llemberg suffered death, and
O'Farrel was broke with infamy. The prince of Vaudemont sent a message
to the French general, demanding the garrisons of those two places,
according to a cartel which had been settled between the powers at war;
but no regard was paid to this remonstrance. Villeroy, after several
marches and countermarches, appeared before Brussels on the thirteenth
day of August, and sent a letter to the prince of Berghem, governor of
that city, importing that the king his master had ordered him to bombard
the town, by way of making reprisals for the damage done by the English
fleet to the maritime towns of France; he likewise desired to know in
what part the electress of Bavaria resided, that he might not fire
into that quarter. After this declaration, which was no more than an
unmeaning compliment, he began to bombard and cannonade the place with
red-hot bullets, which produced conflagrations in many different parts
of the city, and frightened the electress into a miscarriage. On the
fifteenth, the French discontinued their firing, and retired to Enghein.

During these transactions, the siege of Namur was prosecuted with great
ardour under the eye of the king of England; while the garrison defended
the place with equal spirit and perseverance. On the eighteenth day
of July, major-general Ramsay and lord Cutis, at the head of five
battalions, English, Scots, and Dutch, attacked the enemy's advanced
works on the right of the counterscarp. They were sustained by six
English battalions commanded by brigadier-general Fitzpatrick; while
eight foreign regiments, with nine thousand pioneers, advanced on the
left under major-general Salish. The assault was desperate and bloody,
the enemy maintaining their ground for two hours with undaunted courage;
but at last they were obliged to give way, and were pursued to the very
gates of the town, though not before they had killed or wounded twelve
hundred men of the confederate army. The king was so well pleased with
the behaviour of the British troops, that during the action he laid his
hand upon the shoulder of the elector of Bavaria, and exclaimed with
emotion, "See, my brave English." On the twenty-seventh the English and
Scots, lander Ramsay and Hamilton, assaulted the counterscarp, where
they met with prodigious opposition from the fire of the besieged.
Nevertheless, being sustained by the Dutch, they made a lodgement on the
foremost covered-way before the gate of St.