h he was out-numbered by the
French, was to secure posts and passes, with a view to retard their
progress, and employ detachments to harass and surprise their advanced
parties. In a few days after the action at Warbourg, general Luckner
repulsed a French detachment which had advanced as far as Eimbeck, and
surprised another at Nordheim. At the same period, colonel Donap, with
a body of the allied army, attacked a French corps of two thousand men,
posted in the wood of Sababourg, to preserve the communication between
their grand army and their troops on the other side of the Weser; and,
notwithstanding the strength of their situation, drove them from
their posts, with the loss of five hundred men, either killed or made
prisoners; but this advantage was overbalanced by the reduction of
Ziegenheim, garrisoned by seven hundred men of the allied army, who,
after a vigorous resistance, were obliged to surrender themselves
prisoners of war.

On the fifth day of August, prince Ferdinand, being encamped at Buhne,
received intelligence that a considerable body of the enemy, amounting
to upwards of twenty thousand men, were in motion to make a general
forage in the neighbourhood of Geismar. He passed the Dymel early in the
morning, with a body of troops and some artillery, and posted them in
such an advantageous manner, as to render the enemy's attempt totally
ineffectual, although the foragers were covered with great part of
their army. On the same morning, the hereditary prince set out on
an expedition to beat up the quarters of a French detachment. Being
informed that the volunteers of Clermont and Dauphine, to the number of
one thousand, horse and foot, were cantoned at Zierenberg, at a small
distance from the French camp at Dierenberg, and passed their time in
the most careless security, he advanced towards them from his camp at
Warbourg, within a league of their cantonment, without seeing any of
their posts, or meeting with any of their patrols, a circumstance that
encouraged him to beat up their quarters by surprise; for this service
he pitched upon five battalions, with a detachment of Highlanders, and
eight regiments of dragoons. Leaving their tents standing, they began
their march at eight in the evening, and passed the Dymel near Warbourg.
About a league on the other side of the Dymel, at the village of Witzen,
they were joined by the light troops under major Bulow; and now the
disposition was made both for entering the