h military affairs, they had recourse on every
occasion to the very fractious generals who already had done so much
mischief to the common cause. In vain Marlborough repeatedly
endeavoured, as he himself said, "to cheat them into victory," by
getting their consent to measures, of which they did not see the
bearing, calculated to achieve that object; their timid, jealous
spirit interposed on every occasion to mar important operations, and
the corps they commanded was too considerable to admit of their being
undertaken without their co-operation. After nine days' watching the
enemy across the Dyle, Marlborough proposed to cross the river near
Louvain, and attack the enemy; the Dutch Deputies interposed their
negative, to Marlborough's infinite mortification, as, in his own
words, "it spoiled the whole campaign."[6]

Worn out with these long delays, Marlborough at length resolved at all
hazards to pass the river, trusting that the Dutch, when they saw the
conflict once seriously engaged, would not desert him. But in this he
was mistaken. The Dutch not only failed to execute the part assigned
them in the combined enterprise, but sent information of his designs
to the enemy. The consequence was, Villeroi was on his guard. All the
Duke's demonstrations could not draw his attention from his left,
where the real attack was intended; but nevertheless the Duke pushed
on the English and Germans under his orders, who forced the passage in
the most gallant style. But when the Duke ordered the Dutch generals
to support the attack of the Duke of Wirtemberg, who had crossed the
river, and established himself in force on the opposite bank, they
refused to move their men. The consequence was that this attack, as
well planned and likely to succeed as the famous forcing of the lines
a fortnight before, proved abortive; and Marlborough, burning with
indignation, was obliged to recall his troops when on the high-road to
victory, and when the river had been crossed, before they had
sustained a loss of a hundred men. So general was the indignation at
this shameful return on the part of the Dutch generals to Marlborough
for all the services he had rendered to their country, that it drew
forth the strongest expressions from one of his ablest, but most
determined opponents, Lord Bolingbroke, who wrote to him at this
juncture:--"It was very melancholy to find the malice of Slangenberg,
the fears of Dopf, and the ignorance of the deputies, to menti