goners drove off at full speed, and
never stopped till they were many miles from the field of battle.
Monmouth had hitherto done his part like a stout and able warrior. He
had been seen on foot, pike in hand, encouraging his infantry by voice
and by example. But he was too well acquainted with military affairs not
to know that all was over. His men had lost the advantage which surprise
and darkness had given them. They were deserted by the horse and by the
ammunition waggons. The King's forces were now united and in good order.
Feversham had been awakened by the firing, had got out of bed, had
adjusted his cravat, had looked at himself well in the glass, and had
come to see what his men were doing. Meanwhile, what was of much more
importance, Churchill had rapidly made an entirely new disposition of
the royal infantry. The day was about to break. The event of a conflict
on an open plain, by broad sunlight, could not be doubtful. Yet Monmouth
should have felt that it was not for him to fly, while thousands
whom affection for him had hurried to destruction were still fighting
manfully in his cause. But vain hopes and the intense love of life
prevailed. He saw that if he tarried the royal cavalry would soon
intercept his retreat. He mounted and rode from the field.

Yet his foot, though deserted, made a gallant stand. The Life Guards
attacked them on the right, the Blues on the left; but the Somersetshire
clowns, with their scythes and the butt ends of their muskets, faced
the royal horse like old soldiers. Oglethorpe made a vigorous attempt to
break them and was manfully repulsed. Sarsfield, a brave Irish officer,
whose name afterwards obtained a melancholy celebrity, charged on the
other flank. His men were beaten back. He was himself struck to the
ground, and lay for a time as one dead. But the struggle of the hardy
rustics could not last. Their powder and ball were spent. Cries were
heard of "Ammunition! For God's sake ammunition!" But no ammunition was
at hand. And now the King's artillery came up. It had been posted half
a mile off, on the high road from Weston Zoyland to Bridgewater. So
defective were then the appointments of an English army that there would
have been much difficulty in dragging the great guns to the place where
the battle was raging, had not the Bishop of Winchester offered
his coach horses and traces for the purpose. This interference of a
Christian prelate in a matter of blood has, with strange in