pondence with Avaux.
The letters were intercepted; and a formidable plot was brought to
light. It appeared that, if Schomberg had been weak enough to yield to
the importunity of those who wished him to give battle, several French
companies would, in the heat of the action, have fired on the English,
and gone over to the enemy. Such a defection might well have produced
a general panic in a better army than that which was encamped under
Dundalk. It was necessary to be severe. Six of the conspirators were
hanged. Two hundred of their accomplices were sent in irons to England.
Even after this winnowing, the refugees were long regarded by the rest
of the army with unjust but not unnatural suspicion. During some
days indeed there was great reason to fear that the enemy would be
entertained with a bloody fight between the English soldiers and their
French allies, [444]

A few hours before the execution of the chief conspirators, a general
muster of the army was held; and it was observed that the ranks of the
English battalions looked thin. From the first day of the campaign,
there had been much sickness among the recruits: but it was not till
the time of the equinox that the mortality became alarming. The autumnal
rains of Ireland are usually heavy; and this year they were heavier
than usual. The whole country was deluged; and the Duke's camp became a
marsh. The Enniskillen men were seasoned to the climate. The Dutch were
accustomed to live in a country which, as a wit of that age said, draws
fifty feet of water. They kept their huts dry and clean; and they had
experienced and careful officers who did not suffer them to omit any
precaution. But the peasants of Yorkshire and Derbyshire had neither
constitutions prepared to resist the pernicious influence, nor skill
to protect themselves against it. The bad provisions furnished by the
Commissariat aggravated the maladies generated by the air. Remedies
were almost entirely wanting. The surgeons were few. The medicine chests
contained little more than lint and plaisters for wounds. The English
sickened and died by hundreds. Even those who were not smitten by the
pestilence were unnerved and dejected, and, instead of putting forth the
energy which is the heritage of our race, awaited their fate with the
helpless apathy of Asiatics. It was in vain that Schomberg tried to
teach them to improve their habitations, and to cover the wet earth on
which they lay with a thick carpet of fern