for such a length of time and was
able to choose its own terrain.

Now all this character in the campaign preceding the battle is exemplified
in the attempt upon Marchiennes upon August 8th and 9th and its failure.
Had it succeeded, had the line been pierced, there would have been no
"block" at Malplaquet but an immediate invasion of France, just as there
would have been had the line been pierced in the first attempt of five
weeks before.

In the next week and the next, Villars continually extended that line. He
brought it up solidly as far as St Venant on his left, as far as
Valenciennes on his right. He continually strengthened it, so that at no
one place should it need any considerable body of men to hold it, and that
the mass of the army should be free to move at will behind this strong
entrenchment and dyke, fortified as it was with careful inundation and the
use of two large rivers.

Though the body of the allies again appeared in the neighbourhood of the
lines, no general attack was delivered, but on the 30th of August Villars
heard from deserters and spies that the citadel of Tournai was at the end
of its provisions. Though but a certain minority of the allied army was
necessary to contain that citadel, yet once it had fallen the whole of the
allied forces would be much freer to act.

It was upon the 31st of August that Surville, finding himself at the end
of his provisionment of food, proposed capitulation. At first no
capitulation could be arrived at. Marlborough insisted upon the garrison's
complete surrender; Surville replied by threatening a destruction of the
place. It was not until the morning of the 3rd September that a
capitulation was signed in the form that the officers and soldiers of the
garrison should not be free to serve the king until after they had been
exchanged. The troops should march out with arms and colours, and should
have safe escort through the French lines to Douai. They reached that town
and camp upon the 4th, and an exchange of prisoners against their numbers
was soon effected.

Thus after two months ended the siege of Tournai, a piece of resistance
which, as the reader will soon see, determined all that was to follow. Six
thousand four hundred men had held the place when it was first invested.
Of these, 1709 (nearly a third) had been killed; a number approximately
equal had been wounded. The figures are sufficient to show the desperate
character of the fighting, and how worthy