troops. But
there was a wide difference between the well clad, well armed and well
drilled Irish, with whom he was familiar, and the ragged marauders whom
he found swarming in the alleys of Limerick. Accustomed to the splendour
and the discipline of French camps and garrisons, he was disgusted by
finding that, in the country to which he had been sent, a regiment of
infantry meant a mob of people as naked, as dirty and as disorderly
as the beggars, whom he had been accustomed to see on the Continent
besieging the door of a monastery or pursuing a diligence up him. With
ill concealed contempt, however, he addressed himself vigorously to the
task of disciplining these strange soldiers, and was day and night in
the saddle, galloping from post to post, from Limerick to Athlone, from
Athlone to the northern extremity of Lough Rea, and from Lough Rea back
to Limerick. [86]

It was indeed necessary that he should bestir himself; for, a few days
after his arrival, he learned that, on the other side of the Pale,
all was ready for action. The greater part of the English force was
collected, before the close of May, in the neighbourhood of Mullingar.
Ginkell commanded in chief. He had under him the two best officers,
after Marlborough, of whom our island could then boast, Talmash and
Mackay. The Marquess of Ruvigny, the hereditary chief of the refugees,
and elder brother of the brave Caillemot, who had fallen at the Boyne,
had joined the army with the rank of major general. The Lord Justice
Coningsby, though not by profession a soldier, came down from Dublin, to
animate the zeal of the troops. The appearance of the camp showed that
the money voted by the English Parliament had not been spared. The
uniforms were new; the ranks were one blaze of scarlet; and the train of
artillery was such as had never before been seen in Ireland. [87]

On the sixth of June Ginkell moved his head quarters from Mullingar. On
the seventh he reached Ballymore. At Ballymore, on a peninsula almost
surrounded by something between a swamp and a lake, stood an ancient
fortress, which had recently been fortified under Sarsfield's direction,
and which was defended by above a thousand men. The English guns were
instantly planted. In a few hours the besiegers had the satisfaction of
seeing the besieged running like rabbits from one shelter to another.
The governor, who had at first held high language, begged piteously for
quarter, and obtained it. The whole gar