was circulated with such exaggerations as elevated their spirits, and effaced all thoughts of submission. The king had returned to Dublin, with a view to embark for England; but receiving notice that the designs of his domestic enemies were discovered and frustrated, that the fleet was repaired, and the French navy retired to Brest, he postponed his voyage, and resolved to reduce Limerick; in which monsieur Boisseleau commanded as governor, and the duke of Berwick and colonel Sarsfield acted as inferior officers. On the 9th day of August, the king having called in his detachment, and advanced into the neighbourhood of the place, summoned the commander to deliver the town; and Boisseleau answered, that he imagined the best way to gain the good opinion of the prince of Orange would be a vigorous defence of the town which his majesty had committed to his charge. Before the place was fully invested, colonel Sarsfield, with a body of horse and dragoons, passed the Shannon in the night, intercepted the king's train of artillery on its way to the camp, routed the troops that guarded it, disabled the cannon, destroyed the carriages, waggons, and ammunition, and returned in safety to Limerick. Notwithstanding this disaster, the trenches were opened on the 17th day of the month, and a battery was raised with some cannon brought from Waterford. The siege was carried on with vigour, and the place defended with great resolution. At length, the king ordered his troops to make a lodgement in the covered way or counterscarp, which was accordingly assaulted with great fury; but the assailants met with such a warm reception from the besieged, that they were repulsed with the loss of twelve hundred men, either killed on the spot or mortally wounded. This disappointment concurring with the badness of the weather, which became rainy and unwholesome, induced the king to renounce his undertaking. The heavy baggage and cannon being sent

away, the army decamped, and marched towards Clonmel. William, having constituted the lord Sydney and Thomas Coningsby lords-justices of Ireland, and left the command of the army with count Solmes, embarked at Duncannon with prince George of Denmark on the 5th of September, and next day arrived in King-road, near Bristol, from whence he repaired to Windsor.

§ XXXVI. About the latter end of this month, the earl of Marlborough arrived in Ireland, with five thou sand English troops, to attack Cork and Kinsale, in conjunction with a detachment from the great army, according to a scheme he had proposed to king William. Having landed his soldiers without much opposition in the neighbourhood of Cork, he was joined by five thousand men under the prince of Wirtemberg, between whom and the earl a dispute arose about the command; but this was compromised by the interposition of La Mellionere. The place being invested, and the batteries raised, the besiegers proceeded with such rapidity that a breach was soon effected. Colonel Mackillicut, the governor, demanded a parley, and hostages were exchanged; but he rejected the conditions that were offered, and hostilities recommenced with redoubled vigour. The duke of Grafton, who served on this occasion as a volunteer, was mortally wounded in one of the attacks, and died regretted as a youth of promising talents. Preparations being made for a general assault, the besieged thought proper to capitulate, and surrendered themselves prisoners of war. Besides the governor and colonel Ricaut, the victor found the earls of Clancarty and Tyrone among the individuals of the garrison. Marlborough having taken possession of Cork, detached brigadier Villiers with a body of horse and dragoons to summon the town and forts of Kinsale, and next day advanced with the rest of the forces. The old fort was immediately taken by assault; but sir Edward Scott, who commanded the other, sustained a regular

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siege, until the breach was practicable, and then obtained an honourable capitulation. These maritime places being reduced, all communication between France and the enemy, on this side of the island, was cut off, and the Irish were confined to Ulster, where they could not subsist without great difficulty. The earl of Marlborough having finished this expedition in thirty days, returned with his prisoners to England, where the fame of this exploit added greatly to his reputation.

§ XXXVII. During these transactions, count de Lauzun, commander of the French auxiliaries in Ireland, lay inactive in the neighbourhood of Galway, and transmitted such a lamentable account of his situation to the court of France, that transports were sent over to bring home the French forces. In these he embarked with his troops, and the command of the Irish forces devolved to the duke of Berwick, though it was afterward transferred to M. St. Ruth. Lauzun was disgraced at Versailles for having deserted the cause before it was desperate: Tyrconnel, who accompanied him in his voyage, solicited the French court for a farther supply of officers, arms, clothes, and ammunition, for the Irish army, which he said would continue firm to the interest of king James, if thus supported. Meanwhile they formed themselves into separate bodies of freebooters, and plundered the country, under the appellation of rapparies; while the troops of king William either enjoyed their ease in quarters, or imitated the rapine of the enemy; so that, between both, the poor people were miserably ha

rassed.

XXXVIII. The affairs of the continent had not yet undergone any change of importance, except in the conduct of the duke of Savoy, who renounced his neutrality, engaged in an alliance with the emperor and king of Spain; and, in a word, acceded to the grand confederacy. He had no sooner declared himself, than Catinat, the French general, entered his territories at

the head of eighteen thousand men, and defeated him in a pitched battle near Saluces, which immediately surrendered to the conqueror. Then he reduced Savillana, Villa Franca, with several other places, pursued the duke to Carignan, surprised Suza, and distributed his forces in winter-quarters, partly in Provence, and partly in the dutchy of Savoy, which St. Ruth had lately reduced under the dominion of France. The duke, finding himself disappointed in the succours he expected from the emperor and the king of Spain, demanded assistance of the states-general and king William; to this last he sent an ambassador, to congratulate him upon his accession to the throne of England. The confederates, in their general congress at the Hague, had agreed that the army of the States under prince Waldeck should oppose the forces of France, commanded by the duke of Luxembourg, in Flanders; while the elector of Brandenburgh should observe the marquis de Boufflers on the Moselle: but, before the troops of Brandenburgh could be assembled, Boufflers encamped between the Sambre and the Meuse, and maintained a free communication with Luxembourg.

§ XXXIX. Prince Waldeck, understanding that this general intended to cross the Sambre between Namur and Charleroy, in order to lay the Spanish territories under contribution, decamped from the river Pieton, and detached the count of Berlo, with a great body of horse, to observe the motions of the enemy. He was encountered by the French army near Fleurus, and slain; and his troops, though supported by two other detachments, were hardly able to rejoin the main body, which continued all night in order of battle. Next day they were attacked by the French, who were greatly superior to them in number; after a very obstinate engagement the allies gave way, leaving about five thousand men dead upon the field of battle. The enemy took about four thousand prisoners, and the greatest

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part of their artillery: but the victory was dearly bought. The Dutch infantry fought with surprising resolution and success. The duke of Luxembourg owned, with surprise, that they had surpassed the Spanish foot at the battle of Rocroy. "Prince Waldeck (said he) ought always to remember the French horse; and I shall never forget the Dutch infantry." The Dutch general exerted himself with such activity, that the French derived very little advantage from their victory. The prince being reinforced with the five English regiments, nine thousand Hanoverians, ten thousand from the bishoprick of Liege and Holland, joined the elector of Brandenburgh; so that the confederate army amounted to five-and-fifty thousand men, and they marched by the way of Genap to Bois-Seigneur-Isaac. They were now superior to Luxembourg, who thought proper to fortify his camp, that he might not be obliged to fight, except with considerable advantage. Nevertheless, prince Waldeck would have attacked him in his intrenchments, had he not been prohibited from hazarding another engagement, by an express order of the states-general; and, when this restriction was removed, the elector would not venture a battle.

§ XL. By this time the emperor's son Joseph was by the electoral college chosen king of the Romans; but his interest sustained a rude shock in the death of the gallant duke of Lorraine, who was suddenly seized with a quinsey, at a small village near Lintz, and expired, not without suspicion of having fallen a sacrifice to the fears of the French king, against whom he had formerly declared war, as a sovereign prince unjustly expelled from his territories. He possessed great military talents, and had threatened to enter Lorraine at the head of forty thousand men, in the course of the ensuing summer. The court of France, alarmed at this declaration, is said to have had recourse to poison, for preventing the execution of the duke's design. At his death, the command