exist, and that, in a disciplined
army led by generals of long experience and great fame a fighting
divine was likely to give less help than scandal. The Bishop elect was
determined to be wherever danger was; and the way in which he exposed
himself excited the extreme disgust of his royal patron, who hated a
meddler almost as much as a coward. A soldier who ran away from a battle
and a gownsman who pushed himself into a battle were the two objects
which most strongly excited William's spleen.

It was still early in the day. The King rode slowly along the northern
bank of the river, and closely examined the position of the Irish, from
whom he was sometimes separated by an interval of little more than two
hundred feet. He was accompanied by Schomberg, Ormond, Sidney, Solmes,
Prince George of Hesse, Coningsby, and others. "Their army is but
small;" said one of the Dutch officers. Indeed it did not appear to
consist of more than sixteen thousand men. But it was well known, from
the reports brought by deserters, that many regiments were concealed
from view by the undulations of the ground. "They may be stronger than
they look," said William; "but, weak or strong, I will soon know all
about them." [692]

At length he alighted at a spot nearly opposite to Oldbridge, sate
down on the turf to rest himself, and called for breakfast. The sumpter
horses were unloaded: the canteens were opened; and a tablecloth was
spread on the grass. The place is marked by an obelisk, built while
many veterans who could well remember the events of that day were still
living.

While William was at his repast, a group of horsemen appeared close to
the water on the opposite shore. Among them his attendants could discern
some who had once been conspicuous at reviews in Hyde Park and at balls
in the gallery of Whitehall, the youthful Berwick, the small, fairhaired
Lauzun, Tyrconnel, once admired by maids of honour as the model of manly
vigour and beauty, but now bent down by years and crippled by gout, and,
overtopping all, the stately head of Sarsfield.

The chiefs of the Irish army soon discovered that the person who,
surrounded by a splendid circle, was breakfasting on the opposite bank,
was the Prince of Orange. They sent for artillery. Two field pieces,
screened from view by a troop of cavalry, were brought down almost to
the brink of the river, and placed behind a hedge. William, who had just
risen from his meal, and was again in the saddle,