"D'Auteroche declining the first fire,"--or accepting it, if ever offered, nobody can say,--"the three Guards Regiments, Lord Charles's on the right, give it him hot and heavy, 'tremendous rolling fire;' so that D'Auteroche, responding more or less, cannot stand it; but has at once to rustle into discontinuity, he and his, and roll rapidly out of the way. And the British Column advances, steadily, terribly, hurling back all opposition from it; deeper and deeper into the interior mysteries of the French Host; blasting its way with gunpowder;--in a magnificent manner. A compact Column, slowly advancing,--apparently of some 16,000 foot.
Pauses, readjusts itself a little, when not meddled with;when meddled with, has cannon, has rolling fire,--delivers from it, in fact, on both hands such a torrent of deadly continuous fire as was rarely seen before or since. 'FEU INFERNAL,' the French call it. The French make vehement resistance. Battalions, squadrons, regiment after regiment, charge madly on this terrible Column; but rush only on destruction thereby. Regiment This storms in from the right, regiment That from the left; have their colonels shot, 'lose the half of their people;' and hastily draw back again, in a wrecked condition. The cavalry-horses cannot stand such smoke and blazing; nor indeed, I think, can the cavaliers. REGIMENT DU ROIrushing on, full gallop, to charge this Column, got one volley from it [says Espagnac] which brought to the ground 460 men.
Natural enough that horses take the bit between their teeth;likewise that men take it, and career very madly in such circumstances!
MAP Chap. VIII, Book 15, PAGE 440 GOES ABOUT HERE--------"The terrible Column with slow inflexibility advances; cannon (now in reversed position) from that Redoubt d'Eu ('Shame on you, Ingoldsby!'), and irregular musketry from Fontenoy side, playing upon it; defeated regiments making barriers of their dead men and firing there; Column always closing its gapped ranks, and girdled with insupportable fire. It ought to have taken Fontenoy and Redoubt d'Eu, say military men; it ought to have done several things! It has now cut the French fairly in two;--and Saxe, who is earnestly surveying it a hundred paces ahead, sends word, conjuring the King to retire instantly,--across the Scheld, by Calonne Bridge and the strong rear-guard there,--who, however, will not. King and Dauphin, on horseback both, have stood 'at the Justice (GALLOWS, in fact) of our Lady of the Woods,' not stirring much, occasionally shifting to a windmill which is still higher,--ye Heavens, with what intrepidity, all day!--'a good many country-folk in trees close behind them.' Country-folk, I suppose, have by this time seen enough, and are copiously making off: but the King will not, though things do look dubious.
"In fact, the Battle hangs now upon a hair; the Battle is as good as lost, thinks Marechal de Saxe. His battle-lines torn in two in that manner, hovering in ragged clouds over the field, what hope is there in the Battle? Fontenoy is firing blank, this some time;its cannon-balls done. Officers, in Antoine, are about withdrawing the artillery,--then again (on new order) replacing it awhile.
All are looking towards the Scheld Bridge; earnestly entreating his Majesty to withdraw. Had the Dutch, at this point of time, broken heartily in, as Waldeck was urging them to do, upon the redoubts of Antoine; or had his Royal Highness the Duke, for his own behoof, possessed due cavalry or artillery to act upon these ragged clouds, which hang broken there, very fit for being swept, were there an artillery-and-horse besom to do it,--in either of these cases the Battle was the Duke's. And a right fiery victory it would have been; to make his name famous; and confirm the English in their mad method of fighting, like Baresarks or Janizaries rather than strategic human creatures. [See, in Busching's <italic> Magazin, <end italic> xvi. 169 ("Your illustrious 'Column,' at Fontenoy?
It was fortuitous, I say; done like janizaries;" and so forth), a Criticism worth reading by soldiers.]
"But neither of these contingencies had befallen. The Dutch-Austrian wing did evince some wish to get possession of Antoine;and drew out a little; but the guns also awoke upon them;whereupon the Dutch-Austrians drew in again, thinking the time not come. As for the Duke, he had taken with him of cannon a good few;but of horse none at all (impossible for horse, unless Fontenoy and the Redoubt d'Eu were ours!)--and his horse have been hanging about, in the Wood of Barry all this while, uncertain what to do;their old Commander being killed withal, and their new a dubitative person, and no orders left. The Duke had left no orders; having indeed broken in here, in what we called a spiritual white-heat, without asking himself much what he would do when in: 'Beat the French, knock them to powder if I can!'--Meanwhile the French clouds are reassembling a little: Royal Highness too is readjusting himself, now got '300 yards ahead of Fontenoy,'--pauses there about half an hour, not seeing his way farther.
"During which pause, Duc de Richelieu, famous blackguard man, gallops up to the Marechal, gallops rapidly from Marechal to King;suggesting, 'were cannon brought AHEAD of this close deep Column, might not they shear it into beautiful destruction; and then a general charge be made?' So counselled Richelieu: it is said, the Jacobite Irishman, Count Lally of the Irish Brigade, was prime author of this notion,--a man of tragic notoriety in time coming.
