacute; singuli&egrave;rement touch&eacute; de la fa&ccedil;on dont vous appr&eacute;ciez le g&eacute;nie
+fran&ccedil;ais. Vous avez su le comprendre et vous avez dit votre pens&eacute;e
+franchement, je pouvais ajouter <i>fran&ccedil;aisement</i>.&#8221;</p>
+
+<p class="center"><br />London: STEPHEN SWIFT &amp; CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi</p></div></div>
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[Pg 100]</a></span></p>
+<div class="adverts"><div class="adbox">
+<h2>THE ROLL OF THE SEASONS</h2>
+<p class="center">Nature Essays</p>
+<p class="center">BY G. G. DESMOND</p>
+<p class="center"><i>Crown</i> 8<i>vo. Cloth.</i> 5<i>s. net</i></p>
+<p class="center"><i>A NATURE BOOK FOR TOWN FOLK</i></p>
+
+<p>This book for all Nature-lovers appeals perhaps most strongly to those in
+cities pent, for whom a word in season can call up visions of the open
+moor, the forest, the meadow stream, the flowered lane, or the wild
+sea-shore. The extreme penalty for reading one of these spring, summer,
+autumn, or winter chapters is to be driven from one&#8217;s chair into the
+nearest field, there to forget town worries among the trees. The author
+does not spare us for fog, rain, frost, or snow. Sometimes he makes us get
+up by moonlight and watch the dawn come &#8220;cold as cold sea-shells&#8221; to the
+fluting of blackbirds, or he takes us through the woods by night and shows
+us invisible things by their sounds and scents. The spirit, even if the
+body cannot go with it, comes back refreshed by these excursions to the
+country.</p>
+
+<p class="center"><br />London: STEPHEN SWIFT &amp; CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi</p></div></div>
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[Pg 101]</a></span></p>
+<div class="adverts"><div class="adbox">
+<h2>THE MASTERY OF LIFE</h2>
+<p class="center">BY G. T. WRENCH, M.D. <span class="smcap">Lond.</span></p>
+<p class="center"><i>Demy</i> 8<i>vo.</i> 15<i>s. net</i></p>
+<p class="center"><i>OLD VALUES RE-VALUED</i></p>
+
+<p>This book is a review of the history of civilisation with the object of
+discovering where and under what conditions man has shown the most
+positive attitude towards life. The review has been based not so much upon
+scholarship as upon the direct evidence of the products and monuments of
+the different peoples of history, and the author has consequently
+travelled widely in order to collect his material. The author shows how
+the patriarchal system and values have always been the foundation of
+peoples, who have been distinguished for their joy in and power over life,
+and have expressed their mastery in works of art, which have been their
+peculiar glory and the object of admiration and wonder of other peoples.
+In contrast to them has been the briefer history of civilisation in
+Europe, in which the paternal and filial values of interdependence have
+always been rivalled by the ideal of independence from one&#8217;s fellow-man.
+The consequences of this ideal of personal liberty in the destruction of
+the art of life are forcibly delineated in the last chapters.</p>
+
+<p class="center"><br />London: STEPHEN SWIFT &amp; CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi</p></div></div>
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[Pg 102]</a></span></p>
+<div class="adverts"><div class="adbox">
+<h2>TORY DEMOCRACY</h2>
+<p class="center">BY J. M. KENNEDY</p>
+<p class="center"><i>Crown</i> 8<i>vo. Cloth.</i> 3<i>s.</i> 6<i>d. net</i></p>
+<p class="center"><i>LORDS, GOVERNMENT, LIBERALISM</i></p>
+
+<p>There are unmistakable indications that the system of politics at present
+pursued by the two chief political parties is not meeting with the
+approval of the electorate as a whole, though this electorate, as a result
+of the Caucus methods, finds it increasingly difficult to give expression
+to its views. In his book on Tory Democracy, Mr J. M. Kennedy, who is
+already favourably known through his books on modern philosophical and
+sociological subjects, sets forth the principles underlying a system of
+politics which was seriously studied by men so widely different as
+Disraeli, Bismarck, and Lord Randolph Churchill. Mr Kennedy not only shows
+the close connection still existing between the aristocracy and the
+working classes, but he also has the distinction of being the first writer
+to lay down a constructive Conservative policy which is independent of
+Tariff Reform. Apart from this, the chapters of his work which deal with
+Representative Government, the House of Lords, and &#8220;Liberalism at Work&#8221;
+throw entirely new light on many vexed questions of modern politics. The
+book, it may be added, is written in a style that spares neither parties
+nor persons.</p>
+
+<p class="center"><br />London: STEPHEN SWIFT &amp; CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi</p></div></div>
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[Pg 103]</a></span></p>
+<div class="adverts"><div class="adbox">
+<h2>PRINCIPLES OF A NEW SYSTEM OF PSYCHOLOGY</h2>
+<p class="center">BY ARTHUR LYNCH,<br />
+M.A., C.E., L.R.C.P., M.R.C.S.E., M.P.<br />
+AUTHOR OF &#8220;HUMAN DOCUMENTS,&#8221; ETC., ETC.</p>
+<p class="center"><i>Two Vols. Demy</i> 8<i>vo.</i> 10<i>s.</i> 6<i>d. net each</i></p>
+<p class="center"><i>A BASIC WORK OF ANALYSIS</i></p>
+
+<p>This book is dynamic. It is new in the sense in which Schwann&#8217;s Cell
+Theory was new to Physiology, or Dalton&#8217;s Atomic Theory to Chemistry. The
+author has faced the problem in its widest extension: Can the entire realm
+of knowledge, and the whole possible scope of mental acts, be so resolved
+that we may formulate the unanalysable elements, the Fundamental Processes
+of the mind? This problem is solved, and thence the manner of all
+synthesis indicated. The argument is closely consecutive, but the severity
+is relieved by abundant illustrations drawn from many sciences. The
+principles established will afford criteria in regard to every position in
+Psychology. New light will be thrown, for instance, on Kant&#8217;s Categories,
+Spencer&#8217;s Hedonism, Fechner&#8217;s Law, the foundation of Mathematics, Memory,
+Association, Externality, Will, the Feeling of Effort, Brain
+Localisations, and finally on the veritable nature of Reason. A philosophy
+of Research is foreshadowed. The work offers a base on which all valid
+studies may be co-ordinated, and developments are indicated. It
+presupposes no technical knowledge, and the exposition is couched in
+simple language. It will give a new impetus to Psychology.</p>
+
+<p class="center"><br />London: STEPHEN SWIFT &amp; CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi</p></div></div>
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">[Pg 104]</a></span></p>
+<div class="adverts"><div class="adbox">
+<h2>EIGHT CENTURIES OF PORTUGUESE MONARCHY</h2>
+<p class="center">BY V. de BRAGAN&Ccedil;A CUNHA</p>
+<p class="center"><i>Demy</i> 8<i>vo.</i> 14 <i>Pencil Portraits.</i> 15<i>s. net</i></p>
+<p class="center"><i>THE TRUTH ABOUT PORTUGAL</i></p>
+
+<p>This book reveals the series of causes, both political and social, which
+have brought Portugal to its present condition and affected the character
+of its people.</p>
+
+<p>The entire history of Monarchical Portugal is reviewed in masterly
+fashion, and the work is based on a thorough knowledge and critical
+appreciation of all available sources. The author writes, not as an
+outsider, but as one who knows his country from within, and the book
+therefore constitutes a serious attempt to tell the English-speaking world
+the truth about Portugal.</p>
+
+<p>The author knows that he treads &#8220;forbidden ground,&#8221; but even where he
+apportions the severest blame he does so in the conviction that adverse
+criticism of any country, &#8220;however unpleasant it may be to all Chadbands
+and Stigginses,&#8221; cannot be considered abusive if it be made with the
+intention of stirring up the forces of reform and of remedying the defects
+which it discloses.</p>
+
+<p class="center"><br />London: STEPHEN SWIFT &amp; CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi</p></div></div>
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[Pg 105]</a></span></p>
+<div class="adverts"><div class="adbox">
+<h2>SIR EDWARD</h2>
+<p class="center">A BRIEF MEMORIAL OF A NOBLE LIFE</p>
+<p class="center"><span class="smcap">By a Fellow of the Literary Society</span></p>
+<p class="center"><i>Crown</i> 8<i>vo. Cloth.</i> 1<i>s. net</i></p>
+<p class="center"><i>AN IRRESISTIBLE SATIRE</i></p>
+
+<p>The humour of this remarkable satire is irresistible. The truth concerning
+Sir Edward is gradually revealed by fantastic touches and sly suggestions,
+and with a manner so correct as almost to put the reader off his guard.</p>
+
+<p>Although the subject of this &AElig;sopian biography is drawn in such a way as
+to suggest now one and now another familiar figure in modern life, yet
+these fleeting and shadowy resemblances are in reality an indication of
+the archetypal nature of Sir Edward; he is not a caricature but a symbol;
+not any particular individual but a composite type&mdash;a materialisation into
+one grotesque shape of the drifting ideas and false ideals of a muddled
+civilisation.</p>
+
+<p>The narrative gathers into its net both big and little fishes&mdash;a heavy
+haul. But people who regard Western civilisation as the final word in
+social wisdom should not read this book: or perhaps they should. Anyway,
+everyone else should.</p>
+
+<p class="center"><br />London: STEPHEN SWIFT &amp; CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi</p></div></div>
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[Pg 106]</a></span></p>
+<div class="adverts"><div class="adbox">
+<h2>PARISIAN PORTRAITS</h2>
+<p class="center">BY FRANCIS GRIERSON</p>
+<p class="center"><i>F&#8217;cap</i> 8<i>vo.</i> 2<i>s.</i> 6<i>d. net</i></p>
+<p class="center"><i>AN APPRECIATION OF FRENCH GENIUS</i></p>
+
+<p>These profoundly sagacious studies and finely drawn portraits are of the
+greatest interest, not only in virtue of the author&#8217;s intimate knowledge
+of Paris and Parisian life (dating from 1869), but also because Mr
+Grierson is one of the few living Englishmen who thoroughly understand and
+appreciate the French Genius. The book will be an enduring delight to all
+lovers of fine literature.</p>
+
+<p>Mr <span class="smcap">Richard Le Gallienne</span> says:&mdash;&#8220;Mr Francis Grierson, cosmopolite and
+subtile critic of the arts, is one of those sudden new acquaintances that
+assume immediate importance in one&#8217;s world of thought.... Everywhere with
+remarkable rectitude of perception, Mr Grierson puts his finger on the
+real power, and it is always spiritual.&#8221;</p>
+
+<p><i>The Spectator</i> says:&mdash;&#8220;Mr Grierson has a right to speak, for he uses with
+success one of the most difficult of literary forms, the essay.&#8221;</p>
+
+<p class="center"><br />London: STEPHEN SWIFT &amp; CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi</p></div></div>
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[Pg 107]</a></span></p>
+<div class="adverts"><div class="adbox">
+<h2>THE VALLEY OF SHADOWS</h2>
+<p class="center">BY FRANCIS GRIERSON</p>
+<p class="center"><i>Second Edition. Demy</i> 8<i>vo.</i> 6<i>s. net</i></p>
+<p class="center"><i>MEMORIES OF LINCOLN&#8217;S COUNTRY</i></p>
+
+<p>In this book Mr Grierson recalls in vivid memories the wonderful romance
+of his life in Lincoln&#8217;s country before the war. &#8220;<i>The Valley of the
+Shadows</i> is not a novel,&#8221; says Mr W. L. Courtney in the <i>Daily Telegraph</i>,
+&#8220;yet in the graphic portraiture of spiritual and intellectual movements it
+possesses an attraction denied to all but the most significant kind of
+fiction.... With a wonderful touch Mr Grierson depicts scene after scene,
+drawing the simple, native characters with bold, impressive strokes.&#8221;</p>
+
+<p>&#8220;Told with wonderful charm ... enthralling as any romance ... truth,
+though often stranger than fiction, is almost always duller; Mr Grierson
+has accomplished the rare feat of making it more interesting. There are
+chapters in the book ... that haunt one afterwards like remembered music,
+or like passages in the prose of Walter Pater.&#8221;&mdash;<i>Punch.</i></p>
+
+<p class="center"><br />London: STEPHEN SWIFT &amp; CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi</p></div></div>
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[Pg 108]</a></span></p>
+<div class="adverts"><div class="adbox">
+<h2>MODERN MYSTICISM</h2>
+<p class="center">And Other Essays</p>
+<p class="center"><span class="smcap">By</span> FRANCIS GRIERSON</p>
+<p class="center"><i>F&#8217;cap.</i> 8<i>vo.</i> 2<i>s.</i> 6<i>d. net</i></p>
+<p class="center"><i>ORIGINAL, INCISIVE, SUBTLE, ACUTE</i></p>
+
+<p>This book embodies profound thinking expressed in an original and happy
+style.</p>
+
+<p>Mr <span class="smcap">Maurice Maeterlinck</span> says:&mdash;&#8220;This volume is full of thoughts and
+meditations of the very highest order.... Mr Grierson has concentrated his
+thought on the profound and simple questions of life and conscience....
+What unique and decisive things in &#8216;Parsifalitis,&#8217; for example, what
+strange clairvoyance in &#8216;Beauty and Morals in Nature,&#8217; in the essay on
+&#8216;Tolstoy,&#8217; in &#8216;Authority and Individualism,&#8217; in &#8216;The New Criticism&#8217;!&#8221;</p>
+
+<p>Mr <span class="smcap">James Douglas</span> says:&mdash;&#8220;This little book is tremulous with originality
+and palpitating with style.&#8221;</p>
+
+<p>Mr <span class="smcap">A. B. Walkley</span> says:&mdash;&#8220;A delectable book.... I shall keep it on the same
+shelf as &#8216;Wisdom and Destiny&#8217; and &#8216;The Treasure of the Humble.&#8217;&#8221;</p>
+
+<p class="center"><br />London: STEPHEN SWIFT &amp; CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi</p></div></div>
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[Pg 109]</a></span></p>
+<div class="adverts"><div class="adbox">
+<h2>THE CELTIC TEMPERAMENT</h2>
+<p class="center">BY FRANCIS GRIERSON</p>
+<p class="center"><i>F&#8217;cap</i> 8<i>vo.</i> 2<i>s.</i> 6<i>d. net</i></p>
+<p class="center"><i>CHARMING AND FULL OF WISDOM</i></p>
+
+<p>The late Professor <span class="smcap">William James</span> said:&mdash;&#8220;I find &#8216;The Celtic Temperament&#8217;
+charming and full of wisdom.&#8221;</p>
+
+<p>The <i>Glasgow Herald</i> says:&mdash;&#8220;A remarkable book, and by a remarkable
+man.... This book will be read and re-read by all who recognise acuteness
+of intellectual faculty, culture which has gained much from books, but
+more from human intercourse, deep thinking, and a gift of literary
+expression which at times it quite Gallic.&#8221;</p>
+
+<p>Mr <span class="smcap">Maurice Maeterlinck</span> says:&mdash;&#8220;In this volume I am privileged once more to
+breathe the atmosphere of supreme spiritual aristocracy which emanates
+from all Mr Grierson&#8217;s work. He has, in his best moments, that most rare
+gift of casting certain shafts of light, at once simple and decisive, upon
+questions the most difficult, obscure, and unlooked-for in art, morals,
+and psychology.... I place these essays among the most subtle and
+substantial that I know.&#8221;</p>
+
+<p class="center"><br />London: STEPHEN SWIFT &amp; CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi</p></div></div>
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">[Pg 110]</a></span></p>
+<div class="adverts"><div class="adbox">
+<h2>SOME NEIGHBOURS</h2>
+<p class="center">STORIES, SKETCHES, AND STUDIES</p>
+<p class="center">BY CHARLES GRANVILLE</p>
+<p class="center"><i>Second edition. Crown</i> 8<i>vo.</i> 6<i>s.</i></p>
+<p class="center"><i>FULL OF CLEVER CHARACTERISATION</i></p>
+
+<p>A fine vein of poetic feeling runs through all these stories, sketches,
+and studies, which are, without exception, highly entertaining and full of
+clever characterisation. Mr Granville&#8217;s style is by turns na&iuml;ve,
+deliberate and restrained, but always attractive.</p>
+
+<p><i>The Times.</i>&mdash;&#8220;A pleasant book ... prettily conceived and told....&#8221;</p>
+
+<p><i>The Scotsman.</i>&mdash;&#8220;The stories are always interesting, both as studies of
+odd aspects of humanity and for the curious modern reticence of their
+art.&#8221;</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Clement K. Shorter</span> in <i>The Sphere</i>.&mdash;&#8220;&#8216;Some Neighbours&#8217; deserves the
+highest commendation.&#8221;</p>
+
+<p><i>The Morning Leader.</i>&mdash;&#8220;The treatment is invariably fresh and individual
+... thoroughly readable.&#8221;</p>
+
+<p><i>Eastern Morning News.</i>&mdash;&#8220;There can be nothing but praise&mdash;and that of a
+high quality&mdash;for a man who writes with Mr Granville&#8217;s sympathy and charm
+... his art is so sure that he puts a world of life and reality into a few
+pages.&#8221;</p>
+
+<p><i>Liverpool Daily Post.</i>&mdash;&#8220;Mr Granville is a writer possessing literary
+gifts very much above the average, and the versatility of his gifts is
+very fully indicated in the book under notice.&#8221;</p>
+
+<p><i>Yorkshire Observer.</i>&mdash;&#8220;The author certainly shows that love of humanity
+which marks the creative mind.&#8221;</p>
+
+<p><i>Aberdeen Free Press.</i>&mdash;&#8220;All of them are readable, and there are one or
+two of <i>quite surprising excellence</i>.... These are characterised by real
+literary power, and suffused with true poetic feeling.&#8221;</p>
+
+<p><i>Westminster Review.</i>&mdash;&#8220;Mr Granville&#8217;s humour is of that quality which
+perceives the sense of tears in human things. To those capable of
+appreciating fine literature we recommend &#8216;Some Neighbours.&#8217;&#8221;</p>
+
+<p><i>The Commentator.</i>&mdash;&#8220;This clever writer&#8217;s characteristic originality and
+freshness both of thought and expression.&#8221;</p>
+
+<p class="center"><br />London: STEPHEN SWIFT &amp; CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi</p></div></div>
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[Pg 111]</a></span></p>
+<div class="adverts"><div class="adbox">
+<h2>CIVIL WAR</h2>
+<p class="center">A Play in Four Acts</p>
+<p class="center">BY ASHLEY DUKES</p>
+<p class="center"><i>Crown</i> 8<i>vo.</i> 2<i>s. net</i></p>
+<p class="center"><i>A DRAMA WITHOUT ARTIFICIALITY</i></p>
+
+<p>This play is that rarity, an English drama of ideas which is not in any
+sense imitative of Mr Bernard Shaw. It presents an intellectual conflict
+which is also a passionate conflict of individualities, and the theme is
+treated with sympathy and humanity. The portrait of life in a colony of
+revolutionists alone would make &#8220;Civil War&#8221; something of a dramatic
+curiosity, but it is more than that. It is at once effective and original.
+The play was given for the first time by the Incorporated Stage Society in
+June 1910, with remarkable success, and it will shortly be revived by
+several of our newer repertory theatres. It should be read as well as
+seen, however, for it is dramatic without artificiality, and literary
+without affectation.</p>
+
+<p><i>The following is what some of the Press think of the play:</i></p>
+
+<p><i>Pall Mall Gazette</i>:&mdash;&#8220;A very interesting, sincere, and artistic piece of
+work.&#8221;</p>
+
+<p><i>Westminster Gazette</i>:&mdash;&#8220;In producing &#8216;Civil War,&#8217; by Mr Ashley Dukes, the
+Stage Society has rendered a real service to drama.... The play shows that
+the dramatist possesses in a high degree the capacity for writing
+dialogue&mdash;for finding phrases characteristic of the persons of the comedy,
+useful for the situations, and exhibiting a certain style that is rare and
+indefinable. There were scenes, notably one of great beauty between the
+old Socialist and his daughter, where, apart from the dramatic effect, one
+had real pleasure from the phrases, and this without there being any
+obvious attempt to write in a literary style.&#8221;</p>
+
+<p><i>Times</i>:&mdash;&#8220;A piece of sound and promising work.&#8221;</p>
+
+<p><i>Daily News</i>:&mdash;&#8220;His &#8216;Civil War&#8217; has a strong motive, and, best of all,
+there is humanity and understanding in his treatment of it.... It is
+rarely indeed that we are given a play in which the drama is made
+inevitable by a clash of temperament and ideas.&#8221;</p>
+
+<p class="center"><br />London: STEPHEN SWIFT &amp; CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi</p></div></div>
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[Pg 112]</a></span></p>
+<div class="adverts"><div class="adbox">
+<h2>THE MAID&#8217;S COMEDY</h2>
+<p class="center">A Chivalric Romance in Thirteen Chapters</p>
+<p class="center"><i>Crown</i> 8<i>vo.</i> 3<i>s.</i> 6<i>d. net</i></p>
+<p class="center"><i>UNIQUE</i></p>
+
+<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="5" summary="comedy">
+<tr><td align="right" valign="top">I.</td><td>In which, by favour and fortune, three gentle persons may interest at least three others.</td></tr>
+<tr><td align="right" valign="top">II.</td><td>Wherein is founded a new Order of Chivalry, and matters for simple and wise alike may be discovered.</td></tr>
+<tr><td align="right" valign="top">III.</td><td>Exhibiting a partner in an old-established business pursuing her occupation.</td></tr>
+<tr><td align="right" valign="top">IV.</td><td>Wherein one character is left in a delicate situation, another loses
+her way, and a third is brought to a pretty pass.</td></tr>
+<tr><td align="right" valign="top">V.</td><td>Containing the din of arms, thrust and parry and threat of slaughter,
+but gently concluding with the first canon of feminine craft.</td></tr>
+<tr><td align="right" valign="top">VI.</td><td>Displaying a standing example of feminine folly and a rally of heroes.</td></tr>
+<tr><td align="right" valign="top">VII.</td><td>Concerning, mainly, the passions as toys for the great god, Chance, to fool with.</td></tr>
+<tr><td align="right" valign="top">VIII.</td><td>Wherein an oft-defeated, yet indestructible, ideal is realised.</td></tr>
+<tr><td align="right" valign="top">IX.</td><td>Of matters for old and young, facts and fancies, aspirations and
+exhortations, and chronicling a feat worthy the grand tradition of chivalry.</td></tr>
+<tr><td align="right" valign="top">X.</td><td>A magical chapter, of whose content those who doubt may likely believe
+what should be doubted, and those who believe may doubt what is perfectly true.</td></tr>
+<tr><td align="right" valign="top">XI.</td><td>Confirming the adage that happy beginnings tend to happy endings, and
+showing how Heaven will still preserve Virtue, even at the cost of working a miracle.</td></tr>
+<tr><td align="right" valign="top">XII.</td><td>Which relates the Happy Ending.</td></tr>
+<tr><td align="right" valign="top">XIII.</td><td>Wherein the Romancer takes courteous leave of the Three Gentle Readers.</td></tr></table>
+
+<p class="center">London: STEPHEN SWIFT &amp; CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi</p></div></div>
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<p><b>Footnotes:</b></p>
+
+<p><a name="f1" id="f1" href="#f1.1">[1]</a> From which little place the lines as a whole take the name in history
+of &#8220;Lines of La Bass&eacute;e.&#8221;</p>
+
+<p><a name="f2" id="f2" href="#f2.1">[2]</a> As is common in the history of military affairs, the advocates of
+either party present these confused movements before the lines of La
+Bass&eacute;e upon the eve of the siege of Tournai in very different and indeed
+contradictory lights.</p>
+
+<p>The classical work of Mr Fortescue, to which I must, here as elsewhere,
+render homage, will have the whole movement, from its inception, to be
+deliberately designed; no battle intended, the siege of Tournai to be the
+only real object of the allies.</p>
+
+<p>The French apologists talk of quarrels between Eugene and Marlborough,
+take for granted a plan of assault against Villars, and represent the
+turning off of the army to the siege of Tournai as an afterthought. The
+truth, of course, is contained in both versions, and lies between the two.
+Eugene and Marlborough did intend a destructive assault upon Villars and
+his line, but they were early persuaded&mdash;especially by the reconnoitring
+of Cadogan&mdash;that the defensive skill of the French commander had proved
+formidable, and we may take it that the determination to besiege Tournai
+and to abandon an assault upon the main of the French forces had been
+reached at least as early as the 26th. There is no positive evidence,
+however, one way or the other, to decide these questions of motive. I rely
+upon no more than the probable intention of the men, to be deduced from
+their actions, and I do not believe that the Dutch would have had orders
+to move as early as they did unless Marlborough had decided&mdash;not later
+than the moment I have mentioned&mdash;to make Tournai the first objective of
+the campaign.</p>
+
+<p><a name="f3" id="f3" href="#f3.1">[3]</a> Mr Fortescue in his work makes it the 23rd. I cannot conceive the
+basis for such an error. The whole story of the 24th, 25th, 26th, 27th,
+28th, and 29th is in the French archives, together with full details of
+the capitulation on the 29th and 30th.</p>
+
+<p><a name="f4" id="f4" href="#f4.1">[4]</a> As usual, there is a contradiction in the records. The French record
+definitely ascribes the proposal to Marlborough. Marlborough, in a letter
+to his wife of 5th August, as definitely ascribes it to Surville; and
+there is no positive evidence one way or the other, though Louis&#8217;
+rejection of the terms and the ability of calculation and the character of
+the two men certainly make it more probable that Marlborough and not
+Surville was the author of the proposition.</p>
+
+<p><a name="f5" id="f5" href="#f5.1">[5]</a> The dispute as to who was the author of the suggestion for an
+armistice is further illumined by this refusal on the part of the allies.
+The proposal to contain Tournai and yet to have free their vast forces in
+operation elsewhere, if a trifle crude, was certainly to their advantage,
+and as certainly to the disadvantage of the French.</p>
+
+<p><a name="f6" id="f6" href="#f6.1">[6]</a> This excellent phrase is Mr Fortescue&#8217;s.</p>
+
+<p><a name="f7" id="f7" href="#f7.1">[7]</a> Technically the line of defence was forced, for the line of Trouille
+was but a continuation of the lines of La Bass&eacute;e&mdash;Douai&mdash;Valenciennes. So
+far as strategical results were concerned, the withdrawal of Villars
+behind the forest barrier was equivalent to the reconstruction of new
+lines, and in the event the action of Malplaquet proved that new defensive
+position to be strong enough to prevent the invasion of France. On the
+other hand, there is little doubt that if Villars had been in a little
+more strength he would have elected to fight on the old lines and not
+behind the woods.</p>
+
+<p>It must further be remarked that if the operations had not been prolonged
+as they were by the existence of the posts on the lines, notably at St
+Ghislain, the defensive position of the French would probably have been
+forced and their whole line broken as early as September 4th.</p>
+
+<p><a name="f8" id="f8" href="#f8.1">[8]</a> It is remarkable that these two roads, which are the chief feature
+both of the landscape and the local military topography, and which are of
+course as straight as taut strings, are represented upon Mr Fortescue&#8217;s
+map (vol. i. p. 424) as winding lanes, or, to speak more accurately, are
+not represented at all. In this perhaps the learned historian of the
+British army was misled by Coxe&#8217;s atlas to Marlborough&#8217;s campaign, a
+picturesque but grossly inaccurate compilation. The student who desires to
+study this action in detail will do well to consult the Belgian Ordnance
+Map on the scale of <span style="font-size: 0.8em;"><sup>1</sup></span>&frasl;<span style="font-size: 0.6em;">40,000</span> contours at 5 metres, section Roisin, and the
+French General Staff Map, <span style="font-size: 0.8em;"><sup>1</sup></span>&frasl;<span style="font-size: 0.6em;">80,000</span>, section Maubeuge, south-western
+quarter; the action being fought exactly on the frontier between Belgium
+and France, both maps are necessary. For the general strategic position
+the French <span style="font-size: 0.8em;"><sup>1</sup></span>&frasl;<span style="font-size: 0.6em;">200,000</span> in colours, sheet Maubeuge, and the adjoining sheet,
+Lille, are sufficient.</p>
+
+<p><a name="f9" id="f9" href="#f9.1">[9]</a> The reader who may compare this account of Malplaquet with others will
+be the less confused if he remembers that the forest of Sars is called on
+that extremity nearest to the gap the wood of Blaregnies, and that this
+name is often extended, especially in English accounts, to the whole
+forest.</p>
+
+<p><a name="f10" id="f10" href="#f10.1">[10]</a> These 9000 found at St Ghislain a belated post of 200 French, who
+surrendered. Someone had forgotten them.</p>
+
+<p><a name="f11" id="f11" href="#f11.1">[11]</a> For the discussion of this see later on p. <a href="#Page_75">75</a>.</p>
+
+<p><a name="f12" id="f12" href="#f12.1">[12]</a> They were commanded by Hamilton and Tullibardine. It is to be
+remarked that the command of the whole of the left of the Prince of
+Orange&#8217;s force, though it was not half Scotch, was under the command of
+Hamilton and Douglas. The two regiments of Tullibardine and Hepburn were
+under the personal command of the Marquis of Tullibardine, the heir of
+Atholl.</p>
+
+<p><a name="f13" id="f13" href="#f13.1">[13]</a> Nominally under Tilly, but practically under the young Royal
+commander.</p>
+
+<p><a name="f14" id="f14" href="#f14.1">[14]</a> Villars, wounded and fainting with pain, had been taken from the
+field an hour or two before, and the whole command was now in the hands of
+Boufflers.</p>
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+<pre>
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Malplaquet, by Hilaire Belloc
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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Malplaquet, by Hilaire Belloc
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Malplaquet
+
+Author: Hilaire Belloc
+
+Release Date: May 5, 2010 [EBook #32257]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MALPLAQUET ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by The Online Distributed Proofreading Team at
+https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images
+generously made available by The Internet Archive/Canadian
+Libraries.)
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+MALPLAQUET
+
+
+
+[Illustration: _Malplaquet._
+
+_Frontispiece._]
+
+
+
+
+  MALPLAQUET
+
+
+  BY
+  HILAIRE BELLOC
+
+
+  LONDON
+  STEPHEN SWIFT & CO., LTD.
+  10 JOHN STREET, ADELPHI
+  1911
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+
+                                                     PAGE
+
+    I. THE POLITICAL MEANING OF MALPLAQUET              9
+
+   II. THE SIEGE OF TOURNAI                            27
+
+  III. THE MANOEUVRING FOR POSITION                    45
+
+   IV. THE PRELIMINARIES OF THE BATTLE                 52
+
+    V. THE ACTION                                      65
+
+
+
+
+LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
+
+
+                                                     PAGE
+
+  Sketch Map showing how the Lines of La Bassee
+    blocked the advance of the Allies on Paris,
+    and Marlborough's plan for turning them by
+    the successive capture of Tournai and Mons         19
+
+  Sketch Map showing how the Allies, holding
+    Lille, thrust the French back on to the
+    defensive line St Venant-Valenciennes, and
+    thus cut off the French garrisons of Ypres,
+    Tournai, and Mons                                  28
+
+  Sketch Map showing complete investment of
+    Tournai                                            34
+
+  Sketch Map showing the lines of woods behind
+    Mons, with the two gaps of Boussu and Aulnois      48
+
+  The Elements of the Action of Malplaquet,
+    September 11th, 1709                               66
+
+  Sketch Map showing the peril the French centre
+    ran towards noon of being turned on its left       79
+
+  Sketch Map showing Marlborough bringing up
+    troops to the centre for the final and
+    successful attack upon the entrenchments           84
+
+
+
+
+MALPLAQUET
+
+
+
+
+I
+
+THE POLITICAL MEANING OF MALPLAQUET
+
+
+That political significance which we must seek in all military history,
+and without which that history cannot be accurate even upon its technical
+side, may be stated for the battle of Malplaquet in the following terms.
+
+Louis XIV. succeeding to a cautious and constructive period in the
+national life of France, this in its turn succeeding to the long impotence
+of the religious wars, found at his orders when his long minority was
+ended a society not only eager and united, but beginning also to give
+forth the fruit due to three active generations of discussion and combat.
+
+Every department of the national life manifested an extreme vitality, and,
+while the orderly and therefore convincing scheme of French culture
+imposed itself upon Western Europe, there followed in its wake the triumph
+of French arms; the king in that triumph nearly perfected a realm which
+would have had for its limits those of ancient Gaul.
+
+It would be too long a matter to describe, even in general terms, the
+major issues depending upon Louis XIV.'s national ambitions and their
+success or failure.
+
+In one aspect he stands for the maintenance of Catholic civilisation
+against the Separatist and dissolving forces of the Protestant North; in
+another he is the permanent antagonist of the Holy Roman Empire, or rather
+of the House of Austria, which had attained to a permanent hegemony
+therein. An extravagant judgment conceives his great successes as a menace
+to the corporate independence of Europe, or--upon the other view--as the
+opportunity for the founding of a real European unity.
+
+But all these general considerations may, for the purposes of military
+history, be regarded in the single light of the final and decisive action
+which Louis XIV. took when he determined in the year 1701 to support the
+claims of his young grandson to the throne of Spain. This it was which
+excited against him a universal coalition, and acts following upon that
+main decision drew into the coalition the deciding factor of Great
+Britain.
+
+The supremacy of French arms had endured in Europe for forty years when
+the Spanish policy was decided on. Louis was growing old. That financial
+exhaustion which almost invariably follows a generation of high national
+activity, and which is almost invariably masked by pompous outward state,
+was a reality already present though as yet undiscovered in the condition
+of France.
+
+It was at the close of that year 1701 that the French king had determined
+upon a union of the two crowns of France and Spain in his own family. His
+forces occupied the Spanish Netherlands, which we now call the Kingdom of
+Belgium; others of his armies were spread along the Rhine, or were acting
+in Northern Italy--for the coalition at once began to make itself felt.
+Two men of genius combined in an exact agreement, the qualities of each
+complementing the defects of the other, to lead the main armies that were
+operating against the French. These men were Prince Eugene of Savoy
+(French by birth and training, a voluntary exile, and inspired throughout
+his life by a determination to avenge himself upon Louis XIV.), and the
+Englishman John Churchill, Duke of Marlborough.
+
+The combination of such a pair was irresistible. Its fruit appeared almost
+at the inception of the new situation in the great victory of Blenheim.
+
+This action, fought in August 1704, was the first great defeat French arms
+had registered in that generation. Henceforward the forces commanded from
+Versailles were compelled to stand upon the defensive.
+
+To Blenheim succeeded one blow after another. In 1706 the great battle of
+Ramillies, in 1708 the crushing action of Oudenarde, confirmed the
+supremacy of the allies and the abasement of France. By the opening of
+1709 the final defeat of Louis and his readiness to sue for peace were
+taken for granted.
+
+The financial exhaustion which I have said was already present, though
+hardly suspected, in 1701, was grown by 1709 acute. The ordinary methods
+of recruitment for the French army--which nominally, of course, was upon a
+voluntary basis--had long reached and passed their limit. The failure of
+the harvest in 1708, followed by a winter of terrible severity, had
+completed the catastrophe, and with the ensuing spring of 1709 Louis had
+no alternative but to approach the allies with terms of surrender.
+
+It seemed as though at last the way to Paris lay open. The forces of the
+allies in the Netherlands were not only numerically greatly superior to
+any which the exhausted French could now set against them, but in their
+equipment, in their supplies, the nourishment of the men, and every
+material detail, they were upon a footing wholly superior to the
+corresponding units of the enemy, man for man. They had further the
+incalculable advantage of prestige. Victory seemed normal to them, defeat
+to their opponents; and so overwhelming were the chances of the coalition
+against Louis that its leaders determined with judgment to demand from
+that monarch the very fullest and most humiliating terms.
+
+Though various sections of the allies differed severally as to their
+objects and requirements, their general purpose of completely destroying
+the power of France for offence, of recapturing all her conquests, and in
+particular of driving the Bourbons from the throne of Spain, was held in
+common, and vigorously pursued.
+
+Marlborough was as active as any in pushing the demands to the furthest
+possible point; Eugene, the ruling politicians of the English, the Dutch,
+and the German princes were agreed.
+
+Louis naturally made every effort to lessen the blow, though he regarded
+his acceptance of grave and permanent humiliation as inevitable. The
+negotiations were undertaken at the Hague, and were protracted. They
+occupied the late spring of 1709 and stretched into the beginning of
+summer. The French king was prepared (as his instructions to his
+negotiators show) to give up every point, though he strove to bargain for
+what remained after each concession. He would lose the frontier
+fortresses, which were the barrier of his kingdom in the north-east. He
+would even consent to the abandonment of Spain to Austria.
+
+Had that peace been declared for which the captains of Europe were
+confidently preparing, the future history of our civilisation would have
+proved materially different from what it has become. It is to be presumed
+that a complete breakdown of the strength of France would have followed;
+that the monarchy at Versailles would have sunk immediately into such
+disrepute that the eighteenth century would have seen France divided and
+possibly a prey to civil war, and one may even conclude that the great
+events of a century later, the Revolution and the campaigns of Napoleon,
+could not have sprung from so enfeebled a society.
+
+It so happened, however, that one of those slight miscalculations which
+are productive in history of its chief consequences, prevented the
+complete humiliation of Louis XIV. The demands of the allies were pushed
+in one last respect just beyond the line which it was worth the while of
+the defeated party to accept, for it was required of the old king not only
+that he should yield in every point, not only that he should abandon the
+claims of his own grandson to the throne of Spain (which throne Louis
+himself had now, after eight years of wise administration, singularly
+strengthened), but himself take arms against that grandson and co-operate
+in his proper shame by helping to oust him from it. It was stipulated that
+Louis should so act (if his grandson should show resistance and still
+clung to his throne) in company with those who had been for so many years
+his bitter and successful foes.
+
+This last small item in the programme of the victors changed all. It
+destroyed in the mind of Louis and of his subjects the advantages of the
+disgraceful peace which they had thought themselves compelled to accept;
+and, as Louis himself well put it, if he were still compelled to carry on
+the war, it was better to fail in pursuing it against his enemies than
+against his own household.
+
+The king issued to the authorities of his kingdom and to his people a
+circular letter, which remains a model of statesmanlike appeal. Grave,
+brief, and resolute, it exactly expressed the common mood of the moment.
+It met with an enthusiastic response. The depleted countrysides just
+managed to furnish the armies with a bare pittance of oats and rye (for
+wheat was unobtainable). Recruits appeared in unexpected numbers; and
+though none could believe that the issue could be other than disastrous,
+the campaign of 1709 was undertaken by a united nation.
+
+Of French offensive action against the overwhelming forces of their
+enemies there could be no question. Villars, who commanded the armies of
+Louis XIV. upon the north-eastern frontier, opposing Marlborough and
+Eugene, drew up a line of defence consisting of entrenchments, flooded
+land, and the use of existing watercourses, a line running from the
+neighbourhood of Douai away eastward to the Belgian frontier. Behind this
+line, with his headquarters at La Bassee,[1] he waited the fatal assault.
+
+It was at the close of June that the enemy's great forces moved. Their
+first action was not an attempt to penetrate the line but to take the
+fortresses upon its right, which taken, the defence might be turned. They
+therefore laid siege to Tournai, the first of the two fortresses guarding
+the right of the French line. (Mons was the second.)
+
+Here the first material point in the campaign showed the power of
+resistance that tradition and discipline yet maintained in the French
+army. The long resistance of Tournai and its small garrison largely
+determined what was to follow. Its siege had been undertaken in the hope
+of its rapid termination, which the exiguity of its garrison and the
+impossibility of its succour rendered probable. But though Marlborough had
+established his headquarters before the place by the evening of the 27th
+of June, and Eugene upon the next day, the 28th, though trenches were
+opened in the first week of July and the first of the heavy fighting
+began upon the 8th of that month, though the town itself was occupied
+after a fortnight's struggle, yet it was not until the 3rd of September
+that the citadel surrendered.
+
+This protracted resistance largely determined what was to follow. While it
+lasted no action could be undertaken against Villars. Meanwhile the French
+forces were growing stronger, and, most important of all, the first
+results of the harvest began to be felt.
+
+Tournai once taken, it was the business of the allies to pierce the French
+line of defence as soon as possible, and with that object to bring Villars
+to battle and to defeat him.
+
+The plan chosen for this object was as follows:--
+
+The allied army to march to the extreme right of the positions which the
+French could hope to defend. There the allies would contain the little
+garrison of Mons. Thither the mass of the French forces must march in
+order to bar the enemy's advance upon Paris, and upon some point near Mons
+the whole weight of the allies could fall upon them, destroy them, and
+leave the way to the capital open.
+
+
+[Illustration: Sketch Map showing how the Lines of La Bassee blocked the
+advance of the Allies on Paris, and Marlborough's plan for turning them by
+the successive capture of Tournai and Mons.]
+
+
+The plan was strategically wise. The lines of La Bassee proper could not
+be pierced, but this right extremity of the French positions was backed by
+easy country; the swamps, canals, and entrenchments of the main line to
+the north and west were absent. With the defeat of the inferior French
+forces at this point all obstacle to an advance into the heart of France
+would be removed.
+
+The plan was as rapidly executed as it was skilfully devised. Actually
+before the capitulation of the citadel of Tournai, but when it was
+perceived that that capitulation could only be a matter of hours, Lord
+Orkney had begun to advance upon the neighbourhood of Mons. Upon the day
+of the capitulation of Tournai, the Prince of Hesse-Cassel had started for
+Mons, Cadogan following him with the cavalry. Less than twenty-four hours
+after Tournai had yielded, the whole allied army was on the march
+throughout the night. Never was a military operation performed with
+organisation more exact, or with obedience more prompt. Three days later
+Mons was contained, and by Monday the 9th of September Villars awaited,
+some few miles to the west of that fortress, the assault of the allies.
+
+There followed two days of delay, which will be discussed in detail
+later. For the purposes of this introductory survey of the political
+meaning of the battle, it is enough to fix the date, Wednesday, 11th
+September 1709. A little before eight o'clock on the morning of that day
+the first cannon-shot of the battle of Malplaquet was fired. To the
+numerical superiority of the allies the French could oppose entrenchment
+and that character in the locality of the fight, or "terrain," which will
+be fully described on a later page. To the superior _moral_, equipment,
+and subsistence of the allies, however, it was doubtful whether any factor
+could be discovered on the French side.
+
+An unexpected enthusiasm lent something to the French resistance; the
+delay of two days lent something more to their defensive power. As will be
+seen in the sequel, certain errors (notably upon the left of Marlborough's
+line) also contributed to the result, and the whole day was passed in a
+series of attacks and counter-attacks which left the French forces intact,
+and permitted them in the early afternoon to rely upon the exhaustion of
+the enemy and to leave, in order and without loss, the field to the enemy.
+
+Marlborough's victory at Malplaquet was both honourable and great. The
+French were compelled to withdraw; the allies occupied upon the evening
+of the battle the ground upon which the struggle had taken place. It is
+with justice that Malplaquet is counted as the fourth of those great
+successful actions which distinguish the name of Marlborough, and it is
+reckoned with justice the conclusion of the series whose three other terms
+are Blenheim, Ramillies, and Oudenarde. So much might suffice did war
+consist in scoring points as one does in a game. But when we consider war
+as alone it should be considered for the serious purposes of history--that
+is, in its political aspect; and when we ask what Malplaquet was in the
+political sequence of European events, the withdrawal of the French from
+the field in the early afternoon of September 11, 1709, has no
+significance comparable to the fact that the allies could not pursue.
+
+Strategically the victory meant that an army which it was intended to
+destroy had maintained itself intact; morally, the battle left the
+defeated more elated than the victors; and for this reason, that the
+result was so much more in their favour than the expectation had been. In
+what is most important of all, the general fortunes of the campaign, the
+victory of the allies at Malplaquet was as sure a signal that the advance
+on Paris could not be made, and as sure a prevention of that advance as
+though Marlborough and Eugene had registered, not a success, but a defeat.
+
+Situations of this sort, which render victories barren or actually
+negative, paradoxical to the general reader, simple enough in their
+military aspect, abound in the history of war. It is perhaps more
+important to explain them if one is to make military history intelligible
+than to describe the preliminaries and movements of the great decisive
+action.
+
+The "block" of Malplaquet (to use the metaphor which is common in French
+history), the unexpected power of resistance which this last of the French
+armies displayed, and the moral effect of that resistance upon the allies,
+have an historical meaning almost as high as that of Blenheim upon the
+other side. It has been well said that one may win every battle and yet
+lose a campaign; there is a sense in which it may be said that one may win
+a campaign and suffer political loss as the result.
+
+Malplaquet was the turning-point after which it was evident that the
+decline of the French position in Europe would go no further. As Blenheim
+had marked the turn of the tide against Louis, so Malplaquet marked the
+slack water when the tide was ready to turn in his favour. After Blenheim
+it was certain that the ambition of Louis XIV. was checked, and probable
+that it would wholly fail. After Malplaquet it was equally certain that
+the total destruction of Louis' power was impossible, that the project of
+a march on Paris might be abandoned, and that the last phases of the great
+war would diminish the chances of the allies.
+
+The Dutch (whose troops in particular had been annihilated upon the left
+of the field) did indeed maintain their uncompromising attitude, but no
+longer with the old certitude of success; Austria also and her allies did
+continue the war, but a war doomed to puerility, to a sort of stale-mate
+bound to end in compromise. But it was in England that the effect of the
+battle was most remarkable.
+
+In England, where opinion had but tardily accepted the necessity for war
+nine years before, and where the fruits of that war were now regarded as
+quite sufficient for the satisfaction of English demands, this negative
+action, followed by no greater fruit than the capitulation of the little
+garrison at Mons, began the agitation for peace. Look closely at that
+agitation through its details, and personal motives will confuse you; the
+motives of the queen, of Harley, of Marlborough's enemies. Look at it in
+the general light of the national history and you will perceive that the
+winter following Malplaquet, a winter of disillusionment and discontent,
+bred in England an opinion that made peace certain at last. The accusation
+against Marlborough that he fought the battle with an eye to his failing
+political position is probably unjust. The accusation that he fought it
+from a lust of bloodshed is certainly a stupid calumny. But the
+unpopularity of so great a man succeeding upon so considerable a technical
+success sufficiently proves at what a price the barrenness of that success
+was estimated in England. It was the English Government that first opened
+secret negotiations with Louis for peace in the following year; and when
+the great instrument which closed the war was signed at Utrecht in 1713,
+it was after the English troops had been withdrawn from their allies,
+after Eugene, acting single-handed, had suffered serious check, and in
+general the Peace of Utrecht was concluded under conditions far more
+favourable to Louis than would have been any peace signed at the Hague in
+1709. The Spanish Netherlands were ceded to Austria, but France kept
+intact what is still her Belgian frontier. She preserved what she has
+since lost on the frontier of the Rhine, and (most remarkable of all!) the
+grandson of Louis was permitted to remain upon the Spanish throne.
+
+Such is the general political setting of this fierce action, one of the
+most determined known in the history of European arms, and therefore one
+of the most legitimately glorious; one in which men were most ready at the
+call of duty and under the influences of discipline to sacrifice their
+lives in the defence of a common cause; and one which, as all such
+sacrifices must, illumines the history of the several national traditions
+concerned, of the English as of the Dutch, of the German principalities as
+of the French.
+
+No action better proves the historical worth of valour.
+
+
+
+
+II
+
+THE SIEGE OF TOURNAI
+
+
+When the negotiations for peace had failed, that is, with the opening of
+June 1709, the King of France and his forces had particularly to dread an
+invasion of the country and the march on Paris.
+
+The accompanying sketch map will show under what preoccupations the French
+commander upon the north-eastern frontier lay.
+
+Lille was in the hands of the enemy. There was still a small French
+garrison in Ypres, another in Tournai, and a third in Mons. These of
+themselves (considering that Lille, the great town, was now occupied by
+the allies, and considering also the width of the gap between Ypres and
+Tournai) could not prevent the invasion and the advance on the capital.
+
+It was necessary to oppose some more formidable barrier to the line of
+advance which topography marked out for the allies into the heart of
+France.
+
+
+[Illustration: Sketch Map showing how the Allies holding Lille thrust the
+French back on to the defensive line St Venant-Valenciennes, and thus cut
+off the French garrisons of Ypres, Tournai, and Mons.]
+
+
+Some fear was indeed expressed lest a descent should be made on the coasts
+and an advance attempted along the valley of the Somme. The fear was
+groundless. To organise the transportation of troops thus by sea, to
+disembark them, to bring and continue the enormous supply of provisions
+and ammunition they would require, was far less practical than to use the
+great forces already drawn up under Marlborough and Eugene in the Low
+Countries. Of what size these forces were we shall see in a moment.
+
+The barrier, then, which Villars at the head of the French forces
+proceeded to erect, and which is known in history as "The Lines of La
+Bassee," are the first point upon which we must fix our attention in order
+to understand the campaign of Malplaquet, and why that battle took place
+where it did.
+
+It was upon the 3rd of June that Louis XIV. had written to Villars telling
+him that a renewal of the war would now be undertaken. On the 14th,
+Villars began to throw up earth for the formation of an entrenched camp
+between the marshy ground of Hulluch and that of Cuinchy. Here he proposed
+to concentrate the mass of his forces, with La Bassee just before him,
+the town of Lens behind. He used the waterways and the swamped ground in
+front and to the right for the formation of his defensive lines. These
+followed the upper valley of the Deule, the line of its canal, and finally
+reposed their right upon the river Scarpe. Though the regularly fortified
+line went no further than the camp near La Bassee, he also threw up a
+couple of entrenchments in front of Bethune and St Venant in order to
+cover any march he might have to make towards his left should the enemy
+attempt to turn him in that direction.
+
+It must further be noted that from the Scarpe eastward went the old "lines
+of La Trouille" thrown up in a former campaign, and now largely useless,
+but still covering, after a fashion, the neighbourhood of Mons.
+
+Toward the end of the month of June Villars awaited the advance of the
+allies. His forces were inferior by 40,000 to those of his enemy. He had
+but eight men to their twelve. The season of the year, immediately
+preceding the harvest, made the victualling of his troops exceedingly
+difficult, nor was it until the day before the final assault was expected
+that the moneys necessary to their pay, and to the other purposes of the
+army, reached him; but he had done what he could, and, acting upon a
+national tradition which is as old as Rome, he had very wisely depended
+upon fortification.
+
+The same conditions of the season which produced something like famine in
+the French camp, though they did not press equally severely upon that of
+the allies, rendered difficult the provisioning of their vast army also.
+
+It was the first intention of Marlborough and Eugene to attack the lines
+at once, to force them, and to destroy the command of Villars. But these
+lines had been carefully reconnoitred, notably by Cadogan, who, with a
+party of English officers, and under a disguise, had made himself
+acquainted with their strength. It was determined, therefore, at the last
+moment, partly also from the fears of the Dutch, to whom the possession of
+every fortress upon the frontier was of paramount importance, to make but
+a "feint" upon Villars' lines and to direct the army upon Tournai as its
+true object. The feint took the form of Eugene's marching towards the left
+or western extremity of the line, Marlborough towards the eastern or right
+extremity near Douai, and this general movement was effected on the night
+of the 26th and 27th of June. In the midst of its execution, the feint
+(which for the moment deceived Villars) was arrested.
+
+The 27th was passed without a movement, Villars refusing to leave his
+entrenchments, and the commanders of the allies giving no hint of their
+next intention. But during that same day Tilly with the Dutch had appeared
+before Tournai. On the evening of the day Marlborough himself was before
+the town. On the 28th Prince Eugene joined both the Dutch and Marlborough
+before the town, taking up his headquarters at Froyennes, Marlborough
+being at Willemeau, and the Dutch, under Tilly, already established on the
+east of Tournai from Antoing to Constantin, just opposite Eugene, where
+they threw a bridge across the Scheldt. By the evening of the 28th,
+therefore, Tournai was invested on every side, and the great allied armies
+of between 110,000 and 120,000 men had abandoned all hope of carrying
+Villars' lines, and had sat down to the capture of the frontier
+fortress.[2]
+
+A comprehension of this siege of Tournai, which so largely determined the
+fortunes of the campaign of Malplaquet, will be aided by the accompanying
+sketch map. Here it is apparent that Marlborough with his headquarters at
+Willemeau, Eugene with his at Froyennes, the Dutch under Tilly in a
+semicircle from Antoing to Constantin, completed the investment of the
+fortress, and that the existing bridge at Antoing which the Dutch
+commanded, the bridge at Constantin which they had constructed, giving
+access over the river to the north and to the south, made the circle
+complete.
+
+
+[Illustration: Sketch Map showing complete investment of Tournai.]
+
+
+The fortifications of Tournai were excellent. Vauban had superintended
+that piece of engineering in person, and the scheme of the fortifications
+was remarkable from the strength of the citadel which lay apart from the
+town (though within its ring of earthworks) to the south. The traveller
+can still recognise in its abandonment this enormous achievement of Louis
+XIV.'s sappers, and the opposition it was about to offer to the great
+hosts of Marlborough and Eugene does almost as much honour to the genius
+of the French engineer as to the tenacity of the little garrison then
+defending it.
+
+Two factors in the situation must first be appreciated by the reader.
+
+The first is that the inferiority of Villars' force made it impossible for
+him to do more than demonstrate against the army of observation. He was
+compelled to leave Tournai to its fate, and, indeed, the king in his first
+instructions, Villars in his reply, had taken it for granted that either
+that town or Ypres would be besieged and must fall. But the value of a
+fortress depends not upon its inviolability (for that can never be
+reckoned with), but upon the length of time during which it can hold out,
+and in this respect Tournai was to give full measure.
+
+Secondly, it must be set down for the allies that their unexpectedly long
+task was hampered by exceptional weather. Rain fell continually, and
+though their command of the Scheldt lessened in some degree the problem of
+transport, rain in those days upon such roads as the allies drew their
+supplies by was a heavy handicap. The garrison of Tournai numbered
+thirteen and a half battalions, five detached companies, the complement of
+gunners necessary for the artillery, and a couple of Irish brigades--in
+all, counting the depleted condition of the French units at the moment,
+some six to seven thousand men. Perhaps, counting every combatant and
+non-combatant attached to the garrison, a full seven thousand men.
+
+The command of this force was under Surville, in rank a
+lieutenant-general. Ravignon and Dolet were his subordinates. There was no
+lack of wheat for so small a force. Rationed, it was sufficient for four
+months. Meat made default, and, what was important with a large civil
+population encumbering the little garrison, money. Surville, the bishop,
+and others melted down their plate; even that of the altars in the town
+was sacrificed.
+
+The first trench was opened on the night of the 7th of July, and three
+first attacks were delivered: one by the gate called Marvis, which looks
+eastward, another by the gate of Valenciennes, the third at the gate known
+as that of the Seven Springs. A sortie of the second of these was fairly
+successful, and upon this model the operations continued for five days.
+
+By the end of that time a hundred heavy pieces had come up the Scheldt
+from Ghent, and sixty mortars as well. Four great batteries were formed.
+That to the south opened fire upon the 13th of July, and on the 14th the
+three others joined it.
+
+The discipline maintained in the great camps of the besiegers was severe,
+and the besieged experienced the unusual recruitment of five hundred to
+six hundred deserters who penetrated within their lines. A considerable
+body of deserters also betook themselves to Villars' lines, and the
+operations in these first days were sufficiently violent to account for
+some four thousand killed and wounded upon the side of the allies.
+Villars, meanwhile, could do no more than demonstrate without effect.
+Apart from the inferiority of his force, it was still impossible for him,
+until the harvest was gathered, to establish a sufficient accumulation of
+wheat to permit a forward movement. He never had four days' provision of
+bread at any one time, nor, considering the length of his line, could he
+concentrate it upon any one place. He was fed by driblets from day to day,
+and lived from hand to mouth while the siege of Tournai proceeded to the
+east of him.
+
+That siege was entering, with the close of the month, upon the end of its
+first phase.
+
+It had been a desperate combat of mine and counter-mine even where the
+general circumvallation of the town was concerned, though the worst, of
+course, was to come when the citadel should be attacked. The batteries
+against the place had been increased until they counted one hundred and
+twelve heavy pieces and seventy mortars. On the night of the 24th of July
+the covered way on the right of the Scheldt was taken at heavy loss;
+forty-eight hours later the covered way on the left between the river and
+the citadel. The horn work in front of the Gate of the Seven Springs was
+carried on the 27th, and the isolated work between this point and the Gate
+of Lille upon the following day. Surville in his report, in the true
+French spirit of self-criticism, ascribed to the culpable failure of
+their defenders the loss of these outworks. But the loss, whatever its
+cause, determined the loss of the town. A few hours later practicable
+breaches had been made in the walls, ways were filled in over the ditches,
+and on the imminence of a general assault Surville upon the 28th demanded
+terms. The capitulation was signed on the 29th, and with it the commander
+sent a letter to Versailles detailing his motives for demanding terms for
+the civilian population. Finally, upon the 30th,[3] Surville with 4000
+men, all that was left of his original force of 7000, retired into the
+citadel and there disposed himself for as a long a resistance as might be.
+As his good fortune decided, he was to be able to hold with this small
+force for five full weeks.
+
+To Marlborough is due the honour of the capitulation. The besieging troops
+were under his command, while Eugene directed the army of observation to
+the west. Marlborough put some eight thousand men into the town under
+Albemarle. A verbal understanding was given on both sides that the
+citadel would not fire upon the civilian part, nor the allies make an
+attack from it upon the citadel, and the siege of that stronghold began
+upon the following day, the 21st, towards evening. The operations against
+the citadel proved far more severe and a far greater trial to
+Marlborough's troops than those against the general circumvallation of the
+town. The subterranean struggle of mine and counter-mine particularly
+affected the moral of the allies, and after a week a proposal appeared[4]
+that the active fighting should cease, the siege be converted into a
+blockade, and only the small number of men sufficient for such a blockade
+be left before the citadel until the 5th of September, up to which date, a
+month ahead, at the utmost, it was believed the garrison could hold out.
+Louis was willing to accept the terms upon the condition that this month
+should be one of general truce. The allies refused this condition, and
+hostilities were resumed.[5]
+
+The force employed for containing the citadel and for prosecuting its
+siege had no necessity to be very large.
+
+It was warfare of a terrible kind. Men met underground in the mines, were
+burned alive when these were sprung, were exhausted, sometimes to death,
+in the subterranean and perilous labour. The mass of the army was free to
+menace Villars and his main body.
+
+But the admirable engineering which had instructed and completed the lines
+of La Bassee still checked the allies, in spite of superior numbers and
+provisionment still superior.
+
+The effect of the harvest was indeed just beginning to be felt, and the
+French general was beginning to have a little more elbow-room, so to
+speak, for the disposition of his men through the gradual replenishment of
+his stores. But even so, Marlborough and Eugene had very greatly the
+advantage of him in this respect.
+
+When the siege of the citadel of Tournai had been proceeding a little more
+than a week, upon the 8th of August the main body of the allies fell
+suddenly upon Marchiennes. Here the river Scarpe defended the main French
+positions. The town itself lay upon the further bank like a bastion. The
+attack was made under Tilly, and, consonantly to the strength of all
+Villars' defensive positions, that attack failed. On the night of the 9th
+Tilly retired from before Marchiennes, after having suffered the loss of
+but a few of his men.
+
+This action, though but a detail in the campaign, is well worth noting,
+because it exhibits in a sort of section, as it were, the causes of
+Malplaquet.
+
+Malplaquet, as we shall see in a moment, was fought simply because it had
+been impossible to pierce Villars' line, and Malplaquet, though a victory,
+was a sterile victory, more useful to the defeated than to the victors,
+because the defence had been kept up for such a length of time and was
+able to choose its own terrain.
+
+Now all this character in the campaign preceding the battle is exemplified
+in the attempt upon Marchiennes upon August 8th and 9th and its failure.
+Had it succeeded, had the line been pierced, there would have been no
+"block" at Malplaquet but an immediate invasion of France, just as there
+would have been had the line been pierced in the first attempt of five
+weeks before.
+
+In the next week and the next, Villars continually extended that line. He
+brought it up solidly as far as St Venant on his left, as far as
+Valenciennes on his right. He continually strengthened it, so that at no
+one place should it need any considerable body of men to hold it, and that
+the mass of the army should be free to move at will behind this strong
+entrenchment and dyke, fortified as it was with careful inundation and the
+use of two large rivers.
+
+Though the body of the allies again appeared in the neighbourhood of the
+lines, no general attack was delivered, but on the 30th of August Villars
+heard from deserters and spies that the citadel of Tournai was at the end
+of its provisions. Though but a certain minority of the allied army was
+necessary to contain that citadel, yet once it had fallen the whole of the
+allied forces would be much freer to act.
+
+It was upon the 31st of August that Surville, finding himself at the end
+of his provisionment of food, proposed capitulation. At first no
+capitulation could be arrived at. Marlborough insisted upon the garrison's
+complete surrender; Surville replied by threatening a destruction of the
+place. It was not until the morning of the 3rd September that a
+capitulation was signed in the form that the officers and soldiers of the
+garrison should not be free to serve the king until after they had been
+exchanged. The troops should march out with arms and colours, and should
+have safe escort through the French lines to Douai. They reached that town
+and camp upon the 4th, and an exchange of prisoners against their numbers
+was soon effected.
+
+Thus after two months ended the siege of Tournai, a piece of resistance
+which, as the reader will soon see, determined all that was to follow. Six
+thousand four hundred men had held the place when it was first invested.
+Of these, 1709 (nearly a third) had been killed; a number approximately
+equal had been wounded. The figures are sufficient to show the desperate
+character of the fighting, and how worthy this episode of war was on both
+sides of the legends that arose from it.
+
+
+
+
+III
+
+THE MANOEUVRING FOR POSITION
+
+
+With the end of the siege of Tournai both armies were free, the one for
+unfettered assault, the other to defend itself behind the lines as best it
+might.
+
+To make a frontal attack upon Villars' lines at any point was justly
+thought impossible after the past experience which Eugene and Marlborough
+had of their strength. A different plan was determined on. Mons, with its
+little garrison, should be invested, and the mass of the army should, on
+that extreme right of the French position, attempt to break through the
+old lines of the Trouille and invade France.
+
+Coincidently with the first negotiations for the capitulation of the
+citadel of Tournai, this new plan was entered upon. Lord Orkney, with the
+grenadiers of the army and between 2000 and 3000 mounted men, was sent
+off on the march to the south-east just as the first negotiations of
+Marlborough with Surville were opened. With this mobile force Orkney
+attempted to pass the Haine at St Ghislain. He all but surprised that
+point at one o'clock of the dark September night, but the French posts
+were just in time. He was beaten off, and had to cross the river higher up
+upon the eastern side of Mons, at Havre.
+
+The little check was not without its importance. It meant that the rapid
+forward march of his vanguard had failed to force that extreme extension
+of the French line, which was called "The Line of the Trouille" from the
+name of the small river that falls into the Haine near Mons. In point of
+time--which is everything in defensive warfare--the success of the defence
+at St Ghislain meant that all action by the allies was retarded for pretty
+well a week. Meanwhile, the weather had turned to persistent and harassing
+rain, the allied army, "toiling through a sea of mud,"[6] had not invested
+Mons even upon the eastern side until the evening of the 7th of September.
+On the same day Villars took advantage of a natural feature, stronger for
+purposes of defence than the line of the Trouille. This feature was the
+belt of forest-land which lies south and a little west of Mons, between
+that town and Bavai. He strengthened such forces as he had on the line of
+the Trouille (the little posts which had checked the first advance upon
+Mons, as I have said), concentrated the whole army just behind and west of
+the forest barrier, and watching the two gaps of that barrier, whose
+importance will be explained in a moment, he lay, upon the morning of
+Sunday, September the 8th, in a line which stretched from the river Haine
+at Montreuil to the bridge of Athis behind the woods; keeping watch upon
+his right in case he should have to move the line down south suddenly to
+meet an attack. As Villars so lay, he was in the position of a man who may
+be attacked through one of two doors in a wall. Such a man would stand
+between the two doors, watching both, and ready to spring upon that one
+which might be attacked, and attempt to defend it. The wall was the wall
+of wood, the two doors were the opening by Boussu and the other narrow
+opening which is distinguished by the name of Aulnois, the principal
+village at its mouth. It was this last which was to prove in the event the
+battlefield.
+
+All this I must make plainer and elaborate in what follows, and close
+this section by a mere statement of the manoeuvring for position.
+
+
+[Illustration: Sketch Map showing the Lines of Woods behind Mons, with the
+two gaps of Boussu and Aulnois.]
+
+
+Villars lying, as I have said, with his right at Athis, his left on the
+river Haine at Montreuil, Marlborough countered him by bringing the main
+of his forces over the Trouille[7] so that they lay from Quevy to
+Quaregnon.
+
+Eugene brought up his half, and drew it up as an extension of the Duke of
+Marlborough's line, and by the evening of the Sunday and on the morning of
+the Monday, all the troops who were at Tournai having been meanwhile
+called up, the allied army lay opposite the second or southern of the two
+openings in the forest wall. Villars during the Sunday shifted somewhat
+to the left or the south in the course of the day to face the new position
+of his enemy. It was evident upon that Monday morning the 9th of September
+that the action, when it was forced, would be in the second and
+southernmost of the two gaps. On that same Monday morning Villars brought
+the whole of his army still further south and was now right in front of
+the allies and barring the gap of Aulnois. By ten o'clock the centre of
+the French forces was drawn up in front of the hamlet of Malplaquet, by
+noon it had marched forward not quite a mile, stretched from wood to wood,
+and awaited the onslaught. A few ineffective cannon-shots were exchanged,
+but the expected attack was not delivered. Vastly to the advantage of the
+French and to the inexplicable prejudice of the allies Marlborough and
+Eugene wasted all that Monday and all the Tuesday following: the result we
+shall see when we come to the battle, for Villars used every moment of his
+respite to entrench and fortify without ceasing.
+
+With the drawing up of the French army across the gap, however, ends the
+manoeuvring for position, and under the title of "The Preliminaries of
+the Battle" I will next describe the arrival of Boufflers--a moral
+advantage not to be despised--the terrain, the French defences, and the
+full effect of the unexpected delay upon the part of the allies.
+
+
+
+
+IV
+
+THE PRELIMINARIES OF THE BATTLE
+
+
+The arrival of Louis Francis, Duke of Boufflers, peer and marshal of
+France, upon the frontier and before the army of defence, was one of those
+intangible advantages which the civilian historian will tend to exaggerate
+and the military to belittle, but which, though not susceptible of
+calculation or measurement, may always prove of vast consequence to a
+force, and have sometimes decided between victory and defeat. This
+advantage did not lie in Boufflers' singular capacity for command, nor, as
+will presently be seen, was he entrusted with the supreme direction of the
+action that was to follow. He was a great general. His service under arms
+had occupied the whole of his life and energies; he was to have a high and
+worthy reputation in the particular province of his career. But much more
+than this, the magic of his name and the just prestige which attached to
+the integrity and valour of the man went before him with a spiritual
+influence which every soldier felt, and which reanimated the whole body of
+the defence. His record was peculiarly suited for the confirmation of men
+who were fighting against odds, under disappointment, at the end of a long
+series of defeats, and on a last line to which the national arms had been
+thrust back after five years of almost uninterrupted failure.
+
+Boufflers at this moment was in his 66th year, and seemed older. His
+masterful, prominent face, large, direct, humorous in expression, full of
+command, was an index of a life well lived in the business of
+organisation, of obedience, and at last of supreme direction. Years ago at
+Namur his tenacity, under the pressure of a superior offensive, had earned
+him the particular character which he now bore. Only the year before, his
+conduct of the siege of Lille, when he had determinedly held out against
+the certitude of ultimate surrender, had refused to yield the place even
+after receiving orders from his sovereign, and had finally obtained, by
+his unshakable determination, a capitulation of the most honourable kind,
+was fresh in the minds of all. There is a story that on his arrival in the
+French camp the cheers with which he was greeted reached the opposing
+line, and that the allies were moved by the enormous rumour to expect an
+instant assault. He was one of those leaders who, partly through their
+legend, more through their real virtue, are a sort of flag and symbol to
+the soldiery who have the good fortune to receive their command.
+
+Nine years the senior in age of Villars, of a military experience far
+superior, in rank again possessed of the right to supreme command (for he
+had received the grade of marshal long before), he none the less
+determined to put himself wholly at Villars' orders, for he knew of what
+importance was continuity of direction in the face of the enemy. At the
+end of the last campaign, when he had expected peace, he had honourably
+retired. His life was nearing its close; in two years he was to die. He
+sacrificed both the pretension and the fact of superiority so dear to the
+commander, and told Villars that he came simply as a volunteer to aid as
+best he might, and to support the supreme command in the coming fight.
+
+He had arrived at Arras on the same day that Tournai had surrendered. Upon
+the morrow he had reached Villars' headquarters near Douai, Sin le Noble,
+in the centre of the defensive line. He had followed the easterly
+movement of the mass of the French army along that line to their present
+establishment between the two woods and to the terrain whereupon the
+action would be decided. In that action he was set at the head of the
+troops on the right, while Villars, attending in particular to the left,
+retained the general command and ordered all the disposition of the French
+force.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The landscape which lay before the French commanders when upon the Monday
+morning their line was drawn up and immediate battle expected, has changed
+hardly at all in the two hundred years between their day and ours. I will
+describe it.
+
+From the valley of the Sambre (which great river lies a day's march to the
+south of the French position) the land rises gradually upward in long
+rolls of bare fields. At the head of this slope is a typical watershed
+country, a country that is typical of watersheds in land neither hilly nor
+mountainous; small, sluggish streams, lessening to mere trickles of water
+as you rise, cut the clay; and the landscape, though at the watershed
+itself one is standing at a height of 500 feet above the sea, has the
+appearance of a plain. It is indeed difficult, without the aid of a map,
+to decide when one has passed from the one to the other side of the water
+parting, and the actual summit is, at this season of the year, a confused,
+flat stretch of open stubble fallow, and here and there coarse, heathy,
+untilled land. For two or three miles every way this level stretches,
+hummocked by slight rolls between stream and stream, and upon the actual
+watershed marked by one or two stagnant ponds. Seven miles behind you as
+you stand upon the battlefield lies the little French market town of
+Bavai, which was for centuries one of the great centres of Roman rule. It
+was the capital of the Nervii. Seven great Roman roads still strike out
+from it, to Rheims, to Cologne, to Utrecht, to Amiens, to the sea. Two in
+particular, that to Treves and that to Cologne, spreading gradually apart
+like the two neighbouring fingers of a hand, are the natural ways by which
+an army advancing to such a field or retreating from it would communicate
+with Bavai as a base.[8]
+
+The outstanding feature of this terrain is not that it is the summit of a
+watershed; indeed, as I have said, but for a map one would not guess that
+it bore this character, and to the eye it presents the appearance of a
+plain; it is rather the symmetrical arrangement of it as a broad belt of
+open land, flanked upon either side north and south by two great woods.
+That upon the right is known as the wood of Laniere, that upon the left
+bears several names in its various parts, and is easiest to remember under
+the general title of "The Forest of Sars." The gap between these two woods
+narrows to a line which is precisely 2000 yards in extent and runs from
+north-west to south-east, the two nearest points where either wood
+approaches the other being distant one from another by that distance and
+bearing one to the other upon those points of the compass. The French
+army, therefore, drawn up on the open land and stretching from wood to
+wood, faced somewhat north of east. The allies, drawn up a mile and a
+half away on the broad beginning of that gap, looked somewhat south of
+west. Behind the latter at a day's march was Mons; behind the former some
+seven miles was Bavai; and the modern frontier as well as the natural
+topographical frontier of the watershed runs just in front of what was
+then the emplacement of the French line.
+
+Upon the French side the bare fields are marked by no more than a few
+hamlets, the chief of which is the little village of Malplaquet, a few
+houses built along what is now the main road to Brussels. Certain of the
+French reserve were posted in this village, accompanied by a few sections
+of artillery, but the fields before it lay completely open to the action.
+
+Upon the Belgian side a string of considerable villages stretched; three
+of them from right to left marked the principal position of the allies.
+Their names from north to south, that is, from the left of the allies to
+the right, are Aulnois, Blaregnies, and Sars. The first of these lies
+right under the wood of Laniere; the second faces the gap between the
+woods; the third lies behind the left-hand wood, and takes its name from
+it, and is, as we have seen, called the forest of Sars.[9]
+
+The dispositions which the French army would take in such a defensive
+position were evident enough. It must defend the gap by entrenchment; it
+must put considerable forces into the woods upon the right and to the left
+of the gap to prevent the entrenchments being turned. The character of
+Villars and the French tradition of depending upon earth wherever that be
+possible, was bound, if time were accorded, to make the entrenchment of
+the open gap formidable. The large numbers engaged upon either side left a
+considerable number at the disposal of either commander, to be used by the
+one in holding the woods, by the other in attempting to force them; not
+much more than half of the French force need stand to the defence of the
+open gap. This gap was so suitable, with its bare fields after harvest,
+the absence of hedges, the insignificance of the rivulets, for the action
+of cavalry, that gates or gaps would be left in the French entrenchment
+for the use of that arm in order to allow the mounted men to pass through
+and charge as the necessity for such action might arise. In general,
+therefore, we must conceive of the French position as strong entrenchments
+thrown across the gap and lined with infantry, the cavalry drawn up behind
+to pass through the infantry when occasion might demand, through the line
+of entrenchment, and so to charge; the two woods upon either side thickly
+filled with men, and the position taken up by these defended by felled
+tree trunks and such earthwork as could be thrown up with difficulty in
+the dense undergrowth.
+
+It would be the business of the allies to try and force this line, either
+by carrying the central entrenchments across the gap or by turning the
+French left flank in the forest of Sars or the French right flank in the
+wood of Laniere, or by both of these attempts combined; for it must be
+remembered that the numerical superiority of the allies gave them a choice
+of action. Should either the stand on the left or that on the right be
+forced, the French line would be turned and the destruction of the army
+completed. Should the centre be pierced effectively and in time, the
+Northern half of the army so severed would certainly be destroyed, for
+there was no effective line of retreat; the Southern half might or might
+not escape towards the valley of the Sambre. In either case a decisive
+victory would destroy the last of the French bodies of defence and would
+open the way for an almost uninterrupted march upon Paris.
+
+It will be self-evident to the reader that what with Villars' known
+methods, his dependence upon his engineers, the tradition of the French
+service in this respect, the inferior numbers of the French forces, and
+the glaring necessities of the position, earthworks would be a deciding
+factor in the result.
+
+Now the value of entrenchment is a matter of time, and before proceeding
+to a description of the action we must, if we are to understand its
+result, appreciate how great an advantage was conferred upon the French by
+the delay in the attack of the allies.
+
+As I have said, it was upon the morning of Monday, September 9th, that the
+two armies were drawn up facing each other, and there is no apparent
+reason why the assault should not have been delivered upon that day. Had
+it been delivered we can hardly doubt that a decisive defeat of the French
+would have resulted, that the way to Paris would have been thrown open,
+and that the ruin of the French monarchy would have immediately followed.
+As it was, no attack was delivered upon that Monday. The whole of Tuesday
+was allowed to pass without a movement. It was not until the Wednesday
+morning that the allies moved.
+
+The problem of this delay is one which the historian must anxiously
+consider, for the answer to it explains the barrenness and political
+failure associated with the name of Malplaquet. But it is one which the
+historian will not succeed in answering unless indeed further documents
+should come to light. All that we now know is that in a council of war
+held upon the Monday on the side of the allies, it was thought well to
+wait until all the troops from Tournai should have come up (though these
+were few in number), and necessary to send 9000 men to hold the bridge
+across the Haine at St Ghislain in order to secure retreat in case of
+disaster.[10]
+
+The English historians blame the Dutch, the Dutch the English, and the
+Austrians and Prussians blame both.
+
+Perhaps there would have been an attack upon the Tuesday at least had not
+Villars spent all the Monday and all the Monday night in exacting from
+his men the most unexpected labours in constructing entrenchments of the
+most formidable character. Marlborough and Eugene, riding out before their
+lines to judge their chances on the Tuesday, were astonished at the work
+that had been done in those twenty-four hours. Nine redans, that is,
+openworks of peculiar strength, stretched across the gap to within about
+600 yards of the wood of Laniere, and the remainder of the space was one
+continuous line of entrenchment. What had been done in the woods could not
+be judged from such a survey, but it might be guessed, and the forcing of
+these became a very different problem from what it would have been had an
+attack been delivered on the Monday. Behind this main line Villars drew up
+another and yet another series of earthworks; even Malplaquet itself, with
+the reserve in the rear, was defended, and the work was continued without
+interruption even throughout the Tuesday night with relays of men.
+
+When at last, upon the Wednesday morning, the allies had arrived at their
+tardy agreement and determined to force an action, their superiority in
+numbers, such as it was (and this disputed point must be later
+discussed), was quite negatived by having to meet fortifications so
+formidable as to be called, in the exaggerated phrase of a witness, "a
+citadel."
+
+One last point must be mentioned before the action itself is described:
+the open gap across which the centre of the allies must advance to break
+the French centre and encapture the entrenchments was cut in two by a
+large copse or small wood, called "The Wood of Tiry." It was not defended,
+lying too far in front of the French line, and was of no great consequence
+save in this: that when the advance of the allies against the French
+defence should begin, it was bound to canalise and cut off from support
+for a moment the extreme left of that advance through the channel marked A
+upon the map over page. As will be seen, the Dutch advanced too early and
+in too great strength through this narrow gap, and the check they
+suffered, which was of such effect upon the battle, would not have been
+nearly so severe had not the little wood cut them off from the support of
+the centre.
+
+
+
+
+V
+
+THE ACTION
+
+
+On the morning of Wednesday, the 11th of September, the allied army was
+afoot long before dawn, and was ranged in order of battle earlier than
+four o'clock. But a dense mist covered the ground, and nothing was done
+until at about half-past seven this lifted and enabled the artillery of
+the opposing forces to estimate the range and to open fire. In order to
+understand what was to follow, the reader may, so to speak, utilise this
+empty period of the early morning before the action joined, to grasp the
+respective positions of the two hosts.
+
+
+[Illustration: The Elements of the Action of Malplaquet, September 11th,
+1709.]
+
+
+The nature of the terrain has already been described. The plan upon the
+part of the allies would naturally consist in an attempt to force both
+woods which covered the French flank, and, while the pressure upon these
+was at its strongest, the entrenched and fortified centre. Of course, if
+either of the woods was forced before the French centre should break,
+there would be no need to continue the central attack, for one or other of
+the French flanks would then be turned. But the woods were so well
+garnished by this time, and so strongly lined with fallen tree-trunks and
+such entrenchments as the undergrowth permitted, that it seemed to both
+Eugene and Marlborough more probable that the centre should be forced than
+that either of the two flanks should first be turned, and the general plan
+of the battle depended rather upon the holding and heavy engagement of the
+forces in the two woods to the north and south than in any hope to clear
+them out, and the final success was expected rather to take the form of
+piercing the central line while the flanks were thus held and engaged. The
+barren issue of the engagement led the commanders of the allies to excuse
+themselves, of course, and the peculiar ill-success of their left against
+the French right, which we shall detail in a moment, gave rise to the
+thesis that only a "feint" was intended in that quarter. The thesis may
+readily be dismissed. The left was intended to do serious work quite as
+much as the right. The theory that it was intended to "feint" was only
+produced after the action, and in order to explain its incomplete
+results.[11]
+
+Upon the French side the plan was purely defensive, as their inferior
+numbers and their reliance upon earthworks both necessitated and proved.
+It was Villars' plan to hold every part of his line with a force
+proportionate to its strength; to furnish the woods a little more heavily
+than the entrenchments of the open gap, but everywhere to rely upon the
+steadiness of his infantry and their artificial protections in the
+repelling of the assault. His cavalry he drew up behind this long line of
+infantry defence, prepared, as has already been said, to charge through
+gaps whenever such action on their part might seem effective.
+
+It will be perceived that the plan upon either side was of a very simple
+sort, and one easily grasped. On the side of the allies it was little more
+than a "hammer-and-tongs" assault upon a difficult and well-guarded
+position; on the side of the French, little more than a defence of the
+same.
+
+Next must be described the nature of the troops engaged in the various
+parts of the field.
+
+Upon the side of the allies we have:--
+
+On their left--that is, to the south of their lines and over against the
+wood of Laniere--one-third of the army under the Prince of Orange. The
+bulk of this body consisted in Dutch troops, of whom thirty-one battalions
+of infantry were present, and behind the infantry thus drawn up under the
+Dutch commander were his cavalry, instructed to keep out of range during
+the attack of the infantry upon the wood, and to charge and complete it
+when it should be successful. Embodied among these troops the British
+reader should note a corps of Highlanders, known as the Scottish
+Brigade.[12] These did not form part of the British army, but were
+specially enrolled in the Dutch service. The cavalry of this left wing was
+under the command of the Prince of Hesse-Cassel, who was mentioned a few
+pages back in the advance upon Mons. It numbered somewhat over 10,000
+sabres.
+
+The other end of the allied position consisted in two great forces of
+infantry acting separately, and in the following fashion:--
+
+First, a force under Schulemberg, which attacked the salient angle of the
+forest of Sars on its northern face, and another body attacking the other
+side of the same angle, to wit, its eastern face. In the first of these
+great masses, that under Schulemberg, there were no English troops. In
+strength it amounted alone to nearly 20,000 men. The second part, which
+was to attack the eastern face, was commanded by Lottum, and was only
+about half as strong, contained a certain small proportion of English.
+
+It may be asked when once these two great bodies of the left and the right
+(each of which was to concern itself with one of the two woods in front of
+the gap) are disposed of, what remained to furnish the centre of the
+allies? To this the curious answer must be afforded that in the
+arrangements of the allies at Malplaquet no true centre existed. The
+battle must be regarded from their side as a battle fought by two isolated
+wings, left and right, and ending in a central attack composed of men
+drawn from either wing. If upon the following sketch map the section from
+A to B be regarded as the special province of the Dutch or left wing, and
+the section from C to D be regarded as the special province of the
+Austro-Prussian or right wing, then the mid-section between B and C has no
+large body of troops corresponding to it. When the time came for acting in
+that mid-section, the troops necessary for the work were drawn from either
+end of the line. There were, however, two elements in connection with this
+mid-section which must be considered.
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+First, a great battery of forty guns ready to support an attack upon the
+entrenchments of the gap, whenever that time should come; and secondly,
+far in the rear, about 6000 British troops under Lord Orkney were spread
+out and linked the massed right of the army to its massed left. One
+further corps must be mentioned. Quite separate from the rest of the army,
+and right away on the left on the _French side_ of the forest of Sars, was
+the small isolated corps under Withers, which was to hold and embarrass
+the French rear near the group of farmsteads called La Folie, and when the
+forest of Sars was forced was to join hands with the successful assault
+of the Prussians and Austrians who should have forced it.
+
+The general command of the left, including Lord Orkney's battalions, also
+including (though tactically they formed part of the right wing) the force
+under Lottum, lay with the Duke of Marlborough. The command of the
+right--that is, Schulemberg and the cavalry behind him--lay with Prince
+Eugene.
+
+The French line of defence is, from its simplicity, quite easy to
+describe. In the wood of Laniere, and in the open space just outside it,
+as far as the fields in front of Malplaquet village, were the troops under
+command of the French general D'Artagnan. Among the regiments holding this
+part was that of the Bourbonnais, the famous brigade of Navarre (the best
+in the service), and certain of the Swiss mercenaries. The last of this
+body on the left was formed by the French Guards. The entrenchments in the
+centre were held by the Irish Brigades of Lee and O'Brien, and by the
+German mercenaries and allies of Bavaria and Cologne. These guarded the
+redans which defended the left or northern part of the open gap. The
+remainder of this gap, right up to the forest of Sars, was held by
+Alsatians and by the Brigade of Laon, and the chief command in this part
+lay with Steckenberg. The forest of Sars was full of French troops,
+Picardy, the Marines, the Regiment of Champagne, and many others, with a
+strong reserve of similar troops just behind the wood. The cavalry of the
+army formed a long line behind this body of entrenched infantry; the
+Household Cavalry being on the right near the wood of Laniere, the Gens
+d'armes being in the centre, and the Carabiniers upon the left. These last
+stretched so far northward and westward as to come at last opposite to
+Withers.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Such was the disposition of the two armies when at half-past seven the sun
+pierced the mist and the first cannon-shots were exchanged. Marlborough
+and Eugene had decided that they would begin by pressing, as hard as might
+be, the assault upon the forest of Sars. When this assault should have
+proceeded for half an hour, the opposite end of the line, the left, under
+the Prince of Orange,[13] should engage the French troops holding the wood
+of Laniere. It was expected that the forest of Sars would be forced early
+in the action; that the troops in the wood of Laniere would at least be
+held fast by the attack of the Prince of Orange, and that the weakened
+French centre could then be taken by assault with the use of the reserves,
+of Orkney's men, and of detachments drawn from the two great masses upon
+the wings.
+
+The reader may here pause to consider the excellence of this plan--very
+probably Marlborough's own, and one the comparative ill-success of which
+was due to the unexpected power of resistance displayed by the French
+infantry upon that day.
+
+It was wise to put the greater part of the force into a double attack upon
+the forest of Sars, for this forest, with its thick woods and heavy
+entrenchments, was at once the strongest part of the French position in
+its garnishing and artificial enforcement, yet weak in that the salient
+angle it presented was one that could not, from the thickness of the
+trees, be watched from any central point, as can the salient angle of a
+fortification. Lottum on the one side, Schulemberg on the other, were
+attacking forces numerically weaker than their own, and separate fronts
+which could not support each other under the pressure of the attack.
+
+It was wise to engage the forces upon the French side opposite the allied
+left in the wood of Laniere half an hour after the assault had begun upon
+the forest of Sars, for it was legitimate to expect that at the end of
+that half hour the pressure upon the forest of Sars would begin to be felt
+by the French, and that they would call for troops from the right unless
+the right were very busily occupied at that moment.
+
+Finally, it was wise not to burden the centre with any great body of
+troops until one of the two flanks should be pressed or broken, for the
+centre might, in this case, be compared to a funnel in which too great a
+body of troops would be caught at a disadvantage against the strong
+entrenchments which closed the mouth of the funnel. An historical
+discussion has arisen upon the true role of the left in this plan. The
+commander of the allies gave it out _after_ the action (as we have seen
+above) that the left had only been intended to "feint." The better
+conclusion is that they were intended to do their worst against the wood
+of Laniere, although of course this "worst" could not be expected to
+compare with the fundamental attack upon the forest of Sars, where all the
+chief forces of the battle were concentrated.
+
+If by a "feint" is meant a subsidiary part of the general plan, the
+expression might be allowed to pass, but it is not a legitimate use of
+that expression, and if, as occurred at Malplaquet with the Dutch troops,
+a subsidiary body in the general plan is badly commanded, the temptation
+to call the original movement a "feint," which developed from breach of
+orders into a true attack, though strong for the disappointed commanders,
+must not be admitted by the accurate historian. In general, we may be
+certain that the Dutch troops and their neighbours on the allied left were
+intended to do all they could against the wood of Laniere, did all they
+could, but suffered in the process a great deal more than Marlborough had
+allowed for.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+These dispositions once grasped, we may proceed to the nature and
+development of the general attack which followed that opening cannonade of
+half-past seven, which has already been described.
+
+The first movement of the allies was an advance of the left under the
+Prince of Orange and of the right under Lottum. The first was halted out
+of range; the second, after getting up as far as the eastern flank of the
+forest of Sars, wheeled round so as to face the hedge lining that forest,
+and formed into three lines. It was nine o'clock before the signal for
+the attack was given by a general discharge of the great battery in the
+centre opposite the French entrenchments in the gap. Coincidently with
+that signal Schulemberg attacked the forest of Sars from his side, the
+northern face, and he and Lottum pressed each upon that side of the
+salient angle which faced him. Schulemberg's large force got into the
+fringe of the wood, but no further. The resistance was furious; the
+thickness of the trees aided it. Eugene was present upon this side;
+meanwhile Marlborough himself was leading the troops of Lottum. He
+advanced with them against a hot fire, passed the swampy rivulet which
+here flanks the wood, and reached the entrenchments which had been drawn
+up just within the outer boundary of it.
+
+This attack failed. Villars was present in person with the French troops
+and directed the repulse. Almost at the same time the advance of
+Schulemberg upon the other side of the wood, which Eugene was
+superintending, suffered a check. Its reserves were called up. The
+intervals of the first line were filled up from the second. One French
+brigade lining the wood was beaten back, but the Picardy Regiment and the
+Marines stood out against a mixed force of Danes, Saxons, and Hessians
+opposing them. Schulemberg, therefore, in this second attack had failed
+again, but Marlborough, leading Lottum's men upon the other side of the
+wood to a second charge in his turn, had somewhat greater success. He had
+by this time been joined by a British brigade under the Duke of Argyle
+from the second line, and he did so far succeed with this extension of his
+men as to get round the edge of the French entrenchments in the wood.
+
+The French began to be pressed from this eastern side of their salient
+angle, right in among the trees. Schulemberg's command felt the advantage
+of the pressure being exercised on the other side. The French weakened
+before it, and in the neighbourhood of eleven o'clock a great part of the
+forest of Sars was already filled with the allies, who were beating back
+the French in individual combats from tree to tree. Close on noon the
+battle upon this side stood much as the sketch map upon the opposite page
+shows, and was as good as won, for it seemed to need only a continuation
+of this victorious effort to clear the whole wood at last and to turn the
+French line.
+
+This is undoubtedly the form which the battle would have taken--a complete
+victory for the allied forces by their right turning the French
+left--and the destruction of the French army would have followed, had not
+the allied left been getting into grave difficulty at the other end of the
+field of battle.
+
+
+[Illustration: Sketch Map showing the peril the French centre ran towards
+noon of being turned on its left.]
+
+
+The plan of the allied generals, it will be remembered, was that the left
+of their army under the Prince of Orange should attack the wood of Laniere
+about half an hour after the right had begun to effect an entrance into
+the opposing forest of Sars. When that half hour had elapsed, that is,
+about half-past nine, the Prince of Orange, without receiving special
+orders, it is true, but acting rightly enough upon his general orders,
+advanced against the French right. Tullibardine with his Scottish brigade
+took the worst of the fighting on the extreme left against the extreme of
+the French right, and was the first to get engaged among the trees. The
+great mass of the force advanced up the opening between the coppice called
+the wood of Tiry and the main wood, with the object of carrying the
+entrenchments which ran from the corner of the wood in front of Malplaquet
+and covered this edge of the open gap. The nine foremost battalions were
+led by the Prince of Orange in person; his courage and their tenacity,
+though fatal to the issue of the fight, form perhaps the finest part of
+our story. As they came near the French earthworks, a French battery right
+upon their flank at the edge of the wood opened upon them, enfilading
+whole ranks and doing, in the shortest time, terrible execution. The young
+leader managed to reach the earthworks. The breastwork was forced, but
+Boufflers brought up men from his left, that is, from the centre of the
+gap, drove the Dutch back, and checked, at the height of its success, this
+determined assault. Had not the wood of Tiry been there to separate the
+main part of the Prince of Orange's command from its right, reinforcements
+might have reached him and have saved the disaster. As it was, the wood of
+Tiry had cut the advance into two streams, and neither could help the
+other. The Dutch troops and the Highlanders rallied; the Prince of Orange
+charged again with a personal bravery that made him conspicuous before the
+whole field, and should make him famous in history, but the task was more
+than men could accomplish. The best brigade at the disposal of the French,
+that of Navarre, was brought up to meet this second onslaught, broke it,
+and the French leapt from the earthworks to pursue the flight of their
+assailants. Many of Orange's colours were taken in that rout, and the guns
+of his advanced battery fell into French hands. Beyond the wood of Tiry
+the extreme right of the Dutch charge had suffered no better fate. It had
+carried the central entrenchment of the French, only to be beaten back as
+the main body between the wood of Tiry and the wood of Laniere opened.
+
+At this moment, then, after eleven o'clock, which was coincident with the
+success of Lottum and Schulemberg in the forest of Sars, upon the right,
+the allied left had been hopelessly beaten back from the entrenchments in
+the gap, and from the edge of the wood of Laniere.
+
+Marlborough was hurriedly summoned away from his personal command of
+Lottum's victorious troops, and begged to do what he could for the broken
+regiments of Orange. He galloped back over the battlefield, a mile or so
+of open fields, and was appalled to see the havoc. Of the great force that
+had advanced an hour and a half before against Boufflers and the French
+right, fully a third was struck, and 2000 or more lay dead upon the
+stubble and the coarse heath of that upland. The scattered corpses strewn
+over half a mile of flight from the French entrenchments, almost back to
+their original position, largely showed the severity of the blow. It was
+impossible to attempt another attack upon the French right with any hope
+of success.
+
+Marlborough, trusting that the forest of Sars would soon be finally
+cleared, determined upon a change of plan. He ordered the advance upon the
+centre of the position of Lord Orkney's fifteen battalions, reinforced
+that advance by drafts of men from the shattered Dutch left, and prepared
+with some deliberation to charge the line of earthworks which ran across
+the open and the nine redans which we have seen were held by the French
+allies and mercenaries from Bavaria and Cologne, and await his moment.
+That moment came at about one o'clock; at this point in the action the
+opposing forces stood somewhat as they are sketched on the map over page.
+
+The pressure upon the French in the wood of Sars, perpetually increasing,
+had already caused Villars, who commanded there in person, to beg
+Boufflers for aid; but the demand came when Boufflers was fighting his
+hardest against the last Dutch attack, and no aid could be sent.
+
+Somewhat reluctantly, Villars had weakened his centre by withdrawing from
+it the two Irish regiments, and continued to dispute foot by foot the
+forest of Sars. But foot by foot and tree by tree, in a series of
+individual engagements, his men were pressed back, and a larger area of
+the woodland was held by the troops of Schulemberg and Lottum. Eugene was
+wounded, but refused to leave the field. The loss had been appalling upon
+either side, but especially severe (as might have been expected) among the
+assailants, when, just before one o'clock, the last of the French soldiers
+were driven from the wood.
+
+
+[Illustration: Sketch Map showing Marlborough bringing up troops to the
+centre for the final and successful attack upon the entrenchments about
+one o'clock.]
+
+
+All that main defence which the forest of Sars formed upon the French left
+flank was lost, but the fight had been so exhausting to the assailants in
+the confusion of the underwood, and the difficulty of forming them in the
+trees was so great, that the French forces once outside the wood could
+rally at leisure and draw up in line to receive any further movement on
+the part of their opponents. It was while the French left were thus drawn
+up in line behind the wood of Sars, with their redans at the centre
+weakened by the withdrawal of the Irish brigade, that Marlborough ordered
+the final central attack against those redans. The honour of carrying them
+fell to Lord Orkney and his British battalions. His men flooded over the
+earthworks at the first rush, breaking the depleted infantry behind them
+(for these, after the withdrawal of the Irish, were no more than the men
+of Bavaria and Cologne), and held the parapet.
+
+The French earthworks thus carried by the infantry in the centre, the
+modern reader might well premise that a complete rout of the French forces
+should have followed. But he would make this premise without counting for
+the preponderant role that cavalry played in the wars of Marlborough.
+
+Facing the victorious English battalions of Orkney, now in possession of
+the redans, stood the mile-long unbroken squadrons of the French horse.
+
+The allied cavalry, passing between gaps in its infantry line, began to
+deploy for the charge, but even as they deployed they were charged by the
+French mounted men, thrust back, and thrown into confusion. The short
+remainder of the battle is no more than a melee of sabres, but the nature
+of that melee must be clearly grasped, and the character of the French
+cavalry resistance understood, for this it was which determined the issue
+of the combat and saved the army of Louis XIV.
+
+A detailed account of the charges and counter-charges of the opposing
+horse would be confusing to the reader, and is, as a fact, impossible of
+narration, for no contemporary record of it remains in any form which can
+be lucidly set forth.
+
+A rough outline of what happened is this:--
+
+The first counter-charge of the French was successful, and the allied
+cavalry, caught in the act of deployment, was thrust back in confusion, as
+I have said, upon the British infantry who lined the captured earthworks.
+
+The great central battery of forty guns which Marlborough had kept all day
+in the centre of the gap, split to the right and left, and, once clear of
+its own troops, fired from either side upon the French horse. Shaken,
+confused, and almost broken by this fire, the French horse were charged by
+a new body of the allied horse led by Marlborough in person, composed of
+British and Prussian units. But, just as Marlborough's charge was
+succeeding, old Boufflers, bringing up the French Household Cavalry from
+in front of Malplaquet village, charged right home into the flank of
+Marlborough's mounted troops, bore back their first and second lines, and
+destroyed the order of their third.
+
+Thereupon Eugene, with yet another body of fresh horse (of the Imperial
+Service), charged in his turn, and the battle of Malplaquet ends in a
+furious mix-up of mounted men, which gradually separated into two
+undefeated lines, each retiring from the contest.
+
+It will be wondered why a conclusion so curiously impotent was permitted
+to close the fighting of so famous a field.
+
+The answer to this query is that the effort upon either side had passed
+the limits beyond which men are physically incapable of further action.
+Any attempt of the French to advance in force after two o'clock would have
+led to their certain disaster, for the allies were now in possession of
+their long line of earthworks.[14]
+
+On the other hand, the allies could not advance, because the men upon whom
+they could still count for action were reduced to insufficient numbers.
+Something like one-third of their vast host had fallen in this most
+murderous of battles; from an eighth to a sixth were dead. Of the
+remainder, the great proportion suffered at this hour from an exhaustion
+that forbade all effective effort.
+
+The horse upon either side might indeed have continued charge and
+counter-charge to no purpose and with no final effect, but the action of
+the cavalry in the repeated and abortive shocks, of which a list has just
+been detailed, could lead neither commander to hope for any final result.
+Boufflers ordered a retreat, screened by his yet unbroken lines of horse.
+The infantry were withdrawn from the wood of Laniere, which they still
+held, and from their positions behind the forest of Sars. They were
+directed in two columns towards Bavai in their rear, and as that orderly
+and unhurried retreat was accomplished, the cavalry filed in to follow the
+line, and the French host, leaving the field in the possession of the
+victors, marched back westward by the two Roman roads in as regular a
+formation as though they had been advancing to action rather than
+retreating from an abandoned position.
+
+It was not quite three o'clock in the afternoon.
+
+There was no pursuit, and there could be none. The allied army slept upon
+the ground it had gained; rested, evacuated its wounded, and restored its
+broken ranks through the whole of the morrow, Thursday. It was not until
+the Friday that it was able to march back again from the field in which
+it had triumphed at so terrible an expense of numbers, guns, and colours,
+and with so null a strategic result, and to take up once more the siege of
+Mons. Upon the 9th of October Mons capitulated, furnishing the sole fruit
+of this most arduous of all the great series of Marlborough's campaigns.
+
+No battle has been contested with more valour or tenacity than the battle
+of Malplaquet. The nature of the woodland fighting contributed to the
+enormous losses sustained upon either side. The delay during which the
+French had been permitted to entrench themselves so thoroughly naturally
+threw the great balance of the loss upon the assailants. In no battle,
+free, as Malplaquet was free, from all pursuit or a rout, or even the
+breaking of any considerable body of troops (save the Dutch troops and
+Highlanders on the left in the earlier part of the battle, and the
+Bavarians and Cologne men in the redans at the close of it), has the
+proportion of the killed and wounded been anything like so high. In none,
+perhaps, were casualties so heavy accompanied by so small a proportion of
+prisoners.
+
+The action will remain throughout history a standing example of the pitch
+of excellence to which those highly trained professional armies of the
+eighteenth century, with their savage discipline, their aristocratic
+command, their close formations, and their extraordinary reliance upon
+human daring, could arrive.
+
+
+FINIS
+
+
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+
+
+
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+BRITISH BATTLE BOOKS
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+_HISTORY IN WARFARE_
+
+The British Battle Series will consist of a number of monographs upon
+actions in which British troops have taken part. Each battle will be the
+subject of a separate booklet illustrated with coloured maps, illustrative
+of the movements described in the text, together with a large number of
+line maps showing the successive details of the action. In each case the
+political circumstances which led to the battle will be explained; next,
+the stages leading up to it; lastly, the action in detail.
+
+     1. BLENHEIM
+     2. MALPLAQUET
+     3. TOURCOING
+     4. WATERLOO
+
+Later volumes will deal with Crecy, Poitiers, Corunna, Talaveras, Flodden,
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+_THE THOUGHTS OF THINKING MEN_
+
+No book of the present season has been so much praised--and so much
+reviled: reviled by most of the Party organs, praised by independent
+papers. And yet mark the agreement of the following, as wide asunder as
+the poles often in their views.
+
+"Embodies the silent thoughts of almost all thinking men of to-day."--_The
+Evening Times._
+
+The _Star_ says:--"Says in plain English what everybody in touch with
+reality thinks."
+
+LORD ROBERT CECIL, in the _Morning Post_, says:--"So far the authors of
+'The Party System' only say in plain terms what everyone who has been in
+Parliament knows to be in substance true."
+
+"A complete proof of the necessity of restoring power to the
+people."--_The Daily Express._
+
+London: STEPHEN SWIFT & CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi
+
+
+
+
+GORDON AT KHARTOUM
+
+BY WILFRED SCAWEN BLUNT
+
+_15s. net_
+
+_PRIVATE AND INTIMATE_
+
+This book follows the lines of the author's works on Egypt and India,
+consisting mainly of a private diary of a very intimate kind, and will
+bring down his narrative of events to the end of 1885.
+
+The present volume is designed especially as an answer to Lord Cromer's
+_Modern Egypt_, in so far as it concerned Gordon, and contains several
+important and hitherto unpublished documents throwing new light upon a
+case of perennial interest.
+
+It also includes an account of the author's relations with Lord Randolph
+Churchill, Sir Henry Drummond Wolff, Mr Gladstone, Mr Parnell, and other
+political personages of the day, as well as of the General Election of
+1885, in which the author stood as a Tory Home Ruler.
+
+London: STEPHEN SWIFT & CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi
+
+
+
+
+AN ENGLISHMAN IN NEW YORK
+
+BY JUVENAL
+
+_Crown 8vo. 5s. net_
+
+_VIVID ORIGINALITY_
+
+In these notes and studies on life in New York, Juvenal, by his vivid
+originality and his masterly deductions, has surpassed all other writers
+who have written on the same subject.
+
+Mr Eden Phillpotts writes of the Author: "The things seen are brilliantly
+set down. He writes with great force and skill."
+
+London: STEPHEN SWIFT & CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi
+
+
+
+
+PRINCE AZREEL
+
+A Poem with Prose Notes
+
+BY ARTHUR LYNCH
+
+_Crown 8vo. 5s. net_
+
+_DIRECT--INSPIRING--COMPELLING_
+
+The cry for something new in literature, the indefinable, the unexpected,
+has been answered. Prince Azreel comes to claim his place, not as one who
+has sounded the depths and shoals of the current modes of the day, but as
+one entirely careless of these things, discoursing freely of life, easily
+throughout its whole purport and scope.
+
+The Devil comes into the action, but he also is new--rather the Spirit of
+the World, "man's elder brother." His methods are those neither of _Faust_
+nor of _Paradise Regained_. His temptations are suasive, his lures less
+material.
+
+In the search for the Ideal of statesmanship Azreel and the Devil come to
+our own Parliament, Azreel filled with warm enthusiasm, high conceptions.
+They see, they learn; they discover "types," and discuss them. We find the
+Devil at length defending the Commons, supplying the corrective to
+Azreel's strange disillusions. This part will not be the least piquant.
+
+London: STEPHEN SWIFT & CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi
+
+
+
+
+POEMS
+
+BY CHARLES GRANVILLE
+
+_F'cap 4to. 5s. net._
+
+_REAL POETIC TALENT_
+
+The present volume is composed of a selection from the previous poetical
+works of the Author, who is also well known as a writer of prose. The
+distinctive feature of the poems in this collection--the feature, indeed,
+that marks off and differentiates the work of this poet from the mass of
+verse produced to-day--is their spiritual insight. Mr Granville is
+concerned with the soul of man, with the eternal rather than the
+transitory, and his perception, which is that of the seer, invests his
+language with that quality of ecstasy that constitutes the indisputable
+claim of poetry to rank in the forefront of literature.
+
+London: STEPHEN SWIFT & CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi
+
+
+
+
+THE HUMOUR OF THE UNDERMAN
+
+And Other Essays
+
+BY FRANCIS GRIERSON
+
+_F'cap 8vo. 3s. 6d. net_
+
+_CHARACTERISTICALLY INCISIVE_
+
+This volume contains the latest work of the greatest Essayist of our time.
+Maurice Maeterlinck has said of the Author, "He has, in his best moments,
+that most rare gift of casting certain shafts of light, at once simple and
+decisive, upon questions the most difficult, obscure, and unlooked for in
+Art, Morals, and Psychology ... essays among the most subtle and
+substantial that I know."
+
+This opinion has been endorsed by every critic of note in the British
+Isles and in the United States of America. Indeed, in the latter country a
+veritable Grierson cult has sprung into existence.
+
+London: STEPHEN SWIFT & CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi
+
+
+
+
+LA VIE ET LES HOMMES
+
+BY FRANCIS GRIERSON
+
+_F'cap. 8vo. 3s. 6d. net_
+
+_PENSEES PIQUANTES, INDEPENDANTES_
+
+SULLY PRUDHOMME (de l'Academie Francaise):--"J'ai trouve ces meditations
+pleines d'apercus profonds et sagaces. J'ai ete frappe de l'originalite
+puissante de la pensee de l'auteur."
+
+JULES CLARETIE (de l'Academie Francaise):--"J'ai ete charme par les idees
+originales et justes."
+
+L'Abbe JOSEPH ROUX:--"Il y a la des vues originales, des appreciations
+neuves et frappantes."
+
+FREDERIC MISTRAL:--"Ces pensees m'ont paru neuves et piquantes, et
+independantes de cette ambiance de prejuges a laquelle il est si difficile
+d'echapper."
+
+Le Pere P. V. DELAPORTE, S.J. (Redacteur des Etudes Religieuses):--"J'ai
+admire dans ces pages delicates l'artiste, le penseur et l'ecrivain, et
+j'ai ete singulierement touche de la facon dont vous appreciez le genie
+francais. Vous avez su le comprendre et vous avez dit votre pensee
+franchement, je pouvais ajouter _francaisement_."
+
+London: STEPHEN SWIFT & CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi
+
+
+
+
+THE ROLL OF THE SEASONS
+
+Nature Essays
+
+BY G. G. DESMOND
+
+_Crown 8vo. Cloth. 5s. net_
+
+_A NATURE BOOK FOR TOWN FOLK_
+
+This book for all Nature-lovers appeals perhaps most strongly to those in
+cities pent, for whom a word in season can call up visions of the open
+moor, the forest, the meadow stream, the flowered lane, or the wild
+sea-shore. The extreme penalty for reading one of these spring, summer,
+autumn, or winter chapters is to be driven from one's chair into the
+nearest field, there to forget town worries among the trees. The author
+does not spare us for fog, rain, frost, or snow. Sometimes he makes us get
+up by moonlight and watch the dawn come "cold as cold sea-shells" to the
+fluting of blackbirds, or he takes us through the woods by night and shows
+us invisible things by their sounds and scents. The spirit, even if the
+body cannot go with it, comes back refreshed by these excursions to the
+country.
+
+London: STEPHEN SWIFT & CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi
+
+
+
+
+THE MASTERY OF LIFE
+
+BY G. T. WRENCH, M.D. LOND.
+
+_Demy 8vo. 15s. net_
+
+_OLD VALUES RE-VALUED_
+
+This book is a review of the history of civilisation with the object of
+discovering where and under what conditions man has shown the most
+positive attitude towards life. The review has been based not so much upon
+scholarship as upon the direct evidence of the products and monuments of
+the different peoples of history, and the author has consequently
+travelled widely in order to collect his material. The author shows how
+the patriarchal system and values have always been the foundation of
+peoples, who have been distinguished for their joy in and power over life,
+and have expressed their mastery in works of art, which have been their
+peculiar glory and the object of admiration and wonder of other peoples.
+In contrast to them has been the briefer history of civilisation in
+Europe, in which the paternal and filial values of interdependence have
+always been rivalled by the ideal of independence from one's fellow-man.
+The consequences of this ideal of personal liberty in the destruction of
+the art of life are forcibly delineated in the last chapters.
+
+London: STEPHEN SWIFT & CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi
+
+
+
+
+TORY DEMOCRACY
+
+BY J. M. KENNEDY
+
+_Crown 8vo. Cloth. 3s. 6d. net_
+
+_LORDS, GOVERNMENT, LIBERALISM_
+
+There are unmistakable indications that the system of politics at present
+pursued by the two chief political parties is not meeting with the
+approval of the electorate as a whole, though this electorate, as a result
+of the Caucus methods, finds it increasingly difficult to give expression
+to its views. In his book on Tory Democracy, Mr J. M. Kennedy, who is
+already favourably known through his books on modern philosophical and
+sociological subjects, sets forth the principles underlying a system of
+politics which was seriously studied by men so widely different as
+Disraeli, Bismarck, and Lord Randolph Churchill. Mr Kennedy not only shows
+the close connection still existing between the aristocracy and the
+working classes, but he also has the distinction of being the first writer
+to lay down a constructive Conservative policy which is independent of
+Tariff Reform. Apart from this, the chapters of his work which deal with
+Representative Government, the House of Lords, and "Liberalism at Work"
+throw entirely new light on many vexed questions of modern politics. The
+book, it may be added, is written in a style that spares neither parties
+nor persons.
+
+London: STEPHEN SWIFT & CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi
+
+
+
+
+PRINCIPLES OF A NEW SYSTEM OF PSYCHOLOGY
+
+BY ARTHUR LYNCH,
+
+  M.A., C.E., L.R.C.P., M.R.C.S.E., M.P.
+  AUTHOR OF "HUMAN DOCUMENTS," ETC., ETC.
+
+_Two Vols. Demy 8vo. 10s. 6d. net each_
+
+_A BASIC WORK OF ANALYSIS_
+
+This book is dynamic. It is new in the sense in which Schwann's Cell
+Theory was new to Physiology, or Dalton's Atomic Theory to Chemistry. The
+author has faced the problem in its widest extension: Can the entire realm
+of knowledge, and the whole possible scope of mental acts, be so resolved
+that we may formulate the unanalysable elements, the Fundamental Processes
+of the mind? This problem is solved, and thence the manner of all
+synthesis indicated. The argument is closely consecutive, but the severity
+is relieved by abundant illustrations drawn from many sciences. The
+principles established will afford criteria in regard to every position in
+Psychology. New light will be thrown, for instance, on Kant's Categories,
+Spencer's Hedonism, Fechner's Law, the foundation of Mathematics, Memory,
+Association, Externality, Will, the Feeling of Effort, Brain
+Localisations, and finally on the veritable nature of Reason. A philosophy
+of Research is foreshadowed. The work offers a base on which all valid
+studies may be co-ordinated, and developments are indicated. It
+presupposes no technical knowledge, and the exposition is couched in
+simple language. It will give a new impetus to Psychology.
+
+London: STEPHEN SWIFT & CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi
+
+
+
+
+EIGHT CENTURIES OF PORTUGUESE MONARCHY
+
+BY V. de BRAGANCA CUNHA
+
+_Demy 8vo. 14 Pencil Portraits. 15s. net_
+
+_THE TRUTH ABOUT PORTUGAL_
+
+This book reveals the series of causes, both political and social, which
+have brought Portugal to its present condition and affected the character
+of its people.
+
+The entire history of Monarchical Portugal is reviewed in masterly
+fashion, and the work is based on a thorough knowledge and critical
+appreciation of all available sources. The author writes, not as an
+outsider, but as one who knows his country from within, and the book
+therefore constitutes a serious attempt to tell the English-speaking world
+the truth about Portugal.
+
+The author knows that he treads "forbidden ground," but even where he
+apportions the severest blame he does so in the conviction that adverse
+criticism of any country, "however unpleasant it may be to all Chadbands
+and Stigginses," cannot be considered abusive if it be made with the
+intention of stirring up the forces of reform and of remedying the defects
+which it discloses.
+
+London: STEPHEN SWIFT & CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi
+
+
+
+
+SIR EDWARD
+
+A BRIEF MEMORIAL OF A NOBLE LIFE
+
+BY A FELLOW OF THE LITERARY SOCIETY
+
+_Crown 8vo. Cloth. 1s. net_
+
+_AN IRRESISTIBLE SATIRE_
+
+The humour of this remarkable satire is irresistible. The truth concerning
+Sir Edward is gradually revealed by fantastic touches and sly suggestions,
+and with a manner so correct as almost to put the reader off his guard.
+
+Although the subject of this AEsopian biography is drawn in such a way as
+to suggest now one and now another familiar figure in modern life, yet
+these fleeting and shadowy resemblances are in reality an indication of
+the archetypal nature of Sir Edward; he is not a caricature but a symbol;
+not any particular individual but a composite type--a materialisation into
+one grotesque shape of the drifting ideas and false ideals of a muddled
+civilisation.
+
+The narrative gathers into its net both big and little fishes--a heavy
+haul. But people who regard Western civilisation as the final word in
+social wisdom should not read this book: or perhaps they should. Anyway,
+everyone else should.
+
+London: STEPHEN SWIFT & CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi
+
+
+
+
+PARISIAN PORTRAITS
+
+BY FRANCIS GRIERSON
+
+_F'cap 8vo. 2s. 6d. net_
+
+_AN APPRECIATION OF FRENCH GENIUS_
+
+These profoundly sagacious studies and finely drawn portraits are of the
+greatest interest, not only in virtue of the author's intimate knowledge
+of Paris and Parisian life (dating from 1869), but also because Mr
+Grierson is one of the few living Englishmen who thoroughly understand and
+appreciate the French Genius. The book will be an enduring delight to all
+lovers of fine literature.
+
+Mr RICHARD LE GALLIENNE says:--"Mr Francis Grierson, cosmopolite and
+subtile critic of the arts, is one of those sudden new acquaintances that
+assume immediate importance in one's world of thought.... Everywhere with
+remarkable rectitude of perception, Mr Grierson puts his finger on the
+real power, and it is always spiritual."
+
+_The Spectator_ says:--"Mr Grierson has a right to speak, for he uses with
+success one of the most difficult of literary forms, the essay."
+
+London: STEPHEN SWIFT & CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi
+
+
+
+
+THE VALLEY OF SHADOWS
+
+BY FRANCIS GRIERSON
+
+_Second Edition. Demy 8vo. 6s. net_
+
+_MEMORIES OF LINCOLN'S COUNTRY_
+
+In this book Mr Grierson recalls in vivid memories the wonderful romance
+of his life in Lincoln's country before the war. "_The Valley of the
+Shadows_ is not a novel," says Mr W. L. Courtney in the _Daily Telegraph_,
+"yet in the graphic portraiture of spiritual and intellectual movements it
+possesses an attraction denied to all but the most significant kind of
+fiction.... With a wonderful touch Mr Grierson depicts scene after scene,
+drawing the simple, native characters with bold, impressive strokes."
+
+"Told with wonderful charm ... enthralling as any romance ... truth,
+though often stranger than fiction, is almost always duller; Mr Grierson
+has accomplished the rare feat of making it more interesting. There are
+chapters in the book ... that haunt one afterwards like remembered music,
+or like passages in the prose of Walter Pater."--_Punch._
+
+London: STEPHEN SWIFT & CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi
+
+
+
+
+MODERN MYSTICISM
+
+And Other Essays
+
+BY FRANCIS GRIERSON
+
+_F'cap. 8vo. 2s. 6d. net_
+
+_ORIGINAL, INCISIVE, SUBTLE, ACUTE_
+
+This book embodies profound thinking expressed in an original and happy
+style.
+
+Mr MAURICE MAETERLINCK says:--"This volume is full of thoughts and
+meditations of the very highest order.... Mr Grierson has concentrated his
+thought on the profound and simple questions of life and conscience....
+What unique and decisive things in 'Parsifalitis,' for example, what
+strange clairvoyance in 'Beauty and Morals in Nature,' in the essay on
+'Tolstoy,' in 'Authority and Individualism,' in 'The New Criticism'!"
+
+Mr JAMES DOUGLAS says:--"This little book is tremulous with originality
+and palpitating with style."
+
+Mr A. B. WALKLEY says:--"A delectable book.... I shall keep it on the same
+shelf as 'Wisdom and Destiny' and 'The Treasure of the Humble.'"
+
+London: STEPHEN SWIFT & CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi
+
+
+
+
+THE CELTIC TEMPERAMENT
+
+BY FRANCIS GRIERSON
+
+_F'cap 8vo. 2s. 6d. net_
+
+_CHARMING AND FULL OF WISDOM_
+
+The late Professor WILLIAM JAMES said:--"I find 'The Celtic Temperament'
+charming and full of wisdom."
+
+The _Glasgow Herald_ says:--"A remarkable book, and by a remarkable
+man.... This book will be read and re-read by all who recognise acuteness
+of intellectual faculty, culture which has gained much from books, but
+more from human intercourse, deep thinking, and a gift of literary
+expression which at times it quite Gallic."
+
+Mr MAURICE MAETERLINCK says:--"In this volume I am privileged once more to
+breathe the atmosphere of supreme spiritual aristocracy which emanates
+from all Mr Grierson's work. He has, in his best moments, that most rare
+gift of casting certain shafts of light, at once simple and decisive, upon
+questions the most difficult, obscure, and unlooked-for in art, morals,
+and psychology.... I place these essays among the most subtle and
+substantial that I know."
+
+London: STEPHEN SWIFT & CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi
+
+
+
+
+SOME NEIGHBOURS
+
+STORIES, SKETCHES, AND STUDIES
+
+BY CHARLES GRANVILLE
+
+_Second edition. Crown 8vo. 6s._
+
+_FULL OF CLEVER CHARACTERISATION_
+
+A fine vein of poetic feeling runs through all these stories, sketches,
+and studies, which are, without exception, highly entertaining and full of
+clever characterisation. Mr Granville's style is by turns naive,
+deliberate and restrained, but always attractive.
+
+_The Times._--"A pleasant book ... prettily conceived and told...."
+
+_The Scotsman._--"The stories are always interesting, both as studies of
+odd aspects of humanity and for the curious modern reticence of their
+art."
+
+CLEMENT K. SHORTER in _The Sphere_.--"'Some Neighbours' deserves the
+highest commendation."
+
+_The Morning Leader._--"The treatment is invariably fresh and individual
+... thoroughly readable."
+
+_Eastern Morning News._--"There can be nothing but praise--and that of a
+high quality--for a man who writes with Mr Granville's sympathy and charm
+... his art is so sure that he puts a world of life and reality into a few
+pages."
+
+_Liverpool Daily Post._--"Mr Granville is a writer possessing literary
+gifts very much above the average, and the versatility of his gifts is
+very fully indicated in the book under notice."
+
+_Yorkshire Observer._--"The author certainly shows that love of humanity
+which marks the creative mind."
+
+_Aberdeen Free Press._--"All of them are readable, and there are one or
+two of _quite surprising excellence_.... These are characterised by real
+literary power, and suffused with true poetic feeling."
+
+_Westminster Review._--"Mr Granville's humour is of that quality which
+perceives the sense of tears in human things. To those capable of
+appreciating fine literature we recommend 'Some Neighbours.'"
+
+_The Commentator._--"This clever writer's characteristic originality and
+freshness both of thought and expression."
+
+London: STEPHEN SWIFT & CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi
+
+
+
+
+CIVIL WAR
+
+A Play in Four Acts
+
+BY ASHLEY DUKES
+
+_Crown 8vo. 2s. net_
+
+_A DRAMA WITHOUT ARTIFICIALITY_
+
+This play is that rarity, an English drama of ideas which is not in any
+sense imitative of Mr Bernard Shaw. It presents an intellectual conflict
+which is also a passionate conflict of individualities, and the theme is
+treated with sympathy and humanity. The portrait of life in a colony of
+revolutionists alone would make "Civil War" something of a dramatic
+curiosity, but it is more than that. It is at once effective and original.
+The play was given for the first time by the Incorporated Stage Society in
+June 1910, with remarkable success, and it will shortly be revived by
+several of our newer repertory theatres. It should be read as well as
+seen, however, for it is dramatic without artificiality, and literary
+without affectation.
+
+_The following is what some of the Press think of the play:_
+
+_Pall Mall Gazette_:--"A very interesting, sincere, and artistic piece of
+work."
+
+_Westminster Gazette_:--"In producing 'Civil War,' by Mr Ashley Dukes, the
+Stage Society has rendered a real service to drama.... The play shows that
+the dramatist possesses in a high degree the capacity for writing
+dialogue--for finding phrases characteristic of the persons of the comedy,
+useful for the situations, and exhibiting a certain style that is rare and
+indefinable. There were scenes, notably one of great beauty between the
+old Socialist and his daughter, where, apart from the dramatic effect, one
+had real pleasure from the phrases, and this without there being any
+obvious attempt to write in a literary style."
+
+_Times_:--"A piece of sound and promising work."
+
+_Daily News_:--"His 'Civil War' has a strong motive, and, best of all,
+there is humanity and understanding in his treatment of it.... It is
+rarely indeed that we are given a play in which the drama is made
+inevitable by a clash of temperament and ideas."
+
+London: STEPHEN SWIFT & CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi
+
+
+
+
+THE MAID'S COMEDY
+
+A Chivalric Romance in Thirteen Chapters
+
+_Crown 8vo. 3s. 6d. net_
+
+_UNIQUE_
+
+I. In which, by favour and fortune, three gentle persons may interest at
+least three others.
+
+II. Wherein is founded a new Order of Chivalry, and matters for simple and
+wise alike may be discovered.
+
+III. Exhibiting a partner in an old-established business pursuing her
+occupation.
+
+IV. Wherein one character is left in a delicate situation, another loses
+her way, and a third is brought to a pretty pass.
+
+V. Containing the din of arms, thrust and parry and threat of slaughter,
+but gently concluding with the first canon of feminine craft.
+
+VI. Displaying a standing example of feminine folly and a rally of heroes.
+
+VII. Concerning, mainly, the passions as toys for the great god, Chance,
+to fool with.
+
+VIII. Wherein an oft-defeated, yet indestructible, ideal is realised.
+
+IX. Of matters for old and young, facts and fancies, aspirations and
+exhortations, and chronicling a feat worthy the grand tradition of
+chivalry.
+
+X. A magical chapter, of whose content those who doubt may likely believe
+what should be doubted, and those who believe may doubt what is perfectly
+true.
+
+XI. Confirming the adage that happy beginnings tend to happy endings, and
+showing how Heaven will still preserve Virtue, even at the cost of working
+a miracle.
+
+XII. Which relates the Happy Ending.
+
+XIII. Wherein the Romancer takes courteous leave of the Three Gentle
+Readers.
+
+London: STEPHEN SWIFT & CO., LTD., 10 John St., Adelphi
+
+
+
+
+Footnotes:
+
+[1] From which little place the lines as a whole take the name in history
+of "Lines of La Bassee."
+
+[2] As is common in the history of military affairs, the advocates of
+either party present these confused movements before the lines of La
+Bassee upon the eve of the siege of Tournai in very different and indeed
+contradictory lights.
+
+The classical work of Mr Fortescue, to which I must, here as elsewhere,
+render homage, will have the whole movement, from its inception, to be
+deliberately designed; no battle intended, the siege of Tournai to be the
+only real object of the allies.
+
+The French apologists talk of quarrels between Eugene and Marlborough,
+take for granted a plan of assault against Villars, and represent the
+turning off of the army to the siege of Tournai as an afterthought. The
+truth, of course, is contained in both versions, and lies between the two.
+Eugene and Marlborough did intend a destructive assault upon Villars and
+his line, but they were early persuaded--especially by the reconnoitring
+of Cadogan--that the defensive skill of the French commander had proved
+formidable, and we may take it that the determination to besiege Tournai
+and to abandon an assault upon the main of the French forces had been
+reached at least as early as the 26th. There is no positive evidence,
+however, one way or the other, to decide these questions of motive. I rely
+upon no more than the probable intention of the men, to be deduced from
+their actions, and I do not believe that the Dutch would have had orders
+to move as early as they did unless Marlborough had decided--not later
+than the moment I have mentioned--to make Tournai the first objective of
+the campaign.
+
+[3] Mr Fortescue in his work makes it the 23rd. I cannot conceive the
+basis for such an error. The whole story of the 24th, 25th, 26th, 27th,
+28th, and 29th is in the French archives, together with full details of
+the capitulation on the 29th and 30th.
+
+[4] As usual, there is a contradiction in the records. The French record
+definitely ascribes the proposal to Marlborough. Marlborough, in a letter
+to his wife of 5th August, as definitely ascribes it to Surville; and
+there is no positive evidence one way or the other, though Louis'
+rejection of the terms and the ability of calculation and the character of
+the two men certainly make it more probable that Marlborough and not
+Surville was the author of the proposition.
+
+[5] The dispute as to who was the author of the suggestion for an
+armistice is further illumined by this refusal on the part of the allies.
+The proposal to contain Tournai and yet to have free their vast forces in
+operation elsewhere, if a trifle crude, was certainly to their advantage,
+and as certainly to the disadvantage of the French.
+
+[6] This excellent phrase is Mr Fortescue's.
+
+[7] Technically the line of defence was forced, for the line of Trouille
+was but a continuation of the lines of La Bassee--Douai--Valenciennes. So
+far as strategical results were concerned, the withdrawal of Villars
+behind the forest barrier was equivalent to the reconstruction of new
+lines, and in the event the action of Malplaquet proved that new defensive
+position to be strong enough to prevent the invasion of France. On the
+other hand, there is little doubt that if Villars had been in a little
+more strength he would have elected to fight on the old lines and not
+behind the woods.
+
+It must further be remarked that if the operations had not been prolonged
+as they were by the existence of the posts on the lines, notably at St
+Ghislain, the defensive position of the French would probably have been
+forced and their whole line broken as early as September 4th.
+
+[8] It is remarkable that these two roads, which are the chief feature
+both of the landscape and the local military topography, and which are of
+course as straight as taut strings, are represented upon Mr Fortescue's
+map (vol. i. p. 424) as winding lanes, or, to speak more accurately, are
+not represented at all. In this perhaps the learned historian of the
+British army was misled by Coxe's atlas to Marlborough's campaign, a
+picturesque but grossly inaccurate compilation. The student who desires to
+study this action in detail will do well to consult the Belgian Ordnance
+Map on the scale of 1/40,000 contours at 5 metres, section Roisin, and the
+French General Staff Map, 1/80,000, section Maubeuge, south-western
+quarter; the action being fought exactly on the frontier between Belgium
+and France, both maps are necessary. For the general strategic position
+the French 1/200,000 in colours, sheet Maubeuge, and the adjoining sheet,
+Lille, are sufficient.
+
+[9] The reader who may compare this account of Malplaquet with others will
+be the less confused if he remembers that the forest of Sars is called on
+that extremity nearest to the gap the wood of Blaregnies, and that this
+name is often extended, especially in English accounts, to the whole
+forest.
+
+[10] These 9000 found at St Ghislain a belated post of 200 French, who
+surrendered. Someone had forgotten them.
+
+[11] For the discussion of this see later on p. 75.
+
+[12] They were commanded by Hamilton and Tullibardine. It is to be
+remarked that the command of the whole of the left of the Prince of
+Orange's force, though it was not half Scotch, was under the command of
+Hamilton and Douglas. The two regiments of Tullibardine and Hepburn were
+under the personal command of the Marquis of Tullibardine, the heir of
+Atholl.
+
+[13] Nominally under Tilly, but practically under the young Royal
+commander.
+
+[14] Villars, wounded and fainting with pain, had been taken from the
+field an hour or two before, and the whole command was now in the hands of
+Boufflers.
+
+
+
+
+Transcriber's Notes:
+
+Passages in italics are indicated by _underscore_.
+
+The misprint "Schulenberg" has been corrected to "Schulemberg" (page 70).
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Malplaquet, by Hilaire Belloc
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