Within two minutes the charge was general along the whole line. Yet it was as if advancing into semi-darkness of whirling snow and powder smoke. One survivor of the battle, a Highlander, said that after rushing forward the first glimpse he received of the Duke’s troops was, when the cloud of smoke and snow lifted, he saw the white gaiters of the soldiers. The Duke’s cannon, now loaded with grapeshot, and the musketry of his solid columns swept the field as with a hailstorm. The three ranks in the front line of English Hessians delivered simultaneous volleys, while the regiments of Wolfe--of whom we Americans have heard in his later career at Quebec--poured in a flank fire. Nevertheless, the right wing and centre of the Highlanders fought with even more than usual gallantry and resolution. Notwithstanding the fact that they were outflanked, enfiladed, and met by a heavy musketry fire in front of them, the right wing of the Highlanders broke Barrel’s regimental front and passed the guns; but their attack was checked by the bayonets of the second line. Of the Highlanders who first rushed forward the majority were hardly able to see their enemy for the smoke, until involved inextricably among their weapons. Tn their onset, nearly all in the front ranks fell before either bullets or the piercing weapons used obliquely, as directed by the Duke, almost every bayonet being bent or bloody with the strife. Nevertheless, the Highlanders, despite their impending annihilation, kept on, line after line pushing forward, even though only a few of those charging last reached the front files of the royal troops. In parts of the plain, the dead lay three and four deep. During all this time the Macdonalds, who, because their ancestors at Bannockburn had fought on the right wing, had ever afterwards, except on this occasion, occupied this position, would not fight. They made no onset, and even received the fire of the English regiments without flinching. They were dissatisfied because they had been put on the left wing. At last, when the moment of decision and defeat had come, there being no hope, they also fled with the other clans. Charles had yet in reserve his foreign troops, and these, after the mountaineers had been ruined, he hoped, as he looked on from the mound at some distance off, would redeem the day. But though there were instances of bravery among these men, yet, demoralized by the wreck of the clans coming as fugitives among them, and seeing the Duke’s army getting ready to charge with the cold steel, they fled in a body. Thus the rout was complete. Charles, who had made his last cast for a crown, seemed now unable to realize what had happened. Confounded, bewildered, and in tears, he seemed unable to act. His attendants were obliged to turn his horse’s head and compel him to retreat, Sullivan his friend seizing the horse’s bridle and dragging him away.