been equally active. On the
Lower Rhine a force was stationed to keep that of Cohorn in check.
Marshal Tallard, with 15,000 men, came down from the Upper Rhine to
interrupt the siege of Kaiserwerth, while the main army, 45,000
strong, under the Duke of Burgundy and Marshal Boufflers, was
posted in the Bishopric of Liege, resting on the tremendous chain
of fortresses of Flanders, all of which were in French possession,
and strongly garrisoned by French and Spanish soldiers.

At the time, however, when the vessel containing Rupert Holliday
and Hugh Parsons sailed up the Scheldt, early in the month of May,
these arrangements were not completed, but both armies were waiting
for the conflict.

The lads had little time for the examination of the Hague, now the
dullest and most quiet of European capitals, but then a bustling
city, full of life and energy; for, with the troops who had arrived
with them, they received orders to march at once to join the camp
formed at Breda. Accustomed to a quiet English country life, the
activity and bustle of camp life were at once astonishing and
delightful. The journey from the Hague had been a pleasant one.
Rupert rode one of the two horses with which the Earl of
Marlborough had presented him, Hugh the other; and as a portion of
the soldiers with them were infantry, the marches were short and
easy; while the stoppages at quaint Dutch villages, the solemn ways
of whose inhabitants, their huge breeches, and disgust at the
disturbance of their usual habits when the troops were quartered
upon them, were a source of great amusement to them.

Upon reaching the camp they soon found their way to their regiment.
Here Rupert presented to Colonel Forbes the letter of recommendation
with which the Earl of Marlborough had provided him, and was at once
introduced by him to his brother officers, most of them young men, but
all some years older than himself. His frank, pleasant, boyish manner
at once won for him a cordial acceptance, and the little cornet, as he
was called in the regiment, soon became a general favourite.

Hugh, who had formally enlisted in the regiment before leaving
England, was on arrival handed over to a sergeant; and the two lads
were, with other recruits, incessantly drilled from morning till
night, to render them efficient soldiers before the day of trial
arrived.

Rupert shared a tent with the other two officers of his troop,
Captain Lauriston, a quiet Scotchman, and Lieuten