struction of the whole city, or, at least, as far as the bridge, and parts adjacent. Let his thoughts proceed to examine why or how, in that precipitate fall, not one nail nor one piece of iron, in that large fabric, should afford one little spark to inflame that mass of sulphurous matter it was loaded with; and if he is at a loss to find a providence, I fear his friends will be more at a loss to find his understanding. But the battle of Landen happening while our regiment was here on duty, we were soon removed, to our satisfaction, from that pacific station to one more active, in Flanders.

Notwithstanding that fatal battle the year preceding, namely, A. D. 1694, the confederate army under king William lay encamped at Mont St. André, an open place, and much exposed; while the French were intrenched up to their very teeth, at Vignamont, a little distance from us. This afforded matter of great reflection to the politicians of those times, who could hardly allow, that if the confederate army suffered so much, as it really did in the battle of Landen, it could consist with right conduct to tempt, or rather dare a new engagement. But those sage objectors had forgot the well-known courage of that brave prince, and were as little capable of fathoming his designs. The enemy, who, to their sorrow, had by experience been made better judges, were resolved to traverse both'; for which purpose they kept close within their intrenchments; so that after all his efforts, king William, finding he could no way draw them to a battle, suddenly decamped, and marched directly to Pont Espiers, by long marches, with a design to pass the French lines at that place.

But notwithstanding our army marched in a direct line, to our great surprise, we found the enemy had first taken possession of it. They gave this the name of the Long March, and very deservedly; for though. our army marched upon the string, and the enemy upon the bow, sensible of the importance of the post, and the necessity of securing it, by double horsing

with their foot, and by leaving their weary and weak in their garrisons, and supplying their places with fresh men out of them, they gained their point in disappointing us. Though certain it is, that march cost them as many men and horses as a battle. However, their master, the French king, was so pleased with their indefatigable and auspicious diligence, that he wrote, with his own hand, a letter of thanks to the officers, for the great zeal and care they had taken to prevent the confederate army from entering into French Flanders.

King William, thus disappointed in that noble design, gave immediate orders for his whole army to march through Oudenard, and then encamped at Rosendale; after some little stay at that camp we were removed to the Camerlins, between Newport and Ostend, once more to take our winter quarters there among the boors.

We were now in the year 1695, when the strong fortress of Namur, taken by the French in 1692, and since made by them much stronger, was invested by the earl of Athlone. After very many vigorous attacks, with the loss of many men, the town was taken, the garrison retiring into the castle. Into which, soon after, notwithstanding all the circumspection of the besiegers, mareschal Bouflers found means, with some dragoons, to throw himself.

While king William was thus engaged in that glorious and important siege, prince Vaudemont being posted at Watergaem with about fifty battalions and as many squadrons, the mareschal Villeroy laid a design to attack him with the whole French army. The prince imagined no less, therefore he prepared accordingly, giving us orders to fortify our camp, as well as the little time we had for it would permit. Those orders were pursued; nevertheless, I must confess, it was beyond the reach of my little reason to account for our so long stay in the sight of an army so

up

much superior to ours. The prince in the whole could hardly muster thirty thousand; and Villeroy was known to value himself upon having one hundred thousand effective men. However, the prince provisionally sent away all our baggage that very morning to Ghent, and still made show as if he resolved to defend himself to the last extremity in our little intrenchments. The enemy on their side began to surround us; and, in their motions for that purpose, blew little bags of gunpowder, to give the readier notice how far they had accomplished it. Another captain, with myself, being placed on the right, with one hundred men, (where I found monsieur Montal endeavouring if possible to get behind us,) I could easily observe they had so far attained their aim of encompassing us, as to the very fashion of a horse's shoe. This made me fix my eyes so intently upon the advancing enemy, that I never minded what my friends were doing behind me; though I afterwards found that they had been filing off so very artfully and privately, by that narrow opening of the horse-shoe, that when the enemy imagined us past a possibility of escape, our little army at once, and of a sudden, was ready to disappear. There was a large wood on the right of our army, through which lay the road to Ghent, not broader than to admit of more than four to march abreast. Down this the prince had slid his forces, except to that very small party which the captain and myself commanded, and which was designedly left to bring up the rear. Nor did we stir till captain Collier, then aid-de-camp to his brother, now earl of Portmore, came with the word of command for us to draw off.

When Villeroy was told of our retreat, he was much surprised, as thinking it a thing utterly impossible. However, at last, being sensible of the truth of it, he gave orders for our rear to be attacked; but we kept firing from ditch to ditch, and hedge to hedge, till night came upon us; and so our little army got

clear of its gigantic enemy with very inconsiderable loss. However, the French failed not, in their customary way, to express the sense of their vexation at this disappointment, with fire and sword in the neighbourhood round. Thus prince Vaudemont acquired more glory by that retreat than an entire victory could have given him; and it was not, I confess, the least part of satisfaction in life, that myself had a share of honour under him to bring off the rear at that his glorious retreat at Arseel.

However, in further revenge of this political chicane of the prince of Vaudemont, and to oblige, if possible, king William to raise the siege from before Namur, Villeroy entered into the resolution of bombarding Brussels. In order to which he encamped at Anderleck, and then made his approaches as near as was convenient to the town. There he caused to be planted thirty mortars, and raised a battery of ten guns to shoot hot bullets into the place.

But before they fired from either, Villeroy, in compliment to the duke of Bavaria, sent a messenger to know in what part of the town his duchess chose to reside, that they might, as much as possible, avoid incommoding her, by directing their fire to other parts. Answer was returned, that she was at her usual place of residence, the palace; and accordingly their firing from battery or mortars little incommoded them that way.

Five days the bombardment continued; and with such fury, that the centre of that noble city was quite laid in rubbish. Most of the time of bombarding I was upon the counterscarp, where I could best see and distinguish; and I have often counted in the air, at one time, more than twenty bombs; for they shot whole volleys out of their mortars all together. This, as it must needs be terrible, threw the inhabitants into the utmost confusion. Cart-loads of nuns, that for many years before had never been out of the cloister, were

now hurried about from place to place, to find retreats of some security. In short, the groves, and parts remote, were all crowded; and the most spacious streets had hardly a spectator left to view the ruins. Nothing was to be seen like that dexterity of our people in extinguishing the fires; for where the red-hot bullets fell, and raised new conflagrations, not burghers only, but the vulgar sort, stood staring, and, with their hands impocketed, beheld their houses gradually consume; and without offering prudent or charitable hand to stop the growing flames.

But after they had almost thus destroyed that late fair city, Villeroy, finding he could not raise the siege of Namur by that vigorous attack upon Brussels, decamped at last from before it, and put his army on the march towards Namur, to try if he could have better success by exposing to show his pageant of one hundred thousand men. Prince Vaudemont had timely intelligence of the duke's resolution and motion: and resolved, if possible, to get there before him. Nor was the attempt fruitless; he fortunately succeeded, though with much fatigue, and no little difficulty, after he had put a trick upon the spies of the enemy by pretending to encamp, and, so soon as they were gone, ordering a full march.

The castle of Namur had been all this time under the fire of the besiegers' cannon; and soon after our little army under the prince was arrived, a breach, that was imagined practicable, being made in the Terra Nova (which, as the name imports, was a new work, raised by the French, and added to the fortifications, since it fell into their hands in 1692, and which very much increased the strength of the whole), a breach, as I have said, being made in this Terra Nova, a storm, in a council of war, was resolved upon. Four entire regiments, in conjunction with some draughts made out of several others, were ordered for that work, myself commanding that part of them which had been drawn out of colonel Tiffin's. We were all to rendez