tion. 'Twas heartrending
for an officer who had a heart to look down his line on a parade-day
afterwards, and miss hundreds of faces of comrades--humble or of high
rank--that had gathered but yesterday full of courage and cheerfulness
round the torn and blackened flags. Where were our friends? As the great
Duke reviewed us, riding along our lines with his fine suite of prancing
aides-de-camp and generals, stopping here and there to thank an officer
with those eager smiles and bows of which his Grace was always lavish,
scarce a huzzah could be got for him, though Cadogan, with an oath, rode
up and cried--"D--n you, why don't you cheer?" But the men had no
heart for that: not one of them but was thinking, "Where's my
comrade?--where's my brother that fought by me, or my dear captain that
led me yesterday?" 'Twas the most gloomy pageant I ever looked on; and
the "Te Deum" sung by our chaplains, the most woful and dreary satire.

Esmond's General added one more to the many marks of honor which he
had received in the front of a score of battles, and got a wound in
the groin, which laid him on his back; and you may be sure he
consoled himself by abusing the Commander-in-Chief, as he lay
groaning,--"Corporal John's as fond of me," he used to say, "as King
David was of General Uriah; and so he always gives me the post of
danger." He persisted, to his dying day, in believing that the Duke
intended he should be beat at Wynendael, and sent him purposely with a
small force, hoping that he might be knocked on the head there. Esmond
and Frank Castlewood both escaped without hurt, though the division
which our General commanded suffered even more than any other, having to
sustain not only the fury of the enemy's cannonade, which was very hot
and well served, but the furious and repeated charges of the famous
Maison du Roy, which we had to receive and beat off again and again,
with volleys of shot and hedges of iron, and our four lines of
musqueteers and pikemen. They said the King of England charged us
no less than twelve times that day, along with the French Household.
Esmond's late regiment, General Webb's own Fusileers, served in the
division which their colonel commanded. The General was thrice in the
centre of the square of the Fusileers, calling the fire at the French
charges, and, after the action, his Grace the Duke of Berwick sent his
compliments to his old regiment and their Colonel for their behavior on
the field.

We dra