So dreadful was the fire that
half the Prussian cavalry were slain, and the rest escaped with
difficulty, hotly pursued by the French household troops.
An even more desperate conflict was all this time raging on the
left. Here Marlborough placed himself at the head of the Dutch and
Hanoverian battalions, and led them back against the French, who
were advancing with shouts of victory, and desperate struggles
ensued. Alison in his history says:
"The ground on which the hostile lines met was so broken, that the
battle in that quarter turned almost into a series of partial
conflicts and even personal encounters. Every bridge, every ditch,
every wood, every hamlet, every enclosure, was obstinately
contested, and so incessant was the roll of musketry, and so
intermingled did the hostile lines become, that the field, seen
from a distance, appeared an unbroken line of flame. A warmer fire,
a more desperate series of combats, was never witnessed in modern
warfare. It was in great part conducted hand to hand, like the
battles of antiquity, of which Livy and Homer have left such
graphic descriptions. The cavalry could not act, from the multitude
of hedges and copses which intersected the theatre of conflict.
Breast to breast, knee to knee, bayonet to bayonet, they maintained
the fight on both sides with the most desperate resolution. If the
resistance, however, was obstinate, the attack was no less
vigorous, and at length the enthusiastic ardour of the French
yielded to the steady valour of the Germans.
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