Horse, formed part of one commanded by Sir William Erskine. His first encounter with the enemy was not attended, as it seems, with much personal danger, or any brilliant result :—

"Too much time,' he remarks, was lost in making the disposition; and when the French cavalry, who showed good countenance to the last, retired, there was an apprehension that the wood was ambuscaded; so that the operation was not accomplished before the French flying from Premont had crossed the plain which separated them from the next village, where they had a reserve strongly posted.'

He was not long without being brought to a severer trial of his courage and horsemanship. We again quote his own words, omitting here and there, or shortening, for the convenience of our readers, an irrelevant or redundant phrase :

'On the 23rd (April) the 15th had taken the advanced posts at Fontaine Antique, with two squadrons of Leopold Hussars, to observe the enemy, near Cambray. We found the enemy so numerous that General Otto, who commanded, sent to the Duke of York for reinforcements. Two squadrons of Zetchwitz Cuirassiers, an English heavy brigade, and the 11th Light Dragoons, under General Mansell, were ordered to support us, and arrived the same night.

'Next morning we mounted, and marched to attack and dislodge the enemy from Villiers en Couché. The 15th and the two squadrons of Leopold preceded, and, as all supposed, were closely followed by the heavy cavalry, though the undulating character of the ground kept them from view. This error continued until the 15th and Leopold were within half cannon-shot, when we were unable to perceive a vestige of them.

At this period General Otto, who had moved on with the advance, received advice that the Emperor, who was on his road to Câteau, was intercepted by the enemy in front, and must infallibly be taken unless they were obliged to throw back their left. Otto immediately halted our advancing line, and calling together the commanders, told them the perilous situation of his Sovereign, and the desperate position in which they were placed. Gentlemen! he added, remember, your numbers do not permit prisoners.

This speech, repeated to officers and men, was received with enthusiastic cheers.

The French cavalry appeared to be in one line, supported by a wood on the left, and the village Villiers en Couché on the right. No infantry or cannon were visible. On the word "March" being again given, although we could ill spare the detachment, a small body of hussars was ordered to move on the wood, as Otto suspected that there was a corps of the enemy concealed in it. His suspicion was quickly verified.

'When we began to trot the French cavalry made a movement to right and left from the centre, dashed in a gallop-towards wood and village, and at the same moment we saw in lieu of them, as if created

by

by magic, an equal line of infantry with a considerable artillery in advance, which opened a furious cannonade with grape, while the musketry poured its volleys. The surprise was great, and the moment most critical. But happily the heads kept their direction, and the heels were duly applied to the " charge," which order was hailed with repeated huzzas.

The guns were quickly taken, but we then found that the chaussée, which ran through a hollow with steep banks, lay between them and the infantry. There was, however, no hesitation: every horse was true to his master, and the chaussée was passed in uninterrupted impetuous career. It was then, as we gained the crest, that the infantry poured its volley-but in vain. In vain also the first ranks kneeled and presented a steady line of bayonets. The impulse was too rapid and the body attacking too solid for any infantry power formed in line to oppose, although the ranks were three deep. Even the horses struck mortally on the brow of the bank had sufficient momentum to plunge upon the enemy in their fall.

The French cavalry, having gained the flanks of their infantry, endeavoured to take up a position in its rear. Our squadrons, still on the gallop, filled up the apertures which the French fire and bayonets had occasioned, and proceeded to the attack on the French cavalry, which seemed resolved to await the onset; but their discipline or their courage failed, and our horses' heads drove on them just as they were on the half turn to retire.

A dreadful massacre followed in a chase of four miles. Twelve hundred horsemen were cut down, of which about five hundred were Black Hussars. One farrier of the 15th alone killed twenty-two men.'

It must be allowed that this was a stern introduction, a 'durum rudimentum belli,' for one whose raw unpractised youth made him fitter for reading of war than personally encountering its horrors. The return from the pursuit was also beset with difficulties and dangers. It was necessary to repass the ravine, which was full of French baggage-waggons, artillery, and other impediments. The village of Villiers was also choked with the fugitive columns. The victorious party could not venture to stop and secure any part of the booty, though the guns, which they had captured in their charge, remained finally in their possession, the heavy cavalry having at length, after a separation attributable to a mistake of orders, come up to join in occupying the field of battle. General Otto, as indeed he well might be, was frantic in his gestures and exclamations of joy on the return of his forlorn hope. He had given them up for lost. He had even made the Duke of York acquainted with his despair. Speaking of the achievement after an interval of many years, Sir Robert Wilson declares his conviction that it was the most daring in conception, the most resolute in execution, and the

most

most unaccountable in its success that ever

range of his experience.

came within the The young soldier, though he had his share in the glory of so brilliant and unsparing a feat, was not insensible either to the merits of his opponents or to the claims of humanity. He was on the point of falling a sacrifice to the latter, when a watchful and experienced quartermaster, named Stewart, perceived his danger, and with ready trigger relieved him from the wounded prisoner, whose life he had spared, and who, to repay his generosity, was manoeuvring to betray him into the hands of a hostile squadron.

We need not remind our readers that the operations of the Allied Army were more remarkable for the spirit and mutual animosity of the combatants than for any final success attendant on the Imperial standard. The British Contingent, and more especially the Light Brigade, shone out with peculiar lustre in the former respect, though destined of course to partake of the general disappointment as to results of a permanent description. The hope of preserving Holland was no sooner abandoned, on grounds of obvious necessity, than the British troops were transferred to Germany, and thence after some delay restored to their native shores. Wilson's regiment appears to have had the lion's share in most of the engagements which brought the Allies and the French into desperate collision with each other; and it was not till the winter of 1796 that it returned to England, and joined the depôt at Croydon, when our Cornet, having previously become a lieutenant by purchase, obtained the command of a troop in the same manner. His account of the actions which distinguished with alternate successes and defeats the campaign of 1794, from the 10th to the 22nd of May, while Pichegru commanded the French, and while the Duke of York was still with the British troops, is remarkable for the distinctness and reality with which he has brought into view both the general movements of the forces and the particular incidents which in various places arose out of them.

'On the morning of the 10th the enemy, 30,000 strong, attacked us, and made an impression on our advanced line. But the Kaunitz regiment, getting up to the retiring troops before they were driven out of an extensive wood, repelled the assailants. A considerable effort was then made against our centre, and we were sent down with sixteen squadrons of British and two of Austrian Hussars to attack the enemy in flank as he attempted to cross with the design of storming our position. So soon as he perceived our intention he formed a corps into squares and opened upon us a severe fire of shot and shells; he persisted in an advance, and, seeing only level ground between us, a

charge

charge was ordered and the order obeyed; but before we could reach the enemy, who had partly deployed, to our great surprise, as we advanced, we found ourselves in a range of rape-fields; and, in a few seconds, two-thirds of the horses were prostrate under a volley of musketry and grape, which, if well directed, must have annihilated the whole. At this instant, fortunately, the Hungarian Grenadiers, for whose simultaneous operation we ought to have waited, were seen ascending the heights to storm the squares. This obliged the enemy to withdraw, and to take up a new position nearer his reserves and enclosed country.

'I was mounted on my English mare, who extricated herself by extraordinary activity; but she carried me to the enemy, and I should infallibly have been taken if a soldier had not made a blow at her head with the butt-end of his musket, which frightened her so much that she turned like a hare, and ran obliquely along the line until I could find a clear piece of ground, when I succeeded in giving her a new direction. I suppose upwards of a hundred shots were fired at us, of which only one struck her in the neck.

'As soon as the squadrons could be reassembled, another charge was ordered on the retiring squares; it failed; and a third also was repulsed, although some of the angles were pierced. At length, the squares having nearly passed the plain in retreat, all hope of making any impression was abandoned. The enemy observed this, and imprudently changed their formation into columns of march without taking any precaution to line the extreme of the wood into which they were entering. This negligence afforded the opportunity for a sudden attack, which succeeded. Fifteen pieces of cannon were taken, and several hundred men massacred. A more cold-blooded butchery was never perpetrated.

The enemy had the same day attacked the Hanoverian Corps, which was posted on the right of the Duke's army, and had also been repulsed; but on the Sunday following they made a vigorous attack on General Clairfait, who had crossed the river Deule, and were at first successful; but the Austrians not being able to take possession of Cambray, where the enemy had rallied, Clairfait was in his turn obliged to retire, and was pursued to Thielt, suffering very considerably. This advantage was, however, counterbalanced on the 14th by their defeat in an action with General Kaunitz, posted near Mons, who cut through several thousand men and some pieces of cannon.

'Mons being thus secured, the Austrian army, commanded by the Emperor and the Archduke Charles, marched to unite itself with the Duke of York's army, that an offensive movement might be made which, with a co-operation of General Clairfait, should throw the enemy back upon their own frontier line of defence. The junction having been effected at Orchies, the army marched in five columns. The 15th marched in the Duke's column, composed of six squadrons British, four of Hussars, seven battalions British, five Austrian, and two of Hessians.

'From Lannoy, after leaving the two Hessian battalions

there

there, we advanced to Roubaix, where the enemy were strongly posted. The action was very obstinate, though short, as they found themselves likely to be turned, and so retired. . .

"The flank battalion of Guards, supported by the battalion of the 1st Regiment of Guards, led the way through a very close country. On arriving in front of Mouveaux, it was found strongly intrenched and palisaded. About fifteen hundred men defended the place with several pieces of cannon. The British guns having opened a practicable entrance, the Guards stormed, while the cavalry were ordered to proceed at a gallop round the work, and get in the rear and cut off the flying enemy. When we moved, the Guards had not got into the place. The enemy were still firing their cannon charged with grape down the road lined with an avenue of trees, and had set on fire a house on the roadside. By the scorching flames of this we were obliged to pass, as a deep ditch and fences rendered it impossible for us to break off the road till we got close to the walls. The rattling of the shot through the trees, the falling branches, the burning house, the huzzas of the infantry, and shouts, and roar and smoke of the guns, with all the confusion of an assault, was a sublime spectacle for me, and excited all to the highest degree of animation. The French kept their ground manfully, until they saw us, in spite of their fire, wheeling round the very edge of their intrenchments, when they deserted and fled.

The infantry on entering the town had set it on fire, and the church catching the flames gave fatal intelligence to the distant enemy of our success and position.'

Sir Robert goes on to state by what arrangements the Duke of York endeavoured to secure his army in the positions which he had occupied with no very distinct idea of their mutual relations to each other, and how General Pichegru, acting on the information derived from the fire at Mouveaux, marched 30,000 men during the night, and attacked Turcoing at break of day. It appears from his account that the column of the Allied Army, which was the immediate object of this attack, suffered most severely, and owed its preservation in the end rather to want of energy on the part of its assailants than to its own combinations; that at one time it was surrounded by five times its own numbers, and that, in spite of gallantry and self-possession, it lost the whole of its artillery, though its loss was in other respects comparatively small, considering the circumstances in which it had been placed. At one moment the Duke of York was cut off. 'With great difficulty,' says Sir Robert, and attended only by a few dragoons, he was fortunate enough to reach General Otto's column.' To the extreme vigour with which that officer attacked the enemy, in order to make a diversion in the Duke's favour, may be justly attributed the preservation of any part of His Royal Highness's division.

The