ghtly wounded. To the officers, who crowded round him with
congratulations, he replied, with one of those short and happy
speeches which tell upon an army more than the most labored harangues,
"With troops like you, gentlemen, a man ought to attack boldly, for he
is sure to conquer." The beaten army fell back behind the Neckar,
where they effected a junction with the troops of Brandenburg; but
they dared attempt nothing further, and left the Palatinate in the
quiet possession of Turenne. Under his eye, and, as it appears from
his own letters, at his express recommendation, as a matter of policy,
that wretched country was laid waste to a deplorable extent. This
transaction went far beyond the ordinary license of war, and excited
general indignation even in that unscrupulous age. It will ever be
remembered as a foul stain upon the character of the general who
executed, and of the king and minister who ordered or consented to it.

Having carried fire and sword through that part of the Palatinate
which lay upon the right or German bank of the Rhine, he crossed that
river. But the Imperial troops, reinforced by the Saxons and Hessians
to the amount of sixty thousand men, pressed him hard; and it seemed
impossible to keep the field against so great a disparity of force;
his own troops not amounting to more than twenty thousand. He
retreated into Lorraine, abandoning the fertile plains of Alsace to
the enemy, led his army behind the Vosges Mountains, and crossing them
by unfrequented routes, surprised the enemy at Colmar, beat him at
Mulhausen and Turkheim, and forced him to recross the Rhine. This is
esteemed the most brilliant of Turenne's campaigns, and it was
conceived and conducted with the greater boldness, being in opposition
to the orders of Louvois. "I know," he wrote to that minister, in
remonstrating, and indeed refusing to follow his directions, "I know
the strength of the Imperialists, their generals, and the country in
which we are. I take all upon myself, and charge myself with whatever
may occur."

Returning to Paris at the end of the campaign, his journey through
France resembled a triumphal progress; such was the popular enthusiasm
in his favor. Not less flattering was his reception by the king, whose
undeviating regard and confidence, undimmed by jealousy or envy, is
creditable alike to the monarch and to his faithful subject. At this
time Turenne, it is said, had serious thoughts of retiring to a
convent,