d had
ceased firing. It was a neck and neck race, and a very near thing. As
the horsemen cleared the open space and dashed safe into the arms of
their friends, a huge rabble of demoralized French swept across the
path they had just been following. No narrower escape had the two
young fellows yet had.

The truth was at once evident. The Dutchman's division, having driven
the enemy from the high ground, had wheeled, and was thus meeting the
Prince's wing, which in its turn had advanced along a curving line.
Each body in the growing darkness had mistaken the other for the
enemy. The plucky dash made by the two young fellows, though happily
not in the end needed, nevertheless received high praise from their
brother officers, and especially from the colonel himself.

For the next half-hour the fleeing French poured headlong through the
gap across which the lieutenants had galloped, between the Dutchman's
division and the Prince's. Darkness alone prevented the slaughter from
being greater than it was. The numbers of those who fell on the field
of Oudenarde, important as the battle was, were in fact far short of
those killed at Blenheim or Ramillies.

What was there now to prevent Marlborough from marching straight on
Paris itself? He was actually on the borders of France, victorious,
the French army behind him. He was eager; the home Government would
almost certainly have approved of the step. The heart of many a young
fellow under the great leader beat high, when he thought of the mighty
possibilities before him. But it was not to be. The Prince raised the
strongest objections to the Duke's bold plan, and the Dutch were
terrified at the bare thought of it. So Marlborough turned him to
another task, the siege of the great stronghold of Lille. It may be
observed in passing that Vendome wanted to fight again the next day
after Oudenarde, but Burgundy refused. Vendome in a rage declared that
they must then retreat, adding, "and I know that you have long wished
to do so," a bitter morsel for a royal duke to swallow.

Lille had been fortified by no less a person than the great master of
the art, Vauban himself. In charge of its garrison was Marshal
Boufflers, a splendid officer. Louis was as resolute to defend and
keep the place as the Allies were to take it. The actual investment of
the town was placed in the hands of Eugene, whose men had by this time
arrived, while Marlborough covered him. The siege train brought up by
the