just instinct to gamble on the chance of the French army in Alsace not
noting his move, and of the few troops he left opposite them upon the
Rhine sufficing to screen his movements and to give the effect of much
larger numbers. In other words, though his task in the coalition was to
watch the central Rhine, he decided to take the risk of seeing the Rhine
forced, and to march in aid of the English general whom he had himself
summoned to Bavaria, with whose genius his own had such sympathy, and at
whose side he was to accomplish the marvels of the next seven years.

Like Marlborough, he was successful in concealing his determination, but,
with a smaller force than Marlborough's had been, he was able to be more
successful still.

Villeroy, who commanded the French upon the Middle Rhine, was informed by
numerous deserters and spies that Eugene, after the fall of Villingen, was
at Radstadt, and intended detaching but two or three battalions at most
from his lines upon the right bank of the Rhine, and these not, of
course, for work upon the Danube, but only to cover Wurtemburg by
garrisoning Rottweil.

This information, coming though it did from many sources, was calculatedly
false, and Eugene's movements, after the siege of Villingen had been
raised, were arranged with a masterly penetration of his enemy's mind. A
leisurely two days after the siege of Villingen was raised he entered that
fortress, ordered the breaches to be repaired, and, in his every order and
disposition, appeared determined to remain within the neighbourhood of the
Upper Rhine. Nearly a week later he was careful to show himself at
Rottweil, hardly a day's march away, apparently doing no more than cover
Wurtemburg against a possible French attack from beyond the Rhine; and, so
far as such leisure and immobility could testify to his intentions, he
proclaimed his determination to remain in that neighbourhood, and in no
way to preoccupy himself with what might be going on in the valley of the
Upper Danube.

With due deliberation, he left eight battalions in Rottweil to garrison
that place, posted seventeen upon his lines upon the Rhine, and himself
openly proceeded--and that at no great speed--to march for the valley of
the Neckar with 15,000 men.... Those 15,000 had been picked from his army
with a particular care; nearly one-third were cavalry in the highest
training, and the command, which seemed but one of three detachments all
destined to operate upo