Page:British campaigns in Flanders, 1690-1794; being extracts from "A history of the British army," (IA britishcampaigns00fort).pdf/251

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the 27th he fell in force upon the posts of Beaulieu and the Prince of Orange at Cysoing and Tourcoing. He was beaten back by Beaulieu with the loss of four guns; but the Dutch abandoned Tourcoing with suspicious alacrity, and would have retired to Tournai and Courtrai had not Murray sent a detachment to support them. "There is ill-will and disinclination to favour our present operations," wrote Murray; and indeed the fact is hardly surprising. The marvel is that he and the Duke of York should have remained in so dangerous a position, when a successful attack by the enemy upon the Dutch and a bold push forward would have carried the French to Furnes, and cut off the whole of the army about Dunkirk beyond rescue. Indeed, though they knew it not, this operation had actually been projected at the French headquarters.

With the arrival of his last reinforcements from the Moselle, Houchard resolved to attack the scattered posts of Freytag, the nearest of which lay little more than five miles from Cassel. Assembling thirty thousand men, he led them forward early in the morning

of the 6th of September in five columns, under Generals Vandamme, Hédouville, Colland, Jourdan, and himself, the three first against Poperinghe, Proven, and Rousbrugge, the two last against Wormhoudt, Herzeele, and Houtkerke. Though outnumbered by ten to one, the Hanoverians and Hessians fought most obstinately, and the troops opposed to Houchard and Jourdan would have held their own behind the Yser at Bambecque, had not the French already penetrated to Rexpoede in their rear. The fighting lasted all day, the garrison of Dunkirk at the same time keeping the besieging army employed by a sortie;