A disorderly council was being held around Louis XV. With the fine judgment and sense which he often displayed when he took the trouble to have an opinion on his affairs, the king had been wise enough to encourage his troops by his presence without in any way interfering with the orders of Marshal Saxe. The Duke of Richelieu vented an opinion more worthy of the name he bore than had been his wont in his life of courtiership and debauchery. “Throw forward the artillery against the column,” he said, “and let the king’s household, with all the disposable regiments, attack them at the same time; they must be fallen upon like so many foragers.” The retreat of the Hollanders admitted of the movement; the small field-pieces, as yet dragged by hand, were pointed against the English column. Marshal Saxe, with difficulty keeping his seat upon his horse, galloped hastily up to the Irish brigade, commanding all the troops he met on the way to make no more false attacks, and to act in concert. All the forces of the French army burst simultaneously upon the English. The Irish regiments in the service of France, nearly all composed of Jacobite emigrants, fought with fury. Twice the brave enemy rallied, but the officers fell on all sides, the ranks were everywhere broken; at last they retired, without disorder, without enfeeblement, preserving, even in defeat, the honor of a vigorous resistance. The battle was gained at the moment when the most clear-sighted had considered it lost. Marshal Saxe had still strength left to make his way to the king. “I have lived long enough, sir,” he said, “now that I have seen your Majesty victorious. You now know on what the fortune of battles depends.” The victory of Fontenoy, like that of Denain, restored the courage and changed the situation of France. When the King of Prussia heard of his ally’s success, he exclaimed with a grin, “This is about as useful to us as a battle gained on the banks of the Scamander.” His selfish absorption in his personal and direct interests obscured the judgment of Frederick the Great. He, however, did justice to Marshal Saxe: “There was a discussion the other day as to what battle had reflected most honor on the general commanding,” he wrote, a long while after the battle of Fontenoy; “some suggested that of Almanza, others that of Turin; but I suggested--and everybody finally agreed that it was undoubtedly that in which the general had been at death’s door when it was delivered.” The fortress of Tournai surrendered on the 22d of May; the citadel capitulated on the 19th of June. Ghent, Bruges, Oudenarde, Dendermonde, Ostend, Nienport, yielded, one after another, to the French armies. In the month of February, 1746, Marshal Saxe terminated the campaign by taking Brussels. By the 1st of the previous September Louis XV. had returned in triumph to Paris. [Illustration: BRUSSELS----159]