Page:Cassell's Illustrated History of England vol 4.djvu/211

A.D. 1704.] to cross it that it gave way. Numbers were plunged into the stream and perished; numbers were driven by the force behind over the banks; numbers were massacred on the spot. Of the twelve thousand troops who had ascended the Schellenberg, only three thousand ever rejoined the elector of Bavaria, but numbers came in as stragglers and joined the allies. There were seven or eight thousand destroyed on that bloody evening. On the part of the allies one thousand five hundred were killed and four thousand were wounded. But the murderous nature of this fearful struggle was, perhaps, more strikingly shown by the number of officers who perished, namely, eight generals, eleven colonels, six-and-twenty captains, amongst whom were the generals Goor and Beinheim, the prince of Bevern, and count Styrum. Amongst the spoils were sixteen pieces of cannon, thirteen pairs of colours, and all the tents and baggage. The conquering force remained in the camp all night, but the sufferings of their wounded were very great, for the night set in wet and stormy. Marlborough, having taken a necessary care for the dressing and comfort of the wounded, himself returned to his camp up the Wernitz.

What was to be expected, from the particular spirit which the prince of Baden had shown, took place. Though he deprecated the attack of the Schellenberg at all, and though he allowed the English to bear the terrible brunt of the ascent, and came up in the rear of the engagement, because he reached the entrenchments before Marlborough himself came up, he claimed the honour of the victory. Had he headed the attacking column, he would have had no other claim but that of a brave officer, for the whole plan of the campaign and the whole plan of the attack of the Schellenberg were Marlborough's. Had the prince had his way there would have been no battle at all. Marlborough repelled the mean attempt to steal his victory with contempt, and spoke some homely truths to the prince. It served the Louvestein faction in the Netherlands, however, with a pretext to injure Marlborough, by casting a medal bearing the portrait of the margrave, and on the reverse the lines of Schellenberg. But all over the world, not excepting Germany, justice was done to Marlborough, and from that moment his name became famous, celebrated in songs even by the French, dreaded by French children, whose mothers' stilled them with the terrible word Malbrouk.

But the French were hastening to prevent the destruction of their Bavarian ally. Marlborough received the news that they had promised to send to the elector, under Tallard, fifty battalions of foot and sixty squadrons of horse of the best troops in France, which should make him stronger than the confederates. These troops had already crossed the Rhine, and were making their way through the Black Forest. At the same time Eugene, though obliged to divide his forces, at once to watch Villeroi on the Rhine and to check the march of Tallard, promised Marlborough that he would do his uttermost to retard the junction. Meantime the elector, in too dangerous a proximity to the victorious army, abandoned Donauwerth, broke up his camp, and retreated towards Augsburg, leaving his own dominions open to the incursions of the allies. Marlborough lost no time in availing himself of the chance. He prepared to cross the deep and rapid river Lech, which was effected on the 7th of July at Gunderkingen.

Marlborough was now in Bavaria, and the garrison at Neuburg retreating to Ingoldstadt, he had the whole of the country at his mercy. He posted his camp at Mittelstetten on the 10th, and sent word to the elector that if he did not choose to come to terms he would do his best to ruin his country; but the elector, strongly encamped under the walls of Augsburg, and promised early succour by the French, made no sign of treating. Marlborough suffered his troops to levy contributions on the country round, and his army lived luxuriously at the expense of the unfortunate Bavarians. The true policy of the allies was to march on the elector, and dispose of him before the French could come up; but for this the margrave of Baden was in too ill a humour. In fact, the two generals were in the worst possible humour with each other, and the consequence was, the obvious interests of the campaign were sacrificed to the feud and jealousy of the generals. Marlborough proposed to march on Munich, the capital, and take it, but the margrave would not furnish the necessary artillery, and the thing was impossible. Marlborough spent five days in taking Rain, a fortress of little consequence. He also dispatched thirty squadrons to assist Eugene in obstructing the march of the French to join the elector. He contrived also to open negotiations with the elector of Bavaria. The envoy of the emperor offered to the elector to restore all his dominions, and pay him a subsidy of two hundred thousand crowns, on condition of his breaking with the French and assisting the emperor with twelve thousand men. But the negotiation came to nothing, for Tallard was now rapidly advancing with his army, and the elector, instead of keeping an appointment with the emperor's envoy, sent him word that since the king of France had made such powerful exertions to support him, he thought himself in honour obliged to remain firm to his alliance.

The allied generals were so much exasperated at this result, that they gave up the whole country, as far as the walls of Munich, to the ravages of the soldiery, and three hundred burning towns, villages, and castles marked the terrible fury of the allies, and left an indelible stain on the glories of that campaign. Marlborough professed to feel for the poor people. In writing to the duchess, he said:—"It is contrary to my nature, and nothing but absolute necessity could have obliged me to consent to it; for these poor people suffer for their master's ambition. There having been no war in this country for above sixty years, these towns and villages are so clean that you would be pleased with them." Yet all these innocent towns and villages were destroyed simply to compel the elector to treat. War in any shape is a direful calamity, but war carried on in this style is a war of devils, and not of Christians. The conduct of the allies here sunk them to an equality with the infamy of the French, for their like devastations in the palatinate. How infernal was the mode of war where the lives and homes of a whole country were sacrificed merely to compel terms from a prince, who was at hand for them to attack, and was himself alone the just object of punishment, for assisting the enemies of his country. The elector, horrified at this general destruction of the poor people's houses and property,